The Copy Editor

China says it owns that small atoll just 60 miles from Philippine land where one of its missile ships got stuck last week. Actually, China claims to own everything in the area because it says so.

In less than a decade, China has pumped around $4 trillion into property; tens of millions of houses and apartments as well as Ozymandian public buildings and factory estates – and what hits the eye is how much of it all stands empty. Across the country, uninhabited concrete blocks scab the land, not only in the megacities of the eastern seaboard but also in the sleepier southwest; from filthy mining towns in Henan, all the way to entire ghost towns in Inner Mongolia. With an estimated 65 million homes standing vacant, residential construction last year was still running at a rate of five times demand.

Rosemary Righter, Decision time for China

[via TLS]

Xinhua 'borrows' a Foreign Policy article →

Isaac Stone Fish:

In its last print issue, Foreign Policy published an article by Thomas Rid, a reader in war studies at King’s college London, arguing that virtual conflict is still more hype than reality. Someone at China’s state news agency Xinhua must have agreed, because they published practically the entire article (In Chinese here and here). Well, not all of it: the seventh section, which argues that the biggest worry in places like China “is not collapsing power plants, but collapsing political power,” for some unexplainable reason didn’t get translated…

Xinhua ‘borrows’ a lot of articles from foreign newswires and publications — including Onion.

Punchline 2. If you can’t afford the pricey foreign news wires, try cheapo Xinhua. It just copies ‘em verbatim — the original typo errors included.

30-storey building. Built in 15 days. China. Here’s the time-lapse video.

Chinese writing exhibits symptoms of a mental disorder. This is castrated writing. I am a proactive eunuch, I castrate myself even before the surgeon raises his scalpel.

From a speech Murong Xuecun, a Chinese novelist, planned to give about censorship while accepting a literary prize in China.

When the event’s organizers told Murong that he could not deliver it, he instead made a zipping motion across his lips when accepting the award and then left the stage.

Via the New York Times:

But Mr. Murong’s prose inevitably runs up against censorship, which the Chinese Communist Party is intent on maintaining despite the publishing industry’s gradual changes. Mr. Murong says he is a “word criminal” in the eyes of the state, and a “coward” in his own eyes for engaging in self-censorship. His growing frustrations have pushed him to become one of the most vocal critics of censorship in China…

…Mr. Murong owes his commercial success to the fact that he has found ways to practice his art and build a fan base on the Internet, outside the more heavily policed print industry.

He addresses political issues on both a blog and a microblog account that resembles Twitter, which has nearly 1.1 million followers. He posts his novels chapter by chapter or in sections online under different pseudonyms as he writes. This Dickens-style serialization generates buzz, and the writing evolves with reader feedback. Once the book is finished or nearly so, Mr. Murong signs with a publisher. The censored print editions make money, but the Internet versions are more complete.

(via futurejournalismproject)

Here’s what I got after I ran WikiLeaks-published US embassy cable “Embracing the Dragon: The Philippines deepens economic engagement with China” through Wordle.

cultyouth:

Ai Weiwei, June 1994.

Mao Zedong (the portrait on her left) was known to entertain himself with many young women.

Beijing has accused Ai Weiwei of plagiarism, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, quoting a Xinhua report.

the asia writes project:

China Daily, the English-language newspaper based in Beijing, the capital of the People’s Republic of China, is accepting applications for copy editors of general news, business news and sports.

The ideal candidates should have at least 5 years of working experience in the newsroom. He or she will have will have a strong understanding of the finer points of newspaper editing and be able to help foster a culture of accuracy and professionalism in the newsroom.

The newspaper, which publishes seven days a week, has brought together journalists from some of the most important news organizations in the UK and North America, and has established itself as the most authoritative English-language newspaper with a daily circulation of 300,000.

We offer very competitive salaries and benefits packages. We would like to thank all applicants for their interest in these positions; however, only those who are considered for an interview will be contacted. Interested candidates should submit their CV and cover letter to job@chinadaily.com.cn.

More information here.

Hmmm… tempting.

Ai Weiwei on TED

Chris Anderson, TED:

The news that Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has been detained by authorities has prompted significant concern here at TED HQ. We had shown a film of him at last month’s conference, an unexpected and courageous statement about his treatment by the government, social change, the power of the web, and his hope for the future of China. The film, which was shown as Ai Weiwei himself watched live over the web in the middle of the night, prompted a huge standing ovation from the TED audience.

TED is a nonpartisan, nonpolitical organization, and we understand the Chinese authorities’ concern at anything which might provoke social unrest. But for anyone who believes in the power of ideas, of human imagination, it is heartbreaking to see one of the world’s great artists shackled in this way. We will be tracking developments carefully.

Traffic accidents in Shandong, China

chinaSMACKvideo:

This video became viral on China’s internet after it was aired by Chinese authorities in an effort to increase traffic safety awareness. It is a collection of traffic accidents that occurred in the past few years, caught on surveillance cameras installed at intersections in the city of Heze in Shandong province of China.

Warning: Graphic footage.

China, baby girls, and the one-child policy →

Anne Kingston:

Xinran writes of visiting a family in rural Shandong when a woman was giving birth to her first child; soon after she saw the arm of the newborn girl sticking out of a slop pail. To her shock, two local policemen present did nothing. “It’s not a child,” the midwife told her. “Girl babies don’t count.” Killing her was a kindness, the woman said: “Officials don’t give us any extra land when a girl is born, so girls will starve to death anyway. Women suffer.”

china

17 suicides. Your iPhone was very likely assembled by a very exhausted factory worker in China.

Despite the atheist Chinese Communist Party labeling spirits and ghosts a feudal superstition, the ancient rite of minghun - ghost marriages - persists in Hengshan.
“Atheism is unscientific,” says 71-year-old Wu Juliang, an expert on local culture and a Party member most of his life. “After all these years, I’m confident there are ghosts and deities.”
Dead men or women over the age of 12 cannot be buried without partners, Hengshan burial custom dictates. The corpse of a spinster never goes into her family plot.
Her parents marry her off and she’s buried alongside her new necrotic paramour in his family’s ancestral cemetery.

Xu Donghuan, Coal barons fuel corpse inflation fears

Despite the atheist Chinese Communist Party labeling spirits and ghosts a feudal superstition, the ancient rite of minghun - ghost marriages - persists in Hengshan.

“Atheism is unscientific,” says 71-year-old Wu Juliang, an expert on local culture and a Party member most of his life. “After all these years, I’m confident there are ghosts and deities.”

Dead men or women over the age of 12 cannot be buried without partners, Hengshan burial custom dictates. The corpse of a spinster never goes into her family plot.

Her parents marry her off and she’s buried alongside her new necrotic paramour in his family’s ancestral cemetery.

Xu Donghuan, Coal barons fuel corpse inflation fears

Terra Nullius

Wikipedia:

The Philippines and the People’s Republic of China both claim the Scarborough Shoal or Panatag Shoal or Huangyan Island nearest to the island of Luzon, located in the South China Sea. The Philippines claims it under the principles of terra nullius and EEZ (Exclusive Economic Zone). China’s claim refers to its discovery in the 13th century by Chinese fishermen.

Philippine flag planted on Scarborough Shoal, photo by Adel Rosario

[Infographic] China v America: how do the two countries compare?

China is now also America’s and the developing world’s biggest lender. Beijing held $906.8 billion worth of US Treasury securities as of October 2010.

[via Guardian Data Blog]