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China's Superior Technologies
paRcat writes "Still think China is a land too far away from everything? This article compares some of China's common uses of technology to what we're accustomed to in the West. With the genius traffic lights and the cell phone coverage... I'm kinda jealous."
If you consider the growth of infrastructure in China to the rate of upgrading in the west is it any wonder they are ahead?
They are clearly putting in far more effort than any western government to modernize their country.
A government for the people, what a novel thought.
A lot of these items were not technology related. Slipcovers for coats and purses @ resturants? Nice, but I'm not counting that as points to superior technology. Gotta admit that stoplight timer technology sounds good.
Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
In the Twin Cities.....
We have parking status as you enter downtown, accessible also via a web page. Traffic cameras blanket the freeway system, also via web page.
In St. Paul a lot of the traffic lights have countdown timers.
They are also close to have the debit cars for our new light rail line.
Just watch.
The USA refuses to adopt alternative fuels and prices are rising as fuel needs go up. Watch for china to lead the way in alternative fuel development and be the sole leader in the world. They need a cheap fuel soure to reach their goals of being a (or the) superpower.
Our dependency because we are lapdogs of Saudi Arabia is going to bite us in the ass. We will be the ones buying the technology from the Chinese.
Their image server still has some catching-up to do...
Hey, isn't the whole US economic-religion based on competition above all else? How come when you start losing you turn into communists?
I am very stunned, I've always considered moving to Asia, but whats always plagued me was the difference in idealogies considering privacy. Maybe if they get a constitution with a bill of rights.
then again, our countries going to h3ll lately, maybe in 10 years we'll be equal socially with Asia
I must say they have adopted better uses for the technology. Technology is supposed to make your life easier and that is somethign they are doing that western culture isn't.
China has something western society should model after. It kills me how often I hear, "We have always done it that way, why change"
Evolution or ID?
We're installing breakfast nooks and berber carpeting all on credit at 28% interest compounded daily! We have Disney trademark paint color choices at Home Repo! We're modern too!
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
I've known of one traffic death from a yellow before green in Europe way back. Giving someone a accurate way of determining when they can be moving the microsecond the light turns green is bad given that people have incoporated not just the delayed green but the delayed start after green in their calculations of how late they can run a red light.
Almost every developing nation has a higher rate of cell-phone coverage than the US (and many other "western" nations.)
The Bell System and the various state-owned monopolies built reliable, universal landline networks across these countries almost a century ago. Since the majority of the infrastructure has already been made and paid off decades ago, use of these networks today is commonplace (and very affordable.) The technology is often proven, well tested, and reliable (often regulated.) Cell phones, on the other hand, are more expensive and less reliable.
In developing nations, the landline systems are often unreliable and not much cheaper (if at all) than mobile systems. Users in these countries have every reason to invest in mobile phones. I wonder if this will continue to be the case with the deployment of VoIP systems.
I wish I lived in China for the neat cell phone coverage. As long as I didn't value my fucking freedom more than a flimflam trinket, that would be swell!
Let's all go to China! I love political repression and torture! Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
You know, this is really what we should be trying to do. Better living through technology. If the Chinese can do it, there's no reason why we can't too.
Isn't the grass always greener on the other side? I mean sure all of that is nice but what about the bad? I would think that's only fair after all.
And the existing infrastructure guys are right too.
Although not a technilogical breakthrough, I am super jealous that you can get pants hemmed in-store, in minutes. I am 5' 3" and I have to have all of my pants hemmed. I have a sewing machine, and can do this myslef, but I hate doing it. Either start doing this or I'm moving to China, Dammit!
...of the Yellow Dragon when it awakens" -Napoleon
:-)
I'd think it's time to say: "Good Morning, Yellow Dragon"
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Are they seeing the same ones that I saw when I was there? ;).
I was a bit disappointed with these ten points. I live in Sweden and compared to our standards this list isn't that impressive. Our mobilephones work everywhere and they cost you 10 cents to buy (honestly!). We have computer seating maps in the theaters and movie theaters. And parking signs contain the number of free spaces.
Sure, we don't have everything on the list though. I'd love to have those intelligent stop lights for instance.
I guess the bottom line is that Canada is pretty far behind.
It's interesting how pervasive cellphones have become in China and how they've displaced regular phone lines.
This trend is slowly evolving in North America (my room mate among many other people I know, have cell phones as their only means of personal phone communication) but I'm not certain if it will take root the same way it has with our Chinese neighbors, but it would be neat to see.
There are a lot of things that foster innovation. One of them is culture and China may have a problem here. Confucian ideals do not foster innovation and those ideals are quite common in China. It takes a long time for people to get that kind of thing out of their bones.
Right now, the US of A is the best environment in which to innovate. In fact it is our only advantage. If we manage to kill innovation, we are toast. DMCA, Patriot Act and software patents come to mind in this regard.
About Jan Wong: She used to write a column called 'Lunch With Jan'. She would interview people and then trash them in print. She could pick up on the slightest thing; anything the victim said or did could be twisted and used to mock them. Naturally, she ran out of people stupid or desperate enough to have lunch with her. She even trashed her own family; grandmother, aunts etc.
What about Western Europe? There is much more existing infrastructure in the Western European countries than in the U.S. However, they also seem to embrace technology faster than the U.S. I feel it is due to population density. The U.S. has a low population density. The denser the population the greater your market in a particular area. No surprise that technology hits those types of markets sooner than later.
so, we just need bin ladan and friends to bomb us to the stone age so we can get to upgrading everything.
i'm guessing in about 10-20 years we will be reading how advanced Iraq's tech is and be wondering why i still can't get [next great thing after DSL] in my area.
They have some cool ideas in China. The Styrofoam in the super markets might not work in the US because people might find it unsanitary. I like the traffic light idea and I've always thought about the system of identifying free parking spots every time I'm hunting for one in a large, crowded lot.
However, some of these seem great because they didn't have to replace old technology. They mentioned how landlines were never popular, so they went from no phones straight to cell phones. The US had to piggy back the new system on the old system.
So in 20 years, will they still be cutting edge, or will they be surpassed by other countries that either are just technologically developing or have been developed for a while and are "upgrading".
... you'll still be hungry again in half an hour! (Trolling off-topic, I know -- but it was worth it.)
Hey, isn't the whole US economic-religion based on competition above all else?
No. In each industry there are only a few companies. The economy is based on 40000% markups, a regular campaign of vigorous layoffs, and constant blatantly manipulative advertising.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
Another topic where half the posts will be comments that contain nothing but jingoism and nationalist comments rather than examine China's genuine potential for growth.
Remember people, this is the world's biggest nation (by population), with the real potential to be the world's biggest manufacturer and the world's biggest marketplace. And, remember, that that potential is starting to be realised: China already has a import surplus of billions with most Western countries, including the US, and China is now starting to become a real consumer culture in its own right.
They may have given everyone else a head-start but then so did Japan and Germany post-WWII, and look at how powerful their economies have become.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Don't admire countries that throw people in prison for simply disagreeing with the political system. If we were "at their level" about 48% of us would be in jail right now.
They're not just gadgets in testing, or used in a small part. They're rolled out everywhere, and span every corner of the country.
So when you consider that, it's the proliferation of these 'gadgets' that makes them superior- after all, technology is defined as "The application of science".
the UK's been around a bit longer than Boston and we manage to have DSL?
No its not, thats why there's so many Chinese!!
[/funny]
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
it is superior use of existing technology and better organization. Sadly we're far behind in many aspects. Hopefully we can catch up.
For instance, the traffic light is new. However, there version could be viewed as an improvement. BUT, they had something to build on. I'm sure that in other countries, different and better (than what those countries currently use) traffic lights have been invented. But, there is a standard already in place - one that must be changed slowly due to it's nature.
This is not to say China does not have better tech, just wondering what the impact is of having a different starting point, etc.
A lot of smaller countries tend to have population densities that are noticeably highter than in the US. The higher density makes new technologies (like wireless) easier to deploy because more people can take advantage of the service, distributing the overhead cost over a greater number of people. The following list was copied from here.
Population density of the continents:
* North America - 32 people/mi2
* South America - 73 people/mi2
* Europe - 134 people/mi2
* Asia - 203 people/mi2
* Africa - 65 people/mi2
* Australia and Oceania - 9 people/mi2
Countries with large surface areas like the US also tend to have population hotspots (like New York and Los Angeles) mixed with relatively low-pop-density areas like Nebraska and Montana.
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
You can't drink the water from the tap
Hocking loogies in public seems to be a national pastime
Air pollution so bad that on some days it looks foggy
Diseases like malaria and dengue fever (more a 3rd world than 1st world problem)
China may have cool tech, but the basic infrastructure sucks.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Everyone commenting seems to be all hyped up at the technology. Remember, China's one of the poorest, most overpopulated countries on this Earth in per capita terms. The elite, Party members, and other favored citizens may have access to all this wonderful stuff, but with an average GDP per capita below 5000 USD (as compared to about 38000 USD in the US) the vast majority -- if not most -- of the country has no access to any of the "technology" mentioned.
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
Large portions of Western Europe were bombed to the stone age during WWII and have been able to build more modern cities from scratch. Look at the urban sprawl and some suburban communities around the US and you'll find the same phenomenon. The US has cities that date back to the original colonies and their infrastructure is just about as old. Add that to the fact that we have laws which protect history to the detriment of progress in some cases. Mix in the problem that we are, as should have been quite evident in this last election, a Federal Republic (basically we're a loosely knit group of 50 countries known as states) and Federal laws are limited due to State's Rights which data back as old as the infrastructure and cities that can't be updated due to historical relevance and you have one big catch-22 that makes progress difficult.
We have most of that, with the exception of the stoplights with countdowns.
Most large theatres today, whether live or movie, offer online and in person sales with displays of seat availability.
Most traffic lights in the "almost large" cities that are below the fold of Chicago, LA, and NY, have timers on the crosswalks that effectivily give you the countdowns to a red or green light.
Tailors (which doesn't exactly count as tech, unless it's 1750) are available at just about every large, expensive retailer at your local mall.
All the examples he sites seem to be more a criticism of Canada than a boost to China. Then again, I live in the US, i can't speak for Canada.
The only ubiquitous use of tech that China has that is effectivly used (and not for show like the flat screens throughout Shanghai and the tech areas of Beijing) is cell usage. This was out of necessity, and I wish we had the same coverage and plans. However, I can get a land line with no problems, just about anywhere in the US. Slightly more troublesome in most of China outside the large pop centers.
(not a slam against China, just don't like seeing the status quo bumped up to hero status just because there's a flat screen involved)
Between this and the shortage of strippers, er er er exotic dancers, I don't know how you get by.
In China, the bicycles have bells.
I don't know about Canada, but in most of USA the a$$hole cyclists will speed by a pedestrians shoulder either with no warning or a shout of 'on your left' at the same instant he makes his startling appearance. Good thing they wait till the last moment too. Because fully 20+% of them don't know which side is left!
Solutions such as theft resistant covers for restautant patrons say a lot...
As for the poor Canadians. In the USA...
1)Cellphone ubiquity rivals China.
2)Stoplights give warning but only to the clever.
(hint, watch the walk signal)
3)Taxi's take charge cards, busses and trains take debit cards.
4)No free exercise machines, but planty of parks, jogging trails, and those exercise stations wit chinup bars, etc.
5)Anti-theft slip covers. There is generally no need. Some restaurants do have hooks for bags under the table. Others have plenty of chewing gm to stick your bag to. Seriously, there's no need to worry for your items, if checked.
6)Daily banking? 7/24 by machine, internet, or telephone.
7)Some of the restaurants I patronize offer these. It's pretty neat. Others have such attentive waiters that there is no need for bells. Others actually have hand operated bells.
8)parking data? "lot full" is pretty damn clear and on busy days the competing lots generally have a guy screaming, "park here".
9)Computer seating maps? These are not 'new'. Heck, ticketron and local symphony hall have them for a decade and tickets may be pruchased on line. Even the airlines have seating maps!
10)Free hemming. I have yet to purchase trousers that did not include any required alteration. Sure, sometimes they want $5 or $10 but I've yet to see this charge dropped when I reply with, "If you are going to charge, I'll just purchase my trousers at
Poor Canadians
I smile because it is much easier to find fresh beaver up your way...
Now I'm the grandest Tiger in the Jungle!
I'll take my basic freedoms and liberty any day over technology.
Seriously. Don't you think there's a cost to all this? Do you really think a republic like the US could do something like this?
The fact is -- it would be easier for us to modernize Iraq than it would be to modernize the US. Authoritarian control makes everything a ton easier for the government at the expense of the people.
Pick your poison.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
I was in China earlier this summer and despite their "genius traffic lights" and cellphone coverage, you can still walk behind the internet bars and savvy shopping marts and find dirt roads, people living on other's garbage and sewage in the streets.
The modernization of Chinese technology is less important than the quality of life of its people. In my opinion, they need to focus less on getting every single person in their country internet and more on getting every single person in their country fed and clean.
They have parking lot displays all over. Toronto's new airport parking structure has them, they've had it in Copenhagen for a while now.
10. Free hemming This doesn't count as cheap labour because only three people service an entire department store. Hm. So all a US Department store would need to do is hire 3 people (US$32,760 salary, plus FICA, etc) per location from the profit on pants....
Tokyo, Nagoya, Kobe, Osaka, Yokohama...all bombed pretty well flat.
Am I the only one to notice the name of the compiler is Jan Wong? By no means I discredit the article completely, but, add salt to your taste ;)
Lamers.
The important part is that China has cellphones with out 2 year plans, credit hassles, or idiot vendors.
The man got 2 pairs of pants, measured, trimmed, hemmed and pressed in under 3 minutes.
Signs tell drivers which lots HAVE open spaces and how many are left.
Its not technology, its SERVICE.
How hard is it to put a call button on a restuarant table?
They Live, We Sleep
I thought they rode yaks. You know the RCMYM.
Its always amazing how awe-struck north americans are by mobile phone technology in other countries.
OK- here's the skinny: You yanks have got a looong way to go with your mobile network. It is inferior to most of the rest of the world by any measure you care to apply (cost, coverage, cool sms services and payment systems).
So please, lets stop gaping in amazment at the technology available in supposedly "backwards" countries- its old news for those of us that actually live there.
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
No. In each industry there are only a few companies. The economy is based on 40000% markups, a regular campaign of vigorous layoffs, and constant blatantly manipulative advertising.
Don't give away those last few trade secrets we still have!
Yeah, but it's not as easy to get Chinese food...
Who moderates this stuff? China and Europe have personal residences and restaraunts older than your counry. Boston's a swaddling baby compared to them.
we are free to make mistakes and that is more important that having all the technology in the world. I would rather have Freedom of speech than a fancy parking monitor.
I like the part about free hemming. It beats me why stores in the United States do not offer free length alterations when you buy a pair of pants. Since I am not too tall, it is almost impossible for me to find jeans that fit my length - chopping off a couple of inches would make all the difference. In India where I now buy all my jeans, the alteration comes free with the jeans - out here, the stores do not even know where I could get that done... a blank stare is all I get when I ask them about suggesting a place where I can get the length altered.
:-)
Now I just tear off the end of the jeans and walk hippie style.
"When the only tool you own is a hammer, every problem begins to resemble a nail." - Abraham Maslow (1908-1970)
This is true. But keep in mind that a lot of Western Europe (Germany especially) got reduced to rubble during WWII, everything had to be rebuilt from the ground-up. In Eastern Germany especially, they're still repairing damage from 1945, so it would make sense that as long as you're rebuilding the telephone system, that you might as well rebuild it with the latest hardware.
OK, first of all, much of this is cultural
Second, this is "new development"
Third, this is not pervasive. This is like talking about new services in some of the biggest coastal cities (the gold coast).
Having lived in Asia, I found myself saying "Hmm, I've seen a lot of this before elsewhere".
I would break the article down into these areas:
Parts 1 (Cell phones), 7 (Wireless service bells), 8 (Parking data)
These are new developments, allowed by the jump allowed by not having an infrastructure. They are being done elsewhere, but it's a "wow, we hopped by the stuff over there"
Parts 2, 3, 9, 10
These I know I have seen in Hong Kong and Singapore, to name some places. They styles may be new, but timed lights are nothing, really.
Seating in Asian theaters has often been by row and seat number, and I have used touch screen theater seating (even self serve) way back in 1998 in Singapore.
Parts 4 5
These are cultural. Shoot, there's a park near my house that has exercise path. That's not so uncommon. As for a place for people to congregate, that's also because there's not a lot of privacy living in a multigenerational house.
Anti-theft slipcovers. Nice touch, but cultural and talks about the problems due to the range of incomes there.
All and all, this smells like someone who is either bragging or suffering some "culture shock" that China isn't the backward place so often projected in the west.
-
China is a huge threat in the region. China is best understood as a society with deadly, ultra-modern weapons coupled with a barbaric, medieval mindset. It is an ogre in the 21st century.
Actually the same could be said of the US, a lot of our foriegn policies of late have been decidely midieval, notably the "you're with us or you're against us" black and white take on things. Not to say China's not a potential problem, but this is not sound reasoning as to why it's a problem.-
The Chinese routinely rape and kill Tibetan nuns and children. The Chinese routinely abort female fetuses, producing a skewed ratio of male babies to female babies. There is currently a deficit of about 15% (!) in the female baby population.
I'll decline to comment on the Tibetian bit except to point out the link you provide is decidely not an impartial one. They may be 100% accurate, but they have a vested interest in taking the Tibetian's side so it's hard to tell.As far as the female babies being aborted, yes it happens, but it's not a government policy. It's a side-effect of the one child, one family policy and traditions. Many Chinese feel they must have a male child to support them when they're elderly so they will have female babies aborted. Actually I'm not entirely sure the process is legal. Given the government's nationalistic leanings, I suspect that something will be done about this, they won't want to rely on Chinese marrying women of other ancestries in order to reproduce.
Well, completely wrong is perhaps a bit harsh: ownership of mobile phones is lower in the US than it is in many developing world nations, precisely because a mobile phone is preferable to landline for the reasons that you give but you miss the point that the ownership of mobile phones is far lower in the US than most other developed world nations too.
And it's not all about natural geography or lack of an existing landline infrastructure: mobile phone usage in Scandinavian countries such as Finland and Sweden is fantastic. In fact, if I remember correctly, in Finland over 90 percent of the people have a mobile phone.
As for mobile phones being expensive, well, that's free market capitalism working for you. In Britain, where caller party pays like almost everywhere else (ie, if you call me then you foot the bill and it doesn't cost me a thing), I have a pay as you go mobile phone that cost me £35 (~$75) to buy, and which costs me pennies a day to use and with no contract whatsoever. And it's as reliable as anything else, plus it's portable. (Of course, if I wanted to use my mobile phone more extensively, then I have a range of options available to me from the various UK operators.)
From the anecdotal evidence that keeps cropping up on Slashdot and elsewhere, it very much seems to me that mobile phone ownership being synonymous with costing heaven and earth is an American phenomenon.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Japan was not bombed flat btw.
Joking, surely. The US firebombed Japan severely in WWII, destroying some cities completely and killing every single human in those cities. Dozens and dozens of cities were targeted, with destruction rates of 30-100%.
www.kitchengeek.com -- Nosh for
And we happily sell these concepts to every developed/developing/under developed nation whose salivating industries emulate and tailor them for regional needs.
Thanks for the false dilemma. Either we accept corporate hegemony and end-times theocracy or we accept godless Communism? How about freedom, which resembles neither?
While existing infrastructe surely matters, it does not matter significantly in terms of such things as the nearly ubiquitous cell phone coverage in China. In this country, I will lose a signal on the fringes of major metropolitan areas (I live in New York City). But when I was in China, I too was impressed by the efficiency and ubiquity of the cell phone network. For the US to have a comparable network would not involve rebuilding the current cell phone infrastructure, rather it would require an upgrade to the current infrastructure. The difference between the US and much the rest of the developed world and a few developing countries like China is that these other countries invest much more heavily in the public infrastructure than the US. By any account, especially for a country as wealthy as the US, the public infrastructure in this country is poor and greatly underfunded.
Been in Beijing and Tianjin and Xi'an. I love the traffic lights. The moving bar style are great but I would be concerned about anyone who might be color blind (the red and green occupy the same bar space so you can't judge by "what's on top"). And you very rarely see any accidents, even where four lane roads intersect WITHOUT lights, even densely packed with traffic. There's a difference in attitude on the roads, too. Everyone keeps moving. Horns are not an act of agression, as they are here in the US. Horns are an audio location system, like bats. Toot, toot, I'm here. Toot, toot, in your blind spot. Toot toot, clear to move... Beat's the hell out of the road rage'n rednecks on the loose on our highways.
Yet another societal difference that drives a ot of these "innovatins" is top down government central control. The Chinese have the ability to say "You will!". Where in the US there is a lot more "Will you?". (political rhetoric aside) This allows for a much less decentralized and chaotic implementation of a lot of initiatives.. like cell phones. Who owns thier network? Gov't. Who controls all the phones? Gov't Who says you can't call the anti-party groups? Gov't. Socialistic values do some things very well in this manner... and yet they can't breathe and drink the water because of the same system.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
If you protest the government, they imprison you, or just gun you down on the spot, free! No more paying for Dr. Kevorkian's euthanasia services. Yeah!
A modern day witchhunt.
Cheap labor makes it cost-effective to do all these wonderful things, which all boil down to nothing more than convenience. Things were similar during the turn of the last century, when children worked in factories and even middle class families had servants. Perhaps this is China's "gilded age".
Proverbs 21:19
It seems like people just are not aware that you can go to pretty much any clothing store and ask for your clothes to be tailored for free.
Yes, free. If you are paying then you are a sucker. Demand that the clothing you buy fits. Why else are you buying it? Go to a different store and ask up front if they offer free tailoring, if not tell them thanks but no thanks and see how quickly they will point you in the direction of their free tailoring service.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
yes, that was intended entirely as a joke. i hope my neighbors to the north can forgive me.
Mod parent up!
The Philosophy of Liberty | lewrockwell.com
...if they have reservation touch screens for their Falon Gong Reeducation Centers? Can I denounce someone to the secret police by reporting their reactionary bourgeois activities with a camera cell phone?
What about coffins and death beds? If I want to die in China of some easily preventable disease, black lung, or speaking my mind, can I reserve my place a head of time with a cell phone?
I got a package of PC speakers designed for Dell LCD displays which origininated in China. The cardboard speaker boxes were bound together with something that resembled a 3 foot long strip of papyrus with a papyrus bow on top. I was able to remove all the speaker boxes from the larger shipping box easily by lifting from the bow, as the papyrus-like material was very strong. It made me think about the plastic that they could have used but didn't. I was impressed.
The People's Republic of China is run by one of the most corrupt regimes on the planet.
They use torture, rape, and intimidation on a massive, systemic scale.
They are introducing capitalism, but not human rights. The economy is still largely managed top-down.
Saying they are upgrading faster than Western countries is like saying you want to go to Antarctica because it's springtime there, and you like warm weather.
sigs, as if you care.
On the other hand, it could be the best thing that ever happened to china... let's hope they don't notice, because the interbreeding could be seriously good for them.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Is that different enough for you?
Drill baby drill - on Mars
There are many 1000 years old streets in China.
There is a spark in every single flame bait point.
It is always easier to implement something new and fresh than have to have a transparent upgrade. The US implemented traffic signals long ago and is now straddled with that system.
See the power grid and telephone system for other examples.
Please, please, please RTFA you ignorant yank!
They have are more sophisticated comunication network that you. That is the point of this thread. Now go and read the article, shoo, shoo go on, shoooo
In most European countries, TV ratings are measured using a set-top box, which determines what is being viewed second-by-second. The measurements are downloaded by modem and TV ratings are available for a program the morning after the broadcast. Urban China likewise. And Romania. And Uzbekistan.
But in the US, TV ratings rely on people filling in diaries once a month, to a precision of 15 minutes.
Yes, the country in the world most associated with capitalism and TV advertising has the most primitive system for TV ratings.
The reason? In the US, TV ratings are measured by a company that has an effective monopoly, which uses patents to prevent competition.
Ne mæg werig mod wyrde wiðstondan, ne se hreo hyge helpe gefremman.
To be exact, he said : "Quand la Chine s'éveillera, le monde tremblera", which translates into : "when Chine will awake, the world will tremble".
Our North American infrastructure is very outdated and we are constatly running into problems with it... this article is probably writen from a skewed perspective, but anyone who has payed any attention to the technological advances that China has been doing could say this was a long time comming and will only continue to happen at an ever quickening pace. It might turn out good for us over here.... or it might cause a sort of hyperinflation in our dollars as the yuan is worth 6.87 to 1 Canadian (8.28 to 1 American) and the Hong Kong buck is 7.78 to 1 USD or 6.45 to one Loonie (www.xe.com.)
The only current setback I see for China, Beijing in particular, is air pollution. Although I'm sure they'll have a way to clean it all figured out and implemented well before the Olympics in 4 years if they want the athletes to be able to breathe normally when they are competing. And I'm sure the 20 new Candu reactors that we (Canada) are supplying them will help to combat that instead of burning coal like the places they are replacing.
Now, dont get me wrong, I'm not saying that their current political system is good... its not. Its horrid in the fact corruption is running un-checked through it (ever heard of Payola? Government officials expect it). Its just, with an ever modernizing infrastructure they are going to quickly become a world super power with the ability to use national economies as a weapon against whomever they want (go check and see what you have thats made in china lol). Although, all this assuming and all the articles out could be pre-emptive and their economy and infrastructure could fall flat on its face.... but its intersting nonetheless.
And yet, somehow, life in the old USA goes on.
--- Ban humanity.
You've also got about 3,000,000 people in London vs 590,000 in Boston to spread the cost of upgrading to. How much of the UK's infrastructre was rebuilt after the bombings 1940's?
I have been to Chain. Shanghai to be specific. What awe inspiring technology I saw. A sewage system that was obviously not functioning great. Water that you could not drink. Traffic which was...unbeleivably bad. People living on sidewalks. Oh yeah. nice technology. I've seen far superior technology in both Canada and the US. Its easy to find 10 things better - but honestly this guy had to reach.
I grew up in the Southern United States. We didn't have much down here until after the 50's. I fail to see your point. European countries are the size of our States. Then why aren't the Southern Cities just as wired tech wise. Having lived in Europe I can tell you that I have seen technology just emerging in the US that was available 3-4 years ago in Europe.
You don't even have to travel as far as China to see some of these 'differences' Western Europe supports a lot of things we here in the northern US long for or only dream of. The road side parking information was installed in 1999 in the Netherlands, the same year that cell-phones became the biggest fad. They even had a massive game being played on cell-phones, where a user would sign up, get a cryptic direction every week and whoever followed the directions closest (throughout the entire country) found the location of a prize. The rest of the items are sometimes small, courteous things, that we just don't think of, or our culture is not used to, like the hooks under the tables. Which, once again, in Europe they use in bars, for your coat, so you don't have to wrinkle your jacket by sitting ontop of it on the barstool.
Jan Wong rocks! "Lunch with..." used to be my favourite feature in the Globe, her catty comments were priceless!
You would have freaked at last Saturday's Globe, where this piece originated, because the whole edition was on China, with several articles by JW. This particular article was a fluff piece tucked in a corner, but the rest of the edition was quite insightful.
As for Jan being a "bit" of a communist sympathiser - you should check out _Red China Blues_ sometime. It's her very-readable account of how she left Canada as an impressionable little proto-Maoist university student to study in Beijing, her subsequent disillusionment during the Cultural Revolution, and her return to China during the late 1980s, where she wound up reporting on the events in Tiananmen Square. Good stuff...
Nice to see the EU is pushing back the boundaries of grand unified theories of which sitcom or reality show is the the most popular. I'll bet CERN is involved with those high precision set-top timewasting detecto-widgets, eh? Hey, maybe the ESA can stop that useless science exploration and launch a quantum satellite that will link every teevee together in the EU and provide INSTANT FEEDBACK as to how many people are watching the World Wrestling Federation on TNT-Europe before the show actually airs! Now that's progress, people!
--- Ban humanity.
Hmmmm
I was underwhelmed.
While I like the idea of a transit debt card. Don't you just KNOW that if that were implemented nationwide by any North American government there would be outrage from "privacy" advocates. The Washington DC system is in fact going to something like this, using a single debit card. Having the technology to do something (which we do in this case) doesn't necessarily make it an idea worth throwing everything else out for...
China isn't the first to bypass land line phones for cell phones. Countries in Africa have been doing it for years. If you don't have trenches dug all over your country for telephone wires, a nationwide cellular system makes a lot of sense. On the other hand if you dug your trenches in the 50's why not use them? You are not going to implement broadband Internet, cable TV , especially movies on-demand over a cellular phone system. China, African countries, and others when they have such services will dig holes and run wires, probably fiber-optic ones at which point wired phones in the home (probably VOIP-like) will make perfect sense. We'll end up there too. In our case we have to get to the point of justifying the replacement of something that "just works" whereas countries running "behind" us will be adding a new service and doing it a better way from the beginning. Being in the forefront is not the most cost-effective way to use technology. That rule applies to countries just as it does in our personal lives.
The other advantage China, Japan and Eastern Europe have is a good school system.
You would be hard pressed to find a Japanese or Chinese adult who was ignorant enough to consider Japan "untouched" by WW2 strategic bombing.
One of the dilemmas that US planners encountered when picking nuclear targets was: "Who should be bomb?" Not much was left by August 1945.
The jet stream over Japan makes high altitude precision (by WW2 standards) bombing next to impossible. Not to be deterred, however, the US Army Air Force essentially gutted Japanese urban areas by dropping white phosphorous, aviation fuel and firebombs on Japanese cites, which consisted of mostly wood buildings.
The resulting firestorms killed millions. The B-29 raids over Tokyo produced a column of flame nearly 20,000 feet high... the glow could be seen from Iwo Jima nearly 600 miles away.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Large Portions of the U.S were not even developed until after the 1950's. Very few U.S cities date back 300 years. Europe is full of old cities. Europe also has laws which protect their history. In America we have "Historic" buildings that were built 50 years ago. Europe goes through the same struggles as the US when it comes to historic buildings. Even more so since their structures have more history and in some cases could have been owned by a family for several generations. Yes the U.S has reminence of a Republic. 100 years ago the U.S. was refered to as a Republic not a Democracy. However, our Republic is much more tightly knit than the EU. Try living outside of the U.S with non Americans and you will see that every Country has similar problems and struggles.
i'm kinda jealous
Reminds me of people who say they would have liked to live in the dark ages with the famous artists and musicians, great castles and famous writers.
My response was always that you'd most likely be a peasant or slave considering there wasn't much, if any middle class.
Shit better not happen!
From the article:
"Yet who would have thought that, after a millennium of poverty, they'd already do so many things better than we?"
A millenium? Maybe a century at worst. Historically, China has always been at the fore front of technology, power, and culture. The last few centuries, especially the 20th, was more of an exception than the rule. Three centuries of being behind might seem pretty bad but when you consider that the Chinese civilization has been around for 3,000 years, that's not too bad.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
Can you hear me now ?
When you actually read the article, it's quickly apparent that it compares China to Canada and not "the west". While Canada is indeed in the west, only Canadians would include "free hemming of pants" in a list of top 10 technologies. And of course the fact that you actually care that China is better in the hemming department...boy what will the Chinese think of next!
I hope that it does not take the U.S. too long to catch up to China. The Metro Card in NY is pretty close to the Debit card for public transit in China, but you still have to stand in line to get the Metro Card.
Don't know about you, but I would reather have our freedom them a better light or cell phone coverage.
> Large portions of Western Europe were bombed
> to the stone age during WWII
Mostly correct. Germany was (rightfully) hit most far and away.
> and have been able to build more modern
> cities from scratch.
Wrong. Look at a map af nearly any city in Germany: you will find basically the same layout as hundreds of years before (sometimes up to two milleniums back to the Romans).
> The US has cities that date back to the
> original colonies and their infrastructure
> is just about as old.
So what? Conclusions?
In most parts of Europe most parts of the infrastructure is older.
> Mix in the problem that we are, as a Federal
> Republic and Federal laws are limited due to
> State's Rights
Once more - conclusions? Germany is a federal state too (as opposed eg. to highly centralized France).
> you have one big catch-22 that makes
> progress difficult.
As demonstrated obviously wrong.
Cellphone ubiquity rivals China.
It could be true in big cities (5mln+), but it is not so in general. Do you people hike at all?
Daily banking? 7/24 by machine, internet, or telephone.
Same is true for most of western countries, Japan and China, but it can't rival with open branches on weekends. Didn't you notice the long lines?
No free exercise machines, but planty of parks, jogging trails, and those exercise stations wit chinup bars, etc.
So? Are you claiming that Canada or China lack parks?
I have yet to purchase trousers that did not include any required alteration.
Apparently you are of very common size. Have you ever shopped for a petite size? Those 0-1 size or XS or petite are for some reason long enough for a 6'2'' person.
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
Unfortunately, the article isn't available under their free registration process, and I'm too cheap to pay for an online paper when there's so much available for free.
Moreover, the web-posting of this article is clearly in violation of the Terms of the Globe and Mail site.
As we trust copyright laws to preserve the freedom of open-source software and the like, so should we respect copyright when the copyright holder doesn't wish to be so open. I think this story should be closed and removed.
Ah, well, at least their situation is improving.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Where are you from?
I only hear "hocking loogies" around here... (Western NY State)
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Nobody ought to be surprised by this. China is a first world country. The US is rapidly becoming a third world country.
Wansu, th' chinese sailor
China is aware of the problems with oil + coal, and one of them being that oil leads to dependence on other countries. China also has a accelerating power requirement, so what is the solution? Burn more coal? (A side note: there are huge natural underground coal-burning going on in China, and afaik they contribute more to global warming than any non-natural coal burning in china).
:). (on a side note, the newly elected President of China is a former engineer).
Well, currently they are starting up 2 new nuclear reactors every year and 30 new nuclear reactors are planned until 2020. They are also planning to massproduce a new kind of safer reactors - pebble bed reactors (see this article for more information about this development). The pebble bed reactor in question is designed in china, with focus on safety and cheap mass production, and can be said to be an "chinese innovation". In the article they are talking about the chinese leadership planning 300 GW of nuclear reactors until 2050, amongst others for generating hydrogen for future hydrogen powered cars. (300 GW requires more than a thousand of these 200 MW pebble bed reactors!
SO am pretty confident that china will use innovation and in the future beat us all..
Even the Kip that I live in (Ireland) has got some of that stuff: Good cellphone coverage (well dear tho there is pay as u go), informative traffic-lights (in Dublin anyway), Parking data (Dublin again), and erm, that's about it then. DSL and anything telecom related's feckin dear though - twice the price (at least) of Northern Ireland. and groceries. And going out for a few pints. Actually feck it. Its just a kip.
"... always going forward 'cause we cant find reverse! "
Just you wait, the Bush's mandate given to him by his 3% victory, I bet you will see government support for some such "ministry".
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
I seriously thought that China's well developed firewall technology would have made top ten easily.
Hmm, a very interesting article. However, I've come away with two questions: 1) Where is all the money for this coming from? Socialist or not you can't just go from 3rd world to hightech overnight. 2) How wide spread are most of these technologies? There weren't any details given as to what % of the chinese population ever actually gets to see these technologies. No matter how fast China is growing there is no way that anyone can honestly believe that these technologies are widespread throughout the country. If these techs are available to as few people as some of you say then unfortunately the article is somewhat less impressive. Yes they've come up with some great ways to use tech (I'd love to have some of those traffic lights that count down, etc.) but it doesn't really indicate how China as a whole is evolving. For example, if someone were to come to America and to my university they may think that every University in America has fiber Gb to every computer on campus, 802.11g covers the whole campus and part of the city, online registration, people riding Segways, etc. When in reality we've just blown all our cash on such things rather than good professors :-)
You don't have full-service stations in the States? How strange! Here in Canada, there are self-serves and full-serves almost everywhere. You have a choice: the full-serves are about a couple cents per litre more expensive, but of course you get the service.
I worked at a full-service station for two months this summer. Here's how I served people:
Vehicle pulls up; driver rolls down window.
RAFE: Good morning!
CUSTOMER: Hi, twenty bucks regular please.
RAFE: Twenty regular. How's everything under the hood?
CUSTOMER: Just fine.
RAFE: Okay.
I preset pump to $20 and start it, then squeegee the windshield. If there are a lot of bug guts, I spray the windshield with a citrus solution first to loosen the guts. If there is time after the windshield, I squeegee the back window too. When the pump goes off I hang it up, then go to the customer.
RAFE: That'll be twenty dollars.
Customer hands me a credit card. I go into the store, hand the card to the guy at the till and tell him what pump it's from. He performs the transaction and I clip the card and receipts to the little clipboard. I go out to the vehicle. The customer signs our receipt and takes his own and the card.
RAFE: Have a good day!
First, please note the author is Chinese. Jan, I guess is Janet, a female, very concerned with purses. I agree, China treats its visitors well. Funny, though, they asked me why I was leaving. Fortunately "work ended" is a valid reason.
Agreed, GSM cellular is far, FAR cheaper call for call than landline. It __WONT__ give you 10Mbit/s Internet though, something to think about. GSM service in Canada is quite impressive, possibly rivaling Europe. I had continueous service between Toronto and Montreal last summer.
Germany is quite ahead on the informative stoplights. They don't do it here (in Holland) because of the fear of drag racing.
Transit debit cards -- YES. Even got Europe on that one! I loved the Hong Kong system with the contactloos card system. You could brush against the sensor and not even take out your wallet. We better get that in Europe soon! Canada should consider also.
We have plenty adult playgrounds in Europe. Everybody in Europe is jealous of Canada for its great outdoors. Who needs 'adult playgrounds' when most of your country is one?
Anti-theft devices? Europe is quite good with public safety as well as Canada. Every place has another method. I'd suggest Jan (and anybody) to stay out of the USA however.
Wireless gizmos? Well anything you want! That's my claim to fame.
Parking data. Universal in Europe. Also I noticed it was all over Toronto. Janet, where are you from?
Computer seating? Even lame Windows can do that. Get real!
Oops. "Free" hemming. Jan, didn't you say at the start that you weren't going to mention the things cheap labour brings?
I am very happy I'm free to live in either Europe or Canada! The news is absolute DIRT in China. It is obviously not a free place. These are little things that mean alot to Europeans and Canadians!
Why am I wasting my time with this?
My wife and I were in China last month to adopt our daughter. We were in Beijing for three days and Guangzhou (the fifth largest city in China) for seven - so both are big cities. I was amazed at two aspects of technology in each place: * Cell phone coverage is AMAZING. We had a cell phone and no matter where we went, even if it was the bowels of the hotel we were in, we never had less than full tower coverage. There was a telecom engineer traveling with us and he commented on the sheer number of cell phone transmitters, seemingly everywhere in Guangzhou, even the desperately poverty-stricken areas. * Computer access in general, and internet connections in particular, were at best average and were usually terrible. We hunted all over Guangzhou for a decently-fast broadband connection for sending digital photos back home and the fastest we found (at Blenz Coffeehouse on Shamian Island) was about the speed of the old Earthlink dialup we had 3 years ago. And despite the number of westerners in Guangzhou who are there to process their adoption of Chinese children, internet connections are few and far between - most are in the back rooms of shady-looking tourist shops and consist of circa-1995 pentiums with lots of duct tape. Our theory was that the cell phone was the only way that the Chinese could acquire personal space; which would explain why the cell phone is really a way of life in China from what we could tell.
aka Jan Wong. I really love her reporting style. I've written quite a few papers in school based heavily on her excellent coverage on issues within China. It is nice to see however that she's reporting a somewhat positive message on China, so much of it had been depressing in previous years. I don't think I was the only one to be shocked that Beijing is hosting the Olympics in the near future. Things seem to be slowly turning around for the better. In the words of my college bretherin, I say Giver' China!
-- Bored? Check out my Portfolio
That's not entirely it, sir.
As much as you might not like it, authoritarian governments basically without budgets to balance can (not that they always do) do a few things very well, and infrastructure is one of them. I live in Romania, the former charge of one of the most insane leaders in history, and although things mostly went to hell, there are a few truly excellent byproducts. For one, there is a wonderfully-functioning cheap subway (not as extensive as one would like, but in the '70s when it was built, it was top-notch) with armed guards in every few cars. Totally automated at around $0.10/ride. An increasing number of traffic lights have the countdown technology, many of which were installed under Ceausescu. Schools function wonderfully (nice buildings) with built-in incentives (each child gets 210 000 lei per month as motivation to attend), universities are plentiful and cheap for Romanians.
So yes, things did go to hell. But Communism also brought some good. Not all innovation is due to the fact that people had to start at zero - some is actually due to those whom we credit with completely ruining things.
Trust me - the german trains do not run on time... I mean, ok, if one said an average delay of 15 minutes is on time, then probably...
Our country is so arrogant to acknowledge that we are the infant in the world and we reinvent and claim the technology that's invented by other nations all the time (90% of the scientist in the US are not born US citizen), to say that any other nation are just reinventing the technology in US is like saying Bill Gates invented GUI OS. Until we realize this and put down our ego, we will continue to slow down in advance as a nation.
Wow... the department stores hem your pants for FREE? AND they have a button at the table that summons over your waiter?
What marvelous advances... and so worth giving up things like freedom of speech, uncensored access to the internet, political dissent. And hey... the chineese government hasn't massacred their citizens for peacefully demonstrating for something like 15 years now. Sounds like a real great place!
They neglected to mention China's perfection of the rickshaw and the ox cart.
an ill wind that blows no good
9/10 times I use my credit card before anyone else flames me :P Not all stations have pay at the pump, or more importantly one that works 100% of the time (I really wish they'd solve this).
"Let a thousand flowers bloom," is an interesting quote. This comment was made by Chairman Mao in the 1970's to see who really opposed his policies by letting everyine express themselves. There was a period of free speech and outpourings of democratic writings, especially on college Campuses, that was followed by brutal repression and jailings of many university students and professors when Mao felt like it had run it's course.
"Let a thousand flowers bloom," was more or less a political tactic by Mao to exterminate his enemies in the Communist Party. Not sure what this has to do with economic policy and such.
I think you mis-spelled "Canadian", eh?
Looked that one up. Looks fine to me. Granted not all Canada is Toronto, Montreal or Vancouver. Where are you from, coward? Sure, there are some really 'out back' areas in Canada, but I don't have to live there.
"You can use them in elevators, subways and parking garages."
So, is the author claiming that China's cell technology is so awesome that it has overcome interference? Because I'm better that there are indeed elevators and parking garages, likely cased in concrete, steel, etc. wherein those cell phones indeed do not work.
"It's a cheap, pay-as-you-go system, with no stupid monthly contracts or credit checks. The phones are so cheap -- even sidewalk cabbage vendors have them -- that China is now the biggest cellphone market in the world."
America has pay-as-you-go cellphones. not sure if canada does, though.
The cheapness is likely due to the fact that the conversion of american money to chinese money is something like 8:1. Of course it's cheap- manufacturing there is cheap, labor is cheap. Almost everything is cheaper there.
"In Tianjin, a city of 13 million people, traffic lights display red or green signals in a rectangle that rhythmically shrinks down as the time remaining evaporates. In Beijing, some traffic lights offer a countdown clock for both green and red signals."
Although this is admittedly uncommon, there are lights in america that count down the wait time as well. The only kind I have seen here are audio cues though, with a voice counting down the time.
"Wouldn't it be great to have a single debit card for buses, subways -- and taxis? That's how it works in Shanghai. Passengers don't have to fumble for exact change on buses and subways, or line up to buy tokens or tickets. Taxi drivers don't have to make change, or get ripped off by counterfeit bills, a real plague in China. And they aren't loaded down with cash, which would make them tempting targets for robbery.
(In another transit plus, forget those illegible handwritten taxi receipts we get in Canada. China's taxis automatically print out receipts with date, mileage, taxi medallion number, even the start and end times of the ride. That certainly would help you recover the Stradivarius you inadvertently left in the back seat.)"
Nice idea. Much easier to implement when you have a totalitarian capitalist/communist (it's gonna stuck halfway right now, with gov't still very communist but the people engaging in rampant capitalism) government.
"Adult playgrounds"
Once again, much easier to implement in a totalitarian system. Just tell the people you're installing them, and then make them pay for it.
"Anti-theft slipcovers"
WHOA! CHINA REALLY IS SUPERIOR TO US FOOLISH AMERICANS!
But seriously... how did this make the list?
" Daily banking"
I'd love to see this happen in the US. Once again, much easier to do when the gov't can force banks to do it.
"Wireless service bells"
Having trouble getting enthused about this. Might be convenient, I suppose.
The rest aren't even worth commenting on for me.
The crux of the matter seems to be that a lot of these depend on the gov't being able to organize all the different service providers into doing the same thing, and that's a product of the huge amount of power their gov't has over the everyday lives of their citizens.
But is it worth the tradeoff, when, for example, they have to obtain the government's permission to move to a new area of the country, and their government actively filters everyone's internet connections?
In the 1960s and 1970s Japan was growing leaps and bounds from a completely destroyed country at the end of the world war to nearly the level of US economy. The label "Made in Japan" changed from a denigration to a status symbol. But Japan was unable to go past the US economy. Perhaps capitalism can only so far at a given time. Or else Japan's local characteristics of capitalism- more cronyism, more conglomeration, face-saving hiding of problems, etc.- keeps it at its level.
It will be interesting to see if China also stagnates when it approaches the US per-capita level, or can exceed the US. China may have its own intrinsic issues. But China will rapidly close gap. And will be an interesting sight to watch.
I come from Ahmedabad, India and we had that since last 7 years.
I think a major issue that arises in Capitalist countries is that profit is the main (only?) motivator for most technologies. In other words, if it isn't going to sell more copies, or reap more profit it's not worth doing. Many of the items mentioned in the article would have existed long ago in other countries had it been profitable to do so. Unfortunately, modern capitalism seems to trend towards maximizes proft, and minimizing cost (for both the businesses and consumers). This means that most people will suffer incoveniences to benefit from lower prices.
Supermarkets and other retail outlets are perfect examples of this. It's the classic service vs. price.
Even the stop lights in the article are an example of this. Most citizens would rather have dumb traffic lights and lower taxes than smart ones and higher taxes. Unfortunately this leads to a lifestyle that is filled with minor incoveniences.
A sad indicator of this is how surprised we are when someone gives us good service without charging us an extra fee.
1. Dr Martin Cooper, Motorola, Cell phone inventor (United States) 2. Isaac M. Singer, inventor of sewing machine (United States) 3. Garret Morgan, Stoplight inventor (United States) 4. Don Wetzel, inventor of debit card. (United States) 5. First internet bank (no need to go to bank) (United States) 6. Arthur Jones, inventor of commercial exercise machine (United States) 7. The Lumiere brothers, inventors of the cinema and film. (France) 8. Henry Ford, inventor of mass produced car. (United States) Ok, they have us on the slip cover thing....
Your population figures are apples and oranges. The City of London has a population of what, 12? But everyone knows that's not London. If you count Boston, count the suburbs to the same degree of de-urbanization.
How many of Boston's phone exchanges were in service in 1944?
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Out of those 10 things, only two have a good case for your point: Free hemming and daily banking. The rest don't really have anything to do with cheap labour.
Forget that.
To end the Cold War, the US didn't duke it out with the USSR using weapons - we spent them into the ground. Even at that, with the deficits involved, we darned near spent ourselves into the ground, at the same time.
Right now China is heavily dependent on exporting the US, and it's helping to fuel their growth. I would expect that within 10-20 years their own economy and consumer base will be sufficiently developed that they won't need us, any more. I've already heard (unsubstantiated) that China could absorb *every* job in the US, and still have unemployment.
IMHO, by the year 2050, China will be able to spend the US into the ground, just like we did in the 1980's with the USSR.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
abu-gharaib.
We even export our human rights violations.
China has no such nuisance for their leaders. They can make decisions totally independent of the happiness or the will of the people. They can keep their people disproportionately poor by keeping their currency down, and eat off the fat of America.
So China can plan for the best long-term strategies while America has to make the most people happy in the short term. America just has to promise that the long-term will be fine...
Oh, yeah, Social Security? It'll be fine.
Jobs'll come back!
The federal deficit will heal itself!
The trade deficit? Who cares!
Our currency is propped up by $1.8 billion foreign investment every day? Well, why should they ever stop!
Our federally-insured pension programs are doomed to spectacular collapse? Shhhhh!
Oil production will peak in the next decade? I said SHHHHH!
And natural gas-- SHUT UP!
This author is a wee-bit off of his rocker. I'm in Canada, and I'm not sure how hemming is handled in his neck of the woods (Toronto I presume), but whereever I've lived in Canada sounds fairly close to China's hemming system.
I can't think of a department store in my home city that doesn't offer hemming services.. when in the fitting rooms, I'll inquire about having the pants hemmed, she'll pin/mark them and although I can't recall anything as speedy as 3 minutes, I can usually pick them up in-a-bit (let's suppose 20 or so minutes).
20 minutes isn't so inconvenient.. I can continue shopping during that time.
Also, most malls in my area have hemming shops so when you buy clothes at any of the stores in the mall, they can be brought there for alterations. Some stores reimburse you, but most don't - it's only a few bucks at these little hemming shops in the malls and usually a similar 20min or so wait (depending on how busy they are of course).
Also, offering in-store hemming has nothing to do with technology. It's just a choice of the store - do they need to offer that level of SERVICE (or want to)? There is a cost to offering such a service, and if it gives them no competitive edge, why bother.
This isn't like there's no stores in Canada doing this (see above), it's not a question of technology at all.
..mork
Come on guys!
1) Cellphones
Hong Kong had a massive Cellphone penetration when they were still bricks. Late 80's, Early 90's Hong Kongers either had a cellphone or were busy making fun of someone who did.
2) Informative Stop Lights
Ok we've only had these a few years in Hong Kong. For Prior art see Los Angeles 3rd Street Promenade.
3) Transit Debit Cards
Boo yah, we've had these for years now, ours are called "Octopus" and they're far more than just transit debit cards. You can buy your groceries, a Starbucks latte, pay for your taxi fares, buy from 7-11 and Circle-k with them and that's just the tip of the iceberg. In fact just about anywhere where there's a transaction for less than $400 HK Dollars you'll find an Octopus Card reader.
4) Adult Playgrounds
Ok we don't have these. I don't consider it a substantial loss as compared to a right to vote or freedom of speech.
5) Anti-Theft Slipcovers
See. I prefer "being able to go to a restaurant without substantial fear that your wallet or purse will be stolen" as a solution.
6) Daily Banking
Just about the only time anything in Hong Kong is closed is over Chinese New Year.
7) Wireless Service Bells
Call me old fashioned but these seem rather impersonal and tacky. I wouldn't want to go to a restaurant where I pushed a button to call a waiter - it's just a step up from slotting in your coin at the automat.
8) Parking Data
Got it, we can pay for all our carparks using our Octopus cards too.
9) Computer seating maps
Got them and we can choose our seats when we book online for the theatre and cinema.
10) Cheap Hemming
Ok, first of all that has about as much to do with Technology as the PRC has to do with the term "electoral mandate". Second of all Hong Kong has for years been the domain of cheap tailors, cobblers and just about any other trade you can carry out from a small store or a market stall.
I don't care if I can get it done in a department store or not. Have you been in a Chinese department store? It's like Triple Blue Cross Closing down sales in there every day!
In conclusion:
1) Hong Kong rules all and if Canada can't compete with China then it doth verily suck.
2) Life in china is great if you're an elite party member or a successful entrepreneur. For everyone else it's pretty appalling. No number of slip on umbrella covers (also something that Hong Kong has had for years) is going to make up for a meagre salary, a total lack of electoral power and the prospect of a forced labour camp as payment for dissent. Try finding most of the things on that list in Nanking.
Oh yeah and that Maglev train HAHAHAH! I'm glad you guys in Canada don't have it, it's an ATROCIOUS waste of public money that is hardly used and will never break into profit.
Miss Wong is clearly comparing China to Canada. Her article failed to impress me with China, just made me glad I'm in Silicon Valley, not in Canada. Let's take a look at her list :
1. Cellphones
My cellphone works in elevators, subways, and parking garages too. The no cell phones in hospitals is a safety issue, not an issue of technology. And doctors here break the rule all the time, too. The docotor who delivered my son got a call from his wife (she was going to Taco Bell and wanted to know if he wanted anything) right in the middle of delivery.
2. Informative stop lights
As others have alrady pointed out, this is not the safest thing to do for cars. Most crosswalks where I live do the same thing, except they actually count down the number of seconds (how novel.)
3. Transit debit cards
This is a trivial (though very convenient) "innovation." It's really a product of government. When you have a centralized government that controls everything, you can standardize everything. When you have more freedoms, then different municipalities will do things differently.
4. Adult playgrounds
This is just another product of socialization, and has nothing to do with technologies.
5. Anti-theft slipcovers
A useful innovation when you have problems with crime.
6. Daily banking
My bank is open six days a week. If people demanded it be open seven, it would be open seven so that it could do more business and make more money. This has nothing to do with technology, and is simply an example of free people choosing how businesses operate via a free market vs. a government mandating how businesses operate.
7. Wireless service bells
This has little to do with technology and is much more a cultural issues. This would NOT be desirable at most upscale resteraunts in the west, where good service is expected and rewarded. Now it might be desireable at low-end resteraunts, but in the west, you get what you pay for.
8. Parking data
This is interesting. Do you really need to know how many empty spots there are? Isn't it really just a boolean, i.e. there is at least one empty spot or there are no empty spots? Any paid parking lot is going to keep track of this, and is also going to advertise so that you can find it. So I guess this is talking about free lots. Again it's a function of a free market vs. socialism.
9. Computer seating maps
When I buy tickets to a SF Giants game, I have this exact kind of technology. I don't have this for movies, but movie theaters here are not assigned seating.
10. Free hemming
Again, not technology, but cultural.
My city, for example, got going somewhere in the eleventh century, which makes it a good 600 years older than the USA!
I'm no expert on Chinese history, but I imagine they can easily trace some of their population centres back centuries before that.
When I lived in Houston, there was an area that had what I call "Equal Punishment Lights." You'd be approaching the light, and as you near it, it goes from green to yellow to red. There'd be no traffic on the cross street. You'd sit and wait and wait, and then you'd see a car approach the intersection. The light goes yellow, then red for him, he stops, and I get the green.
It takes talent to time the lights that well.
--JoeProgram Intellivision!
An alien reading TFA would probably find this quote amusing and/or pathetic: (emphasis mine)
"Also, I don't see China being much of a leader in alternative fuels"
http://www.thunder-sky.com/en/index.htm
An innovative technology and an order of magnitude cheaper lithium ion batteries than you're likely to be able to get your hands on.
Deleted
To list the things that you find in the U.S. v. China, or in Europe v. China, that I find superior in U.S., or Europe, or Japan, or wherever?
But those are First World countries! They should be superior in EVERY WAY!
Nonsense. This First World/Third World delineation is extremely rough, at best.
China is a rapidly developing country. While there are factors which still relegate it status to 'third' world, they have come a long way, and will make it to first world soon.
The thing is, you don't always get optimum deployment of technology in a wealthier society, and this has little to do with the economic system (Capitalism, Communism, Socialism, Anythingism).
In a nutshell: The economic system determines who has the power to allocate wealth/resources.
Then, this decision maker decides how much of societies resources should be spent on what developments.
If 'smart' stoplights are not a high priority, even if 'dumb' ones are an annoyance, you won't get them, period. Even in Utopia.
In China, government decision makers simply implemenent whatever policy they feel is appropriate.
In the U.S., popular demand determines the allocation of wealth and resources. Don't think that I am naive enough to not realize that large companies&governments are capable of influencing this demand. Still, by deciding how much you are willing to pay for a certain service, or expressing your political preference by voting, you contribute to averaged indicators that establish this allocation.
In the U.S., people are willing to spend less of the adjusted per capita wealth on cell phones than are people living in Europe, or Japan.
As such, our cell service is crappier. Sure, there are geeks like you (slashdot reader) & me who want better service. But the Jane Doe's of the U.S. bring the average down.
The same thing probably happens with regards to Jane Doe's preferences. I might not be interested in what she wants, and as such, I bring the average allocation down with regards to her preferences.
You see clear, similar trends with regards to broadband service. Price is simply more important that quality of service/performance, and as such, as a society we allocate less towards our Broadband, and we have crappier service.
Now that you are conceptualizing resource allocation as I have described, the effects of government become clearer.
In much of the rest of the world, governments have 'kickstarted' demand by providing for an initial investments in broadband, cell service, and other 'public' goods.
You get better service, but the costs involved in the government 'kickstarting' necessairly come from somewhere else.
This government influence necessairly introduces economic inefficeny.
Not that that is always bad, mind you. I certainly accept that economic inefficency is necessary such that our resource allocation is not totally mindless/mob oriented.
But we need to consider that it is a spectrum. Somewhere between total government control of everything economic allocation, and total free market laissez faire absurditiy, is the world where I want to live.
Wow. This has been rather long winded. In sum, and in short, all I'm really trying to say is that a certain country not having, or having, various technology improvements does not mean that country is doing worse, or better, than other nations. Specific aspects of resource allocation are not a good way to summarize notions of wealth.
They are more important indicators. Not that the U.S. is doing particularly well in these other indicators. But we aren't doing so badly, and I feel that discussions of these indicators are far more important that discussions of anti-theft slip covers, or smart traffic lights.
Just my 20000000 cents.
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
I doubt it, since the whole point of the one child, one family policy was to reduce the population. Seems like removing the breeders is a darn good way to bring this about, eh?
Incidentally, I think that law or a variation thereof should have made this top 10 list, as it is one way China is ahead of the US. I think the US is headed for the same population trouble, and limiting an individual's reproductive freedom to replacement only (2 children per family) is a likely scenario at some future point (barring major military deaths, of course).
Murphy was an optimist.
The exchange rate is set by the govt in China. They only appear not to have money. It's set to flood business into the country, and out of the rest of the world. Just you wait till it's allowed to float on the market...
Deleted
This is entirely your own fault. USA have screwed over a lot of nations and making life har in others. One year you help and arm the muslims, the other one you withdraw your support and watch them die. Just look at the whichunt for communism. You can do whatever you want in your country, but that wasn't enough. You simply felt the urge to stop the spread of an ideology that didn't suit you, and did this by killing countless people around the world. This also happened in countries where the ideologies worked and people actually had chosen them. You supported the murderous contras, red khemers and other death squads around the world. When you inflict so much suffering, is it so strange that people strike back? Currently USA tries to enforce the acceptance of genetically manipulated food in the EU. The majority don't want your gm crops, but you simply cannot accept that, so you force the issue. And no, we cannot make the consumer choise of not bying it, because one of the things the US trade oppose is the special labeling of gm foodstuff. To top this of you go and kill a couple of hundred thousand innocent civilians in Irak and support the state-terrorism currently occuring in Israel. Get a fucking clue: what goes around comes around. I as everybody else am apalled by what the terrorist do, but i am also apalled of the actions the US takes and has taken historically. You need to se the coneqences of your own actions. By electing Bush and continuing with the current policies you only make matters worse. This is not something you can solve with brute force, you need some brains.
When in doubt, act determined. Business 101
That aspect I did not know, but really it won't be too terribly effective since only a male child carries the family name...
Murphy was an optimist.
Those bombed-to-stone-age cities you speak of I've never seen (in Germany). Many were heavily bombarded and largely destroyed, yes, but they were not completely wiped out. And people tend to rebuild the cities, not start new ones from scratch. For the age, there are lot of cities which already existed when the American continent has not even been discovered. I myself grew up in a one that can be dated back to the 8th century and it's just a regular (and small) city.
:w!q
Well, I'm sure the reason for this is they have a more advanced system that ourselves - currently lots of people run red lights in the US. But, when is it safe to do so?
Enter the Red-Red/Red-Green light. Now the light just stays red all the time, since you're going to run it anyway - but the green light tells you when it's safe to run, and the second red tells you when it's safe to stop!
Taking away the yellow makes it a simple state transition that reduces incidences of people speeding up for a light. And both directions change instantly, making it far more efficient as you never have an awkward moment when cars are not going through an intersection.
Yes sir, that is is traffic light of the future.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Capitalism is based on... Capital. So, inorder to Compete you must have capital. That is the overiding theme. If you don't have capital, you really only have one option. You must trick someone else into using theirs to get some for yourself. This usually accomplished through employment. However, as you stated it can be very difficult to do. Raw capitalism, which we seem to have formed, can be very cruel. The great challenge of this centry will be to see how we can keep most of the efficencies of capitalism, while introducing some of our values into the decision making process.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
A great amount of China's technological advances come from the government's desire to keep constant surveillance over it's people.
my password is private, but unchanged.
Amen amen--in Oregon, the homeless rate increased as mental health services decreased.
We have Number 8 (roadside electronic billboards not only give directions to nearby lots and garages, they crucially reveal how many empty spaces are left) in the UK.
Also most banks open on Saturdays. Sundays well.. people need days off
Isn't this a "American sucks and is clinging to 1930's technology" more than "China rules"?
Already exists, of course, just costs a bit to put the sensors in, and a bit for maintenance and sensor tuning so the sensors don't leave people on motorcycles sitting forever. Most places in the US and Europe should already have at least some of these installed, I assume Asia does as well, but I've not been there, just Europe and the US. In fact, I'd bet that the larger cities in the more advanced African and South American countries have them. Where are you that you don't have any sensor traffic lights installed, and have never seen/heard of them?
How good is cell phone reception inside a political prison?
if(!toilet_paper) roll.replace(new roll);
I'm afraid I have to disagree. Any country which can elect Bush *must* have a very dense population indeed...
I am an American student, fluent enough in Swedish, working on a degree in Sweden. I can tell you as an insider that they are neither hot nor blonde--anymore. Those women went extinct in the Eighties. Right now, they are my professors and bosses--not my peers. A list of grievences:
100% dead-serious: At our student union building, we have an annual Bad Taste Party, where one dresses in bad taste, naturally. I could not tell--I honesty sat through a half-hour of our pre-party without noticing that was the theme.
In conclusion, if you are coming to Sweden to have good-looking lovers, only do so if you are a gay man--you'll save yourself a lot of disappointment.
Maybe if you'd change your shitty attitude, you wouldn't have so many problems keeping a job.
Oh, I haven't always had a shitty attitude. It took years of being pissed on, fucked over, cheated and lied to in order to have a really shitty attitude. My chance to own a home, and to have the things I earned by getting an education and putting in years of solid, hard work were submerged in wet shit by liars so they could make a better business case for some half-assed "enterprise paradigm."
I'm probably unemployable in a cubicle now, since I can smell the fragrant horseshit beginning with the smug, arrogant ass-molded phone-flipping hairpiece in the interview. They're only looking for a reason to disqualify candidates, and even if I get hired, what do I have? Nothing, since I can be laid off for no reason any fucking time some asscrack middle manager decides his spreadshit isn't going to stuff his pockets fast enough.
Every single promise I was made in school has turned out to be bullshit. My education is worthless in the workplace. My experience is worthless in the workplace. My skills are worthless in the workplace. Why? Because the middle managers are in control and they say so.
and apparently you've been through a few layoffs.
I've been through layoffs that would make people want to drop to one knee and weep into their hands. I have been lied to and cheated so many times it became funny. The bald-faced rotten craven lying bastards I have worked with and for would truly amaze most people. The financial and emotional horrors they visited upon my co-workers were some of the most repulsive and disgusting things I have ever seen. I watched them happily destroy careers by the dozens, and my company isn't the only place this has happened.
You'll be much happier if you aren't constantly butting heads with people.
I agree. I'm much happier because I don't work in a cubicle job any more. I don't have any office politics and I don't have to work with lying cheat middle managers.
The sooner you learn to make politics work to your advantage instead of against you every time, the better off your career will be.
The only way I can make office politics work to my advantage is to become a lying cheat bastard like the people who set out to destroy mine and several of my friends' and co-workers' careers.
People who take the initiative and actually deliver a good job, like those I worked with, automatically find themselves at a disadvantage in office politics because instead of griping to the lying cheat middle manager in the break room, they are actually doing their job. Competent, qualified, hard-working people are not welcome in the modern workplace, and because of that, our society is destroying the educations of millions of people.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
The U.S. Birth rate is actually not much higher then the replacement rate all the expected population growth projections are largely due to naturalizing new citizens from elsewhere. Closeing the boarders is a much more likely senerio then limmiting current citizens right to have children. It should also be noted that one of the reasons our economy and other pay as you go systems work, such as social security operate only because the population always grows. Infact becase the population has not grown enough is why SS is in such trouble. More then 60% percent of the inhabitable space here in the US is still green field. We don't have any popualtion issues and won't for a long time. Especially if we start to limit imegration. I more fear the reverse, you need only look Germany's economic forcasts to see what could happen to a nation with a similar social-economic system if the population grows to slow or ages to much.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
[Large portions of Western Europe were bombed to the stone age during WWII]
Large portions? I don't think so. Even Germany which was particularly badly hit has a wealth of historic cities.
[The US has cities that date back to the original colonies and their infrastructure is just about as old]
Most US cities were developed into their current guise during the 1950s with the invention of the motor car and the simultaneous distruction of the public transport infrastructure by the wholesale asset stripping by companies such as Ford and GM.
[Add that to the fact that we have laws which protect history to the detriment of progress in some cases]
There are more historic (say 200 year old +)buildings in the average English town than in the entire USA! And despite our best efforts through the 60's and 70's, legislation exists which protect these buildings (See here)
For example there are still some disputes about sorting out some stuff that happened in the 1860s that violated the treaty of 1840.
I take it you've never been to Europe? We may have had a "silly" war in the 1940's but the vast majority of Europe survived relatively unscathed. My local pub for instance has existed around twice as long as the USA.
India too pretty much has all these technological advancements. Plus the biggie - the largest democracy in the world !
Take the amount of times you hear someone spit in NYC, multiply it by about 70, and that's how often you'll hear it in China.
Vile people, believe me.
Exactly ;)
;)
The aquiantance of mine owns apartment building in the center of Cracow/Poland which was built in 16th century, and it's no big deal.
Go, find such buildings in USA
Robert
Bastard Operator From 193.219.28.162
That would be calld a social democracy.
Share, collectively run the nation. Help everyone.
Look up Sweden if you care to.
The stoplights are wonderful. I visited Shanghai, Beijing and Qingdao (home of Tsingtao beer -- and damned fine beer, I might add) a couple of years ago, and the timed stoplights should be that way everywhere. When I was there, Shanghai didn't have the timers, and Beijing still had no lights at some major intersections, but Qingdao had the timed lights on every corner.
The trouble was that such lights are wasted on drivers in Qingdao. Let me tell you about the cab ride that went 65 mph going the wrong way down a one-way residential street. At the intersections, the stoplights were completely ignored. It doesn't matter if you know how long until the light changes if everyone goes through whenever they want to anyway!
At the lightless intersection in Beijing, it was interesting that in the absence of any overt management, people did a great job of communicating and sharing the road so that everyone was able to get to where they needed to without anyone hitting anyone else. In that light, I think they actually did better than they would have with a stoplight in place.
Now a careful reader might suspect that the organization I experienced at the un-lighted intersection in Beijing explains why the people in Qingdao ignored the stoplight. However, people who've been to Qingdao know better. Qingdao drivers are a different breed of animal from Beijing. If I had to pick the animal, I'd say a cat. Being chased. By a toddler with a water hose. After a direct hit.
Don't let that keep you out of Qingdao, though. Go in the Fall for the seafood and the beer. Oh, and the women (their bodies, not their accents).
Man, I need to get back there sometime...
The Villiage Wok, Campus Villiage, on University next to the Big 10, you are buying.
Sera
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
Very few Americans know much at all about China.
People THINK they do but to someone like me (i.e. a white guy who spends months at a time each year in China, is married to a Chinese woman, is well versed in China's history both recent and ancient and speaks Mandarin), listening to American folks discuss China is almost always very frustrating.
The country is not nearly as oppressive as some of you seem to think. Communism is really just a WORD over there... not an ideology... not anymore. Yes the government has it's problems and for the most part are not too well liked but daily life in China (well, for city dwelling, college educated people anyway) is little different from life here. People own pets, they don't eat them, they have cars, cell phones, high speed internet, live (and thus, not so controlled by the government) news on TV, they go shopping, walk in the park, meet friends for coffee, hit the clubs on Friday and Saturday night or go see a soccer match, whatever.
Many places in China would strike the most ardent neo-conservative as the very height of capitalism. Contrary to what one person posted you CAN talk about/criticise/make fun of the government. I have talked with so very many Chinese about their government and they are usually quite frank. No one is hiding behind their hand whispering, no one is "disappeared". Last time I was there (May-August 2004) there were even some fairly large labor protests in a nortern city. Protests that were not crushed, put down, blocked. We just don't hear about this sort of stuff in the states. Viewed objectively (my wife, a professor of communications, has done much research in the area of media coverage between China and the USA), our government's opinions regarding China, the average citizens beliefs on China and the stories we get about China from our media leave us with a general impression that is, quite simply, wrong and negatively biased.Statistically about equal to the bias you would find in the Chinese press about the USA.
Technologically, China IS rapidly pulling ahead of the U.S.A. in many areas (cell phone technology and IT in particular) and China has it's "Microsofts" waiting in the wings eyeing the world market (the Lenovo Group (formerly known as Legend Group) in particular). Bottom line is, most Americans don't know enough about China to make any sort of accurate commentary regarding it. Yes there are many problems in China and with it's government but it is much closer to life here (once again, in the cities, not the countryside) than you probably think.
I agree. And you get full marks for understanding that the optimum reached by capitalism is usually local, not global.
For those who are wondering what the difference is, here's an example. If you're on top of Pike's Peak, you are standing on a local optimum in terms of elevation above sea level. You are on an optimum because you would be going downhill as soon as you moved away from the peak, no matter which direction you took. However, the optimum is local, not global, because Pike's Peak is not the highest mountain in the world, not even close. If your metric is elevation above sea level, the global optimum is far away, on the top of Mt. Everest.
A capitalistic corporation tends to be short-sighted: it tends to take whichever course is immediately most advantageous. In terms of the hill-climbing analogy, the corporation is always walking upwards in whichever direction seems steepest at the moment. Thus it tends to end up at a local optimum: on top of Pike's Peak, or if it is shortsighted enough, on top of the nearest dunghill. And there it will be stuck. This is why the parent poster says that capitalism tends to find the local optimum, not the global one.
I think you mean Japanese and Korean technology. The article even says Samsung. Sorry dude but that's a Korean Company. China is just leveraging off the tech advances in both these countries. I think your also forgetting the extreme use of very, very cheap labour in asian in general. This wealth gap produces severe abuses in every aspect of life. Technology can be an aid to a better life - but can't replace being a thinking, empathic human being. Just my two cents. ;)
Start talking about technology and end up stating all the negative points (rightly or wrongly) about the country. Guess what? The media has you fools brainwashed into hating on China at every opportunity.
Wouldn't it be funny to start a thread on some interesting technology in New York and have the thread end up talking about crime, pollution, overcrowding, etc...?
"Yes, they may have found a way to cure cancer, but their streets stink like garbage!"
I remember seeing traffic light countdown clocks in Melbourne as a kid, circa 1970.
Actually the same could be said of the US, a lot of our foriegn policies of late have been decidely midieval, notably the "you're with us or you're against us" black and white take on things. Not to say China's not a potential problem, but this is not sound reasoning as to why it's a problem.
The foreign policy of China has actually been much more civilized than the foreign policy of the US over the last years. China's statements in the UN are sometimes even sentimental. They are trying to connect to "old Europe" and improve their image in the world.
China-Taiwan relations are a different story, of course.
>> From what I hear it is next to impossible to emingrate to New Zealand
I didn't find it difficult - but judge for yourself : http://www.immigration.govt.nz/
I've been living in China for over 2 years, and have travelled extensively there. I hate crap articles that for the most part aren't true. I'll take this one step by step:
intro:
supermarket spills - alas, they don't bother to disenfect anything at the average supermarket. Some recent imports, Carefour etc., might do better, but simply moving the spill around with water and then drying it might not seem hygenic to some.
free head-and-shoulder massages w/ haircut: this is true. And it's an excellent service. But I usually cut my own hair cause I don't want it to look jacked. You can also get handjobs and blowjobs for 30-100 yuan more. Great services. The Chinese are way ahead of us here.
free movie ticket couriers: true. All couriers for services are free in my experience. Currently their online stores also use these couriers. You order online and a guy comes on a bike with your books and you pay him. quite nice.
duvet covers (even in rural china): yes. it's true. but, if they are freshly laundered, why do they smell so bad? Most of the time you feel like the blankets have been sitting in a smelly closet for weeks, not like they just came in off the line.
automated lockers: they're starting to use them in some stores. Most have places where you check your bag with a person.
taxis, subways, etc with panels and tv: true for about 1% of all taxis (if that much) the buses with tv are pretty annoying but they are thankfully few and far between (there are many more buses with wooden floors with holes where you can see the road)
electronic fly swatter: this is so cool! some are shaped like a small tennis racket. you push a little button and electricity runs through the wire strings. great fun killing bugs and for using on friends when they're drunk.
magnetic-levitation train: it's amazing. so is there space program. So is the realization that they are doing this despite the fact that so many of their people live in complete poverty and would love to have a better life.
1) Cellphones: coverage is extensive. prices aren't that cheap, but it is pay as you go. You pay for incoming and outgoing calls (the same for each)/ SMS messages (cheaper for incoming). on an average month I'll spend about 150-200RMB which works out to 20-25USD.(I like to SMS a lot and don't like using talking on the phone much--most of the time other people call me) It doesn't seem that much cheaper to me. Might have something to do with the Monopoly that is China Mobile.
2)Traffic Lights: this is true, and they are using them more and more. Beijing's use of them is pretty light (no more than 5% of all ligths-a VERY generous estimate as I've only seen 2 or 3), but in Southern cities like Guangzhou or Guilin, most traffic lights are of this type. Unfortunately in China red light means, "I can still go through the extension for the next five seconds."
3)transit debit cards: I haven't been to shanghai in a while, so I'll assume this is true. They do give a lot of nice things to Shanghai (they being the communist party). Taxi receipts are printed. One of the main reason is so that you can report a taxi driver who took you for a ride.
4)Adult playgrounds: true (at least for Beijing--I haven't seen them in small cities; a small city in china is still over 1million people). They also have an occasional program on TV on how to use these machinese. They range from things where you swing your legs and arms like a floating cross trainer, to weight lifting contraptions, to pull up bars, to ping pong tables in some places. And Chinese old people are more active than their western counterparts. But I'd hardly call the air fresh.
5)anti-theft slipcovers: ?????? this is to prevent theft? I never knew it was such a problem. I thought it was so that your clothes don't smell like smoke or get food on them. It's a nice touch. I like them. not in the average rundown restaurant. please note: this doesn't keep wait staff from stealing your cellphones off the table when you
When 500 people die of SARS in China its news. When 50000 die of the freaking flu in the US every year its not news. Wonder why so many people live in China and India. Maybe its just because those areas of the world have always been more geologically stable with a stable climate and fertile land which can support the population. I was going over the US map and trying to find a place which is not hit by hurricanes,forest fires,earthquakes or ice storms and i frankly could not come up with anything other than las Vegas and that is a desert. The US is a wasteland made livable by technology. Now imagine what happens when you apply the same technology to a part of the world which was strong enough to support half of humanity without the tech?
**Life is too short to be serious**
Well I suppose that it would be cheaper than spending billions of dollars to bomb the crap out of them with fire-and-forget smart bombs.
Kudos for giving a civil reply to a obviously demented individual. I was all ready to flame him and to hell with karma.
That said, bloated or not, the US population is... un-sheeplike... to the point where you'd never be able to get that sort of policy down their throats. At least not any current generation. We'd make it a national priority to colonise the moon and mars before we'd accept 'limits on reproductive rights'.
Sheesh...
Methinks thou art a general offence, and every man should beat thee.
Hmm... I always thought we were under a combination of corporate hegemony and end-times theocracy.
That's Republicans and Democrats, right? ::Sarcasm Alert::
Methinks thou art a general offence, and every man should beat thee.
Is CLEAN RESTROOMS. I spent last month in Dalian (north eastern "bit port" city) and was impressed by all the new technology (I was there 3 years ago), but disgusted by the same lack of basic hygene that is common throughout the country.
I swear that the Chinese as a race must have diminished olfactory receptors. (The average Chinese proboscis is indeed smaller than the average European one). There is sewage in the streets and filth everywhere you go.
Another thing the Chinese are renowned for is POLLUTION. They haven't seem to have yet figured out that they have to live on the planet they are rapidly destroying. There are no environmental restrictions on business. Enforcement of what little rules they have is selective and corrupt.
Another thing China seriously lacks is SAFETY. They haven't figured this out yet either. Nobody wears seat belts. Anything with a motor is allowed on the roads. Pedestrians had better look both ways and run out of the way because they have no rights whatsoever. Construction sites leave dangerous holes in the middle of the sidewalk with no warning barrier. You really need to keep on your toes at all times.
My last rant is about the Chinese cultural aversion to MAKING AN ORDERLY LINE. There's no such thing as a line in China, it's everyone for themselves. It shows up everwhere from customers at a street vendor's cart to the downtown automobile traffic. There is no logic to the rules of the road, it's a constant game of "chicken".
--
This space for rent.
... two years ago they just had to give me a call on their cell phone because they thought it was so cool that they could.
I was less thrilled just taking a shower. I guess it could have been worse i.e. in the middle of the night.
a communist country with cutting edge technology, a booming economy, massive censorship, and a constantly expanding middle class... something is really messed up in that country... at what point do they have to let the whole communist thing go and aknowledge that the gov can't run the whole show?
Get your torrents...
Many of the things sighed about are in Japan too, though I don't know where they originated. Best new idea I saw was city-supplied free exercise machinery located outdoors nearby. You could tell a lot about the character of a city about what they look like too - I'd like to think New York would do a good job on it but they would probably be made of massive, grungy steel tubing and molded plastic seats, so you couldn't hijack if you wanted to, like the inside of NYC subways. Japanese ones would probably have too many lcd gadgets and might run an electrical current through your buns to check your body fat level. Article makes me want to go check it out in China myself though!
The article is basically correct.
It would be an error to say that the whole of China has these advances, but the developing areas are very large. The combined pupulation of Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin is over 30 million. Add Chonqing and you have another 30 million.
Those figures leave out the whole of the Pearl River Delta so the real numbers are much larger.
China has its black spots, but there are many aspects of its service economy that are astoundingly good. Give credit where credit is due.
the "article" itself is flamebait. /. is beyond me.
How this was even put up on
I love how someone can write an article like this, and everyone in the States who's never been to China takes it all as gospel. I'm not really criticizing it, since the article is mostly accurate in my experience, but there're some things that have to be seen in context. (Once again, let me preface by saying I'm an American living in Shanghai, and have been living in China for over 3 years now.) 1. Cellphones - No annoying contracts, that's true. But cell phones are EXPENSIVE. In America, we're used to paying between $0 and $150 for a cell phone. The cheapest, oldest, black-and-white cell phone here is $100 because of that freedom from contracts. I've always been amazed that the Chinese, despite their much lower income, probably outspend Americans on cell phones by 3:1. 3. Transit debit cards - I love these things, and I don't understand why it hasn't rated an article in itself on slashdot. Here's an example of one city that is slowly moving away from cash, and no one even notices. The transportation cards are incredibly convenient, work on almost all public transportation, all taxis, and even quite a lot of convenience stores and McDonalds. I wish they had a set monthly 'unlimited' transit option, but... They are quite cool. 5. Anti-theft slipcovers - Only in nice restaurants, where you're probably not that worried about thieves, anyway. Also points to how much petty theft there is in this country. My girlfriend's purse was stolen from the chair next to her last week. 6. Daily Banking - Yeah. I love being able to visit the bank and post offices on any day of the week. You don't appreciate it until you have it. 7. Wireless service bells - I've never seen these before in my life. Maybe only in Beijing? Service in restaurants here is far worse than in America. The waitresses all use a patented method of surveying a room while carefully ignoring anyone who wants their attention. It takes forever to get something you need, and no waitress EVER asks you if you're okay, or if you need anything. The writer mentioned flat-screen video on buses. This is slowly killing me, I swear. Every time you take a bus, it's a constant barrage of advertising from the moment you step on to the moment you step off. Forget about listening to your own music - whatever comes through your headphones is drowned out by the bus's speaker. Forget about reading a book - it's pretty tough to concentrate while someone's shouting at you to buy beef jerky. This would, I hope, be considered unacceptable in America, and I wish it were the same here. One last thing, that the article didn't mention - I don't understand why the air conditioner technology here in China is so much better than in America. While Americans still fill one window with an air conditioner, they mount the machine on the wall outside, with a tube that comes in, leading to an electronically-controlled vent mounted near the ceiling. Everyone's air conditioner has a remote control, and it leaves the window open. The article also didn't mention the complete lack of indoor central heating in most of China. They've got it in the north, where it snows every year, but not here in Shanghai, even though it's frequently below 0C in the winter. I'd give up expensive cell phones, daily banking, chair slipcovers, parking guides, traffic lights with timers, and everything else mentioned here for WARM HOMES in the winter. tek.
Actually, Tiananmen square happened not because the students were protesting, and not even because the world press made it into the story of the year, but because the movement looked to be a genuine mass movement. Teachers, professionals, journalists, party members, and most threatening of all, urban laborers were beginning to join the protests. The students were just a bunch of kids that when left to their own devices, set up a "democracy" that hardly differed from the communist party heirarchy. It was everybody else that got the government worried enough to roll out its tanks...
The author makes it sound like China is the only place where these technologies exist. Except for 5 & 6, I've all of the things on that list in Japan as well. And should 5 even be counted as a good thing? Crime is so bad that your stuff is stolen while you are eating in a restaurant?!
"Watching Access Hollywood is like driving 10 SUVs!" -- Al Sharpton
yeah, whatever those guys above said. Nagasaki and Hiroshima were actually saved to be bombed when the Manhattan Project started. Kyoto and uh...I forgot but one other city was on that very short list. Everything else got flattened. As far as I'm concerned, the Japanese were paid in full for what they did to others in World War II.
The quote was made in 1956, while the period of free speech and the subsequent crackdown was in 1957.
They have many more people then western countries, their population is over a billion so of course they are going to advance faster then nations with less people and hence less talent and economic power. People are the engines of the economy, assuming you have enough landmass and resources to support such populations and the infrastructure of those economies.
:P
Like "No shit!", they have they practically have a billion people more then the united states and canada combined. They're geniuses really, they are outbreeding us all!
"Hail to our new Chinese overlords!"
At least that seems to be the case for 8 of the 10 items. I'm not sure of merits of anti-theft slip covers, but free hemming would be an excellent addition.
I've brought up realtime parking signs before. Each lot feeds the number of vacancies to network which aggregates the data so that you can quickly find your way to lots with space. Key intersections have signs showing the number of free spaces in each direction and, as you get closer to the lots, individual lots. No excuse for either cities in the U.S. or Canada not to have this, especially in the U.S. where mass transit is non-existent except for a few places.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Try upgrading 300 year old streets, sewers and other infrastructure in cobblestone historic districts in Boston, MA, or Providence, RI, and its a different story.
:-) At exorbitant prices, but that's a different story.
Wait a minute, 300 years is old? My home town (Split/Croatia) is 1700 years old. The whole city (some 250000 people) gets water from a water system built by the Romans (no shit). And we still get DSL.
Dude, USA is a very young country, a toddler practically.
There are countdown traffic lights in Japan -- I've seen them -- in Kobe by example ... BUT for the crosswalk, for the pedestrians.
I agree it's a dangerous thing for cars.
"Can the people in China read the report on China?"
"The answer to that would be no. I just tried, and I'm posting from China."
China - Amnesty International
Despite a few positive steps, no attempt was made to introduce the fundamental legal and institutional reforms necessary to bring an end to serious human rights violations. Tens of thousands of people continued to be detained or imprisoned in violation of their rights to freedom of expression and association, and were at serious risk of torture or ill-treatment. Thousands of people were sentenced to death or executed. Restrictions increased on the cultural and religious rights of the mainly Muslim Uighur community in Xinjiang, where thousands of people have been detained or imprisoned for so-called "separatist" or "terrorist" offences. In Tibet and other ethnic Tibetan areas, freedom of expression and religion continued to be severely restricted. China continued to use the international "war against terrorism" as a pretext for cracking down on peaceful dissent.
Background
A new administration headed by President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao took office in March and introduced a few positive reforms, including the abolition of the "custody and repatriation" system of administrative detention (see below). However, no significant attempt was made to address underlying legal and institutional weaknesses that allow human rights violations to be perpetrated with impunity.
The outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in February became the first major test for the new leadership. After months of attempting to conceal vital information about the spread of the disease, the authorities eventually began to respond to international pressure for greater accountability and transparency. The World Health Organization announced that the outbreak was under control in June.
In July, a senior Chinese leader, Luo Gan, called for a continuation of the "strike hard" campaign against crime, which led to a rapid rise in the number of death sentences and executions after its initiation in April 2001, raising fears that this would continue to result in curtailed trial procedures, the use of torture and ill-treatment to obtain "confessions" and imposition of the death penalty without due process.
In August delegates to the Ninth National Women's Congress reportedly discussed a survey that showed that domestic violence had occurred in a third of all Chinese families. Increased media reporting on this issue appeared to indicate a growing willingness to tackle this entrenched and widespread abuse.
China strengthened its ties with neighbouring countries, including Central Asian countries under the auspices of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, as well as India, Nepal and Pakistan. One motive appeared to be the forcible return of Chinese nationals, particularly Uighur asylum-seekers and refugees branded as "separatists" or "terrorists" by the Chinese authorities.
There were concerns that the international community was taking a "softer" line on China by confining its human rights concerns to private dialogue sessions rather than public scrutiny. These were borne out when for the second year running the UN Commission on Human Rights failed to propose a motion criticizing China's human rights record. Nevertheless, the UN Special Rapporteur on education delivered a highly critical assessment of China's education policies following her visit to Beijing in September.
Violations in the context of economic reform
The authorities took an increasingly hard line against people protesting against house demolitions and evictions, particularly in large cities such as Shanghai and Beijing, where demolitions of old homes were accelerated by Beijing's preparations for hosting the Olympics in 2008. Scores of peaceful protesters were detained and lawyers assisting in such cases were at risk of arrest or intimidation.
The rights of freedom of expression and association of workers' representativ
Well, I guess "tricking" them isn't quite the correct word. You'll have to forgive me, I was on a roll. You have to convince them that you will increase their capital more than you will remove through your salary. It has to be a mutually benificial.
Its not that far form raw capitalism over all, however there are a few industries that are far from it.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Besides, one more point to consider: most of the "successful" segment of the US population stops at about 2 kids anyway. The bulk of the families with more than 2 seem to be getting some form of governemnt aid (not all of them, but enough). One thing I love about my country is that money talks, and if the population can save money by enacting some unpalatable legislation it has a much better chance of getting passed.
Murphy was an optimist.
Social Security has already failed, the corpse just hasn't been removed yet. I know any money I put into it is long gone, it's literally just another tax to me. That 60% is where food comes from. We can pack people in like sardines, but if we cannot feed them it's irrelevant. When the average person can no longer get a steak because cattle take up too much room, when food is rationed, when "treat" foods are eliminated to support basic nutrition for an overabundance of people, when those things happen you'll certainly see an outcry. Stomachs and wallets are big motivators here.
Murphy was an optimist.
Touche.(Just imagine that the accent is where it belongs)
I still don't think we're that close to being sheeple, but we are getting closer. The difference between Democracy and Communism may be shown to be about two hundred and fifty years.
And we're getting less creative - or rather the masses are less imaginitive, now that they can just watch TV - so maybe the moon will be turned into a national park instead of a housing tract.
How depressing
Methinks thou art a general offence, and every man should beat thee.
...is that it would probably be owned and operated by Ticketmaster. :-)
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley