No, we're not talking about "personalized networks of influence" — everyone needs those. We're talking about Guanxi, the paid SMS service that allows you to send the name of a venue and it replies with the venue's address. Yesterday, for about the 27th time[1] in the past several months, we got a message supposedly from Guanxi telling us their number had changed ... again:
Due to Mii rule chng,new# of Guanxi Search is 106695882929.Pls save!
The spelling and punctuation of the message screamed out "hoax," but the (amazingly long) number matches what is one their website (Guanxi was sold earlier this year, so their site has changed). Anyway, we don't think we have used Guanxi since way back in the Chen Liangyu administration.
Perhaps we just don't go out much anymore, perhaps we always go to the same places, perhaps after five years we know our way around the city, perhaps we prefer using the internet on our phone for venue searches now, perhaps we got tired of paying RMB 1 for each message we sent to them.
Regardless, now we are just tired of Guanxi sending us (poorly punctuated) messages telling us they added seven more digits to their number.
Also on Shanghaiist
Who needs Guanxi? Dial 962288 to find out!
Guanxi's new number: 85880
[1] Slight exaggeration.
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tell me about it- since I lost my phone a few weeks ago I haven't been able to get a response from any one of about 4 difference numbers I've tried
I use it very often. It even works for Beijing when you put BJ before your search term.
Given the most appalling standard of taxi driving in Beijing, having Guanxi can make your evening, rather than having it ruined by one ignoramus behind the wheel.
To me Guanxi is the single most useful directory service in China, and the most under-rated one on top of that.
Guanxi's PR sucks, with a bit of advertising effort they could have many more users.
It is too unreliable to be useful, and Interent-enabled phones are getting cheaper. I'd rather give my kuais to those grubby lil street kids.