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.
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.
For me, the iPod-killer would be a Palm Tungsten-type PDA with a hard drive. Give me a Tungsten T|E ($200) combined with a 20GB iPod/HD ($300) for $500, and I'll buy it in a second. Even better would be if you could convince Apple to develop a PalmOS version of iTunes. I really don't understand why this hasn't happened yet. Rip off the unnecessary plastic bits you wouldn't need once you put the two items together, and it wouldn't even be that big!
The result would a) be able to play video (new Palm units do that without issue), b) be able to review photos, with a flash memory slot to take stuff directly from memory cards, c) be able to play MP3s, Ogg, AAC, whatever you want through first and third-party software.
Why does this not exist yet???
tek.
Let me preface this by saying that I'm an American living in China now, and have been for the three of the last four years.
Internet cafes are rarely about reading anything. In all my visits to internet 'bars', I've only seen a handful of people reading articles, or news websites. They're all there to chat, play online games, or look at smut.
Closing 18,000 bars barely affects anyone. There's an internet bar on practically every block, so those that have been closed probably were doing something wrong. It's extremely unlikely that they were closed for letting people visit banned websites, however, for the simple reason that anything the government deems 'too sensitive' is blocked behind the Great Firewall.
I'm happy to see a fairly balanced view of the issue here on slashdot, however, given how anti-"Chinese oppression' people usually seem. Living here, it's given me a different view on 'censorship.' Porn is illegal here, and I'm really not quite sure how that's a bad thing. It's available on the internet for anyone who really wants it, and I think it's kind of nice being able to pass by magazine stands and browse without being confronted with a thousand different porn mags. Strangely, the Great Firewall blocks a lot of news and free web servers (BBC, Geocities), but rarely does it block porn.
Another thing that the average American doesn't understand is how much freedom the press here actually has. Yes, there is censorship. Yes, there are topics that the press can't touch with a ten-foot pole (Taiwan, in particular). But there's a lot of criticism of the government in the newspapers here. While I don't approve of censorship of political issues, there is a far wider range of issues that can be discussed and criticised in public forums than the average American hears about.
They are, however, more serious than you'd think about the two issues they mention in the article. The government isn't all that happy about pornography, or kids cutting class to play video games. So they've taken steps to cut down on those activities. Those steps don't square with American libertarian views of how the world should work, but they're not all bad. And sometimes a cigar is just a cigar - I doubt the closure of those internet bars was a pretext for anything.
I don't understand how common this message has been - non-US citizens outside the US won't have a chance to affect the elctions, but US citizens outside the US most certainly do. I'm a US citizen currently living abroad, with absentee ballot in hand. I haven't had any desire to vote for Bush prior to this website gaff, and I still don't, but the international block does affect some people that count.
What's interesting is trying to square this decision with their well-organized, intense drive to get absentee, particularly overseas military, votes. While I don't have any interest in visiting the Bush campaign website, I imagine there ARE any number of overseas Floridian Republicans that DO want to. They're doing some slight damage to themselves in a very tight race.
Let's hope this has a bigger impact than they suspect it will.
For the most part, I agree with you. Sony can't compete with the pirates on price. They can, however, come close, and they do have their own advantages.
China's another country with a terrific problem with music and video piracy. The companies have given in to a large extent, however, and sell their DVDs at prices that are competitive with the pirates. I got a DVD-9 version of the new Wong Kar-Wai flick, 2046, at the local supermarket for 25RMB (USD$3) while the pirated version goes for 15RMB on the street outside.
So sure, the pirated version still costs less, but there's an advantage to being placed in a chain store, next to the apples and TVs and clothing racks. All things being equal, I think most people would rather have the 'real thing', as well.
What we need is for governments and media companies to work together to defeat piracy. Governments need to step up enforcement at the SAME TIME as media companies price their product in a way that will entice consumers of a given market, taking into account their income and the local cost of living. One without the other just isn't going to work. Without enforcement of anti-piracy laws, there will always be an economic incentive to consume pirated goods. Without a sensible pricing model, there will always be economic incentive to skirt the laws.
tek.
If Google is filtering out blocked sites from search results, it should actually result in greater access to relevant sites for users in China (myself included).
Example: I rarely go beyond the first page of Google results. Let's say I click on five of the Google results to open in new tabs. Two never load because they're hosted on blocked sites (geocities, time.com, etc). I end up looking at three sites relating to my search.
If Google pre-filters the blocked sites, all of my tabs will load, and I'm exposed to more information than I would otherwise. A couple sites that would previously have been shunted to the forgotten realm of second-page results will be viewed.
While I still think it would be a good idea to include a "See results including blocked sites" link, I really have no problem with Google's policy.
It's valid. I live in China, and it can get pretty frustrating when a google search results in lots of links to geocities pages, and other sites on blocked servers. I really have no problem with Google just making those results vanish, since I can't see them, anyway, and they sometimes just result in opened tabs that never load when I forget to check the host domain.
It'd be nice if there were an option, however. A little check-box or link to "See results including blocked sites".
tek.
Shanghai, in particular, has to watch out in its attempts to 'emulate the West.' It's no secret that when the Chinese government sees the mass of bikes on the streets of their cities, they think, not about how great and green the method of transportation is, but how backwards it is. They desperately want the world to see that they, too, can build big highways for commuters.
So, as reported by Shanghai newspapers, they're moving to outlaw all two-wheeled vehicles from the city center. They cause traffic congestion, and hey - who wants all those visiting businessmen to see that people still ride around on bikes in such a busy, modern metropolis? There's been a popular outcry, but it remains to be seen whether the government backs down, or not.
There've been occasional crackdowns on internet cafes in China for years. The way it works here in Shanghai, in my experience, is that the police will do a crackdown, check IDs, hand out fines, and the internet cafes will be really careful about getting people to show IDs for the next few weeks. After that, they'll begin to relax and let people sign in without actually showing their IDs - writing '12345' in the log book.
The new system allows the government to make sure this doesn't happen anymore by restricting/recording access at the computer, bypassing the diligence, or lack thereof, of the owners/managers of the internet cafe.
I've been living in China for four years, and in my experience there are a few websites that are always blocked, and some that block and unblock at random. BBC News is always blocked. Free websites are always blocked (geocities, tripod, etc.). CNN and NYTimes have been blocked in the past, but are currently unblocked.
The one I can't figure out is this: The Miami Herald is always blocked. I can't imagine what political stances that newspaper has taken to get itself blocked in China. Me, I just want to read Dave Barry.
The Chinese government always uses porn as an excuse to up the level of intrusion on web-surfing. The fact is that they don't much care about the porn. I'm writing this from China now, and I can tell you that it's as easy to find pics of nekkid people doing unspeakable things to one another here as it is anywhere. What I can't do is read Time magazine online.
I'm living in Shanghai, and I'm frankly a bit frightened by all of this cracking down on internet usage. Yes, I'm sure it's possible to get around the blocking, but that doesn't mean it's easy, or that anyone can do it. The government has been putting their foot down on a lot of news of late that would make the people of the country uneasy, and there's just nothing that the average net surfer here can do to find out about it, or do something about it.
Slashdot Mirror
Some of your suggestions are already implemented at eHarmony.com
Sorry. With paragraphing:
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.
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.
For me, the iPod-killer would be a Palm Tungsten-type PDA with a hard drive. Give me a Tungsten T|E ($200) combined with a 20GB iPod/HD ($300) for $500, and I'll buy it in a second. Even better would be if you could convince Apple to develop a PalmOS version of iTunes. I really don't understand why this hasn't happened yet. Rip off the unnecessary plastic bits you wouldn't need once you put the two items together, and it wouldn't even be that big! The result would a) be able to play video (new Palm units do that without issue), b) be able to review photos, with a flash memory slot to take stuff directly from memory cards, c) be able to play MP3s, Ogg, AAC, whatever you want through first and third-party software. Why does this not exist yet??? tek.
Let me preface this by saying that I'm an American living in China now, and have been for the three of the last four years.
Internet cafes are rarely about reading anything. In all my visits to internet 'bars', I've only seen a handful of people reading articles, or news websites. They're all there to chat, play online games, or look at smut.
Closing 18,000 bars barely affects anyone. There's an internet bar on practically every block, so those that have been closed probably were doing something wrong. It's extremely unlikely that they were closed for letting people visit banned websites, however, for the simple reason that anything the government deems 'too sensitive' is blocked behind the Great Firewall.
I'm happy to see a fairly balanced view of the issue here on slashdot, however, given how anti-"Chinese oppression' people usually seem. Living here, it's given me a different view on 'censorship.' Porn is illegal here, and I'm really not quite sure how that's a bad thing. It's available on the internet for anyone who really wants it, and I think it's kind of nice being able to pass by magazine stands and browse without being confronted with a thousand different porn mags. Strangely, the Great Firewall blocks a lot of news and free web servers (BBC, Geocities), but rarely does it block porn.
Another thing that the average American doesn't understand is how much freedom the press here actually has. Yes, there is censorship. Yes, there are topics that the press can't touch with a ten-foot pole (Taiwan, in particular). But there's a lot of criticism of the government in the newspapers here. While I don't approve of censorship of political issues, there is a far wider range of issues that can be discussed and criticised in public forums than the average American hears about.
They are, however, more serious than you'd think about the two issues they mention in the article. The government isn't all that happy about pornography, or kids cutting class to play video games. So they've taken steps to cut down on those activities. Those steps don't square with American libertarian views of how the world should work, but they're not all bad. And sometimes a cigar is just a cigar - I doubt the closure of those internet bars was a pretext for anything.
tek.
I don't understand how common this message has been - non-US citizens outside the US won't have a chance to affect the elctions, but US citizens outside the US most certainly do. I'm a US citizen currently living abroad, with absentee ballot in hand. I haven't had any desire to vote for Bush prior to this website gaff, and I still don't, but the international block does affect some people that count.
What's interesting is trying to square this decision with their well-organized, intense drive to get absentee, particularly overseas military, votes. While I don't have any interest in visiting the Bush campaign website, I imagine there ARE any number of overseas Floridian Republicans that DO want to. They're doing some slight damage to themselves in a very tight race.
Let's hope this has a bigger impact than they suspect it will.
tek.
For the most part, I agree with you. Sony can't compete with the pirates on price. They can, however, come close, and they do have their own advantages. China's another country with a terrific problem with music and video piracy. The companies have given in to a large extent, however, and sell their DVDs at prices that are competitive with the pirates. I got a DVD-9 version of the new Wong Kar-Wai flick, 2046, at the local supermarket for 25RMB (USD$3) while the pirated version goes for 15RMB on the street outside. So sure, the pirated version still costs less, but there's an advantage to being placed in a chain store, next to the apples and TVs and clothing racks. All things being equal, I think most people would rather have the 'real thing', as well. What we need is for governments and media companies to work together to defeat piracy. Governments need to step up enforcement at the SAME TIME as media companies price their product in a way that will entice consumers of a given market, taking into account their income and the local cost of living. One without the other just isn't going to work. Without enforcement of anti-piracy laws, there will always be an economic incentive to consume pirated goods. Without a sensible pricing model, there will always be economic incentive to skirt the laws. tek.
If Google is filtering out blocked sites from search results, it should actually result in greater access to relevant sites for users in China (myself included).
Example: I rarely go beyond the first page of Google results. Let's say I click on five of the Google results to open in new tabs. Two never load because they're hosted on blocked sites (geocities, time.com, etc). I end up looking at three sites relating to my search.
If Google pre-filters the blocked sites, all of my tabs will load, and I'm exposed to more information than I would otherwise. A couple sites that would previously have been shunted to the forgotten realm of second-page results will be viewed.
While I still think it would be a good idea to include a "See results including blocked sites" link, I really have no problem with Google's policy.
tek.
It's valid. I live in China, and it can get pretty frustrating when a google search results in lots of links to geocities pages, and other sites on blocked servers. I really have no problem with Google just making those results vanish, since I can't see them, anyway, and they sometimes just result in opened tabs that never load when I forget to check the host domain. It'd be nice if there were an option, however. A little check-box or link to "See results including blocked sites". tek.
So, as reported by Shanghai newspapers, they're moving to outlaw all two-wheeled vehicles from the city center. They cause traffic congestion, and hey - who wants all those visiting businessmen to see that people still ride around on bikes in such a busy, modern metropolis? There's been a popular outcry, but it remains to be seen whether the government backs down, or not.
There've been occasional crackdowns on internet cafes in China for years. The way it works here in Shanghai, in my experience, is that the police will do a crackdown, check IDs, hand out fines, and the internet cafes will be really careful about getting people to show IDs for the next few weeks. After that, they'll begin to relax and let people sign in without actually showing their IDs - writing '12345' in the log book. The new system allows the government to make sure this doesn't happen anymore by restricting/recording access at the computer, bypassing the diligence, or lack thereof, of the owners/managers of the internet cafe.
I've been living in China for four years, and in my experience there are a few websites that are always blocked, and some that block and unblock at random. BBC News is always blocked. Free websites are always blocked (geocities, tripod, etc.). CNN and NYTimes have been blocked in the past, but are currently unblocked. The one I can't figure out is this: The Miami Herald is always blocked. I can't imagine what political stances that newspaper has taken to get itself blocked in China. Me, I just want to read Dave Barry.
The Chinese government always uses porn as an excuse to up the level of intrusion on web-surfing. The fact is that they don't much care about the porn. I'm writing this from China now, and I can tell you that it's as easy to find pics of nekkid people doing unspeakable things to one another here as it is anywhere. What I can't do is read Time magazine online. I'm living in Shanghai, and I'm frankly a bit frightened by all of this cracking down on internet usage. Yes, I'm sure it's possible to get around the blocking, but that doesn't mean it's easy, or that anyone can do it. The government has been putting their foot down on a lot of news of late that would make the people of the country uneasy, and there's just nothing that the average net surfer here can do to find out about it, or do something about it.