A new series on Beijing Cream looks at the Twitter account of China Daily, investigating just exactly who the government's English-language mouthpiece has been following. We wish we could say we're surprised at the results. more ›

It seems like it's not just the Global Times' editors that have a surprising sense of humor. Recently appearing on the front page of China Daily was this editorial satirizing China's food safety problems in light of Ministry warnings over radiation from the Fukushima plant. more ›

China Daily reported on three surveys conducted among readers of various papers this week, and most of the results don't look so good. In a nutshell, nobody's happy, everybody wants to be an official, and the dual-pension system sucks. more ›

In an interesting turn of events, Foursquare, the location based social networking system, has been de-listed as a banned site in China thanks to a partnership with China Daily USA. You may remember the popular service was quickly shutdown after waves of check-ins and sensitive comments at Tiananmen Square on June 4th. more ›

Wealthy Chinese mothers-to-be want their children to have the best start in life to such a degree that they're crossing the Pacific to give birth. more ›

Around this time of year, the topic of social unrest in China is never far from the fore. The recent spate of strikes at the Honda plant in Foshan and slew of suicides at Foxconn's Shenzhen factory has provided recent evidence that not only disenfranchised sections of society are willing to show their defiant colours, but also the greater need for the government to address China's wealth distribution. more ›

Oh snap! Someone at China Daily made a booboo and accidentally used a picture of a peasant woman to represent US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner (gaffe caught by Sinocism). [Note: Upon further inspection it seems more a case of bad website layout than a gaffe, unless they also confused the peasant woman for "Passengers of Derailed Train."] more ›

Appalled by the Chinese authorities' torture of Zhao Zuohai, China Daily has this week advocated measures of 'policing the police'. more ›

Shanghai may have topped the ranking of China's 10 most luxurious cities, but as far as China Daily is concerned (surprise, surprise), this city just ain't a world-class city yet. Ok, fair enough, maybe Shanghai doesn't have as much to offer in terms of art, theater, music and literature but did writer Chen Weihua really have to go on and on about the hundred ways in which New York City is better than Shanghai, as if there weren't other world-class cities around? We're not sure how much of this article was self-deprecation, and how much of it was pure penis envy. You decide. more ›

According to Huang Youyi, CPCC member and director of the China International Publishing Group, the Chinese language is facing a new invasion: by the English language. Huang feels that no good can come of the popular use of English words and acronyms (such as GDP and CEO) in published Chinese articles and everyday conversations. He told China Daily: more ›

• As Beijing political season heats up, Chinese blogger Wan Xiaodao has created a how-to list instructing would-be "corrupt officials." Highlights include not writing a diary, living in a nondescript house and not training the next generation to take your place. We're all for dissent, rebellion and free speech, but we always thought part of being corrupt was having money, as well as the thing that come along with it. [china/divide]
• The Great Wall. Terra Cotta Soldiers. Sea of death? Apparently, there a body of water up in Xinjiang that's been causing trouble for centuries - and China has decided to build a railway bridge over it. With a price tag of nearly 4 billion yuan and on track to be completed in just two years, the railway extension seems to be aimed only at cargo - namely potassium salt - which, last we checked, wasn't threatened by death. [China.org.cn]
• Now this is dissent we can get behind! A so-called "naked" blogger - that is, a netizen who has disclosed his real identity to the government and agreed to have his online movements monitored - has taken to his own blog to satirize the "Great Firewall," the Chinese pre-occupation with "walls" in general and the current porn witch hunts. [Global Voices Online]

This week, China Daily got the biggest makeover in its 29-year history. Among the variety of "stunning" changes are a brand new masthead, an incorporation of visual elements using "state-of-the-art" design elements" and a "fine-tuned reporting mix." Not gone: China Daily's hilariously awesome headlines. more ›

Earlier today we told you about the rise of HIV phobia in China. Now it seems help is at hand for sufferers. In a new move, the Ministry of Health is requesting each of China's provinces set up at least one psychological counseling telephone hotline by the close of 2010, as part of a nationwide mental health program. more ›

Did you think that your ability to choke down chicken feet, speak Chinese with your business partners, or play a game of Chinese checkers makes you more Chinese? Well, Hong Huang, the irreverent proprietor of the media empire that owns iLook magazine, wants to let you know that you're wrong: you'll never assimilate, because you're not Chinese. And while you're at it (not being Chinese, that is), don't touch chicken feet, sea cucumbers, or firecrackers: it pisses Chinese people off when you do, because you just don't understand why they're important in the first place. more ›

It was hard to miss this week's revelation that China has been this decade's most read news story, thanks to statistics produced by the Global Language Monitor. Trumping the invasion of Iraq, the number two story, by 400%, and leaving other catastrophic events such as 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, the war in Afghanistan and the global economic crisis in the top ten, China's rise looms over the rest. more ›

We were alerted to this interesting, if somewhat off-kilter opinion piece in China Daily that lists corrupt officials now in jail and their common hobby: writing books. It seems like a lot of officials, now that they have not much else to do, devote it to the pursuit - or at least recording - of knowledge. The list of previously politico scribes now in jail include: more ›

We make no apologies for professing our love of Han Han: there's something about unbridled angst and resistance to the status quo that really gets us going. Needless to say, that view isn't shared by everyone on the mainland, and we often find Han Han at the center of some controversy, which only makes us more intrigued by him. The most recent blow comes from China Daily's Raymond Zhou, knocking the "rebel without a cause" for his poor interview in Time magazine. more ›

From the few Chinese infomercials we've seen, we can tell pretty much immediately that we'd never buy anything off the television in China (except for that breast enhancing bra, maybe?). Apparently we're not the only ones who don't like bad commercials that try to sell things to us: dissatisfaction with infomercial shopping is on the rise around China. Last year, 4,226 people in Shanghai called the police over bad deals, which marks an astronomical 30x increase in four years. And it's getting more pronounced: authorities received over 3,000 complaints in the first quarter of this year. more ›

Yes, the rest of the article clarifies what they actually meant... but what can we say? We're easily amused by the things we find on China Daily. more ›

Yeesh, speaking of propaganda, it seems that China Daily has an entire section devoted solely to foreign dignitaries wishing China, among other things, a happy birthday and a bright future. more ›

Sometimes we wonder if China Daily isn't trying to take the piss out of us with these kind of stories. more ›

And we thought we had trouble determining the hard hitting news of the hour. (Thanks Brad!) more ›

The Boston Globe? Hanging on by a thread. more ›

The second career of Chinese diver-turned-actor Tian Liang has so far been received tepidly, but his latest role has sparked a big debate in China. Tian, a gold medalist in platform diving at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney and a bronze medalist in Athens, has been chosen to play Lei Feng, a soldier held up by Mao as an example of selflessness for all of China to follow. The choice of Tian for the role has angered a host of Chinese netizens, who basically argue that Tian is too self-centered, materialistic and publicity-loving to play Lei Feng. Tian was kicked off the Chinese diving team ahead of the 2008 Olympics for too enthusiastically pursuing commercial activities. more ›

Remember the government's proposed 45 billion yuan effort to ensure that the rest of the world sees a media more aligned with what the central politico wants it to see? It's started! more ›

Much like the better toilet campaign enacted by Beijing before the Olympics, Shanghai will be upgrading its public restrooms in time for the World Expo. The city has said it will clean up and renovate more than 5,200 public toilets to meet the “urgent needs” of roughly 70 million expected Expo visitors. more ›

The U.S. isn't the only country that's making incredibly super rich people cut down on their incredible super richness, China has now also set compensation caps for its State-sector financial companies. Salaries for top executives are now limited to 2.8 million yuan. Caps for pay packages will be slashed for regular executives, down to four times their annual salary (50,000 to 700,000 yuan). Oh, the humanity! Source: China Daily more ›

For lots of young folk going back to visit their families, the Spring Festival can be a bit of a pressure pot. Many times, Chinese parents like to follow up the customary greeting of "Have you eaten?" with "So when are you getting married?" One 31-year-old in Ningbo was so desperate not to disappoint mom and dad that he posted a notice asking to hire a pretend girlfriend. more ›

The China Daily has issued a damning verdict on the construction of the new 632 meter Shanghai Tower — soon to be China's tallest skyscraper. It says that with the new tower, "blind worship and race for skyscrapers has reached a new high" and that the 121 storey tower will be a "milestone in turning Shanghai into a less pleasant concrete jungle". The opinion piece (God knows who it was written by as no byline was supplied) then sought to substantiate with a litany of reasons why the Shanghai Tower would be a bad idea: (1) Shanghai is sinking, and a new skyscraper isn't going to help; (2) Traffic in Lujiazui is congested enough and a new building is going to make rush hours all the more "nightmarish"; (3) The "urban heat island effect" is going to make Shanghai feel even more like a sauna in summers; (4) Skyscrapers are vulnerable to attacks and disasters; (5) The economic risk of building the Shanghai Tower will be shared by various state-owned enterprises and the money could be "better spent elsewhere"; (6) Shanghai should instead save its old buildings from demolition; (7) Shanghai's public transportation sucks. Why not spend more money there? (8) It also has the fastest graying population in China and should build more facilities to cater to the elderly. In conclusion, China Daily judged super skyscrapers like the Shanghai Tower to be "not a priority for Shanghai" and that it "could cause more harm than add to its glamor". Such words of wisdom. more ›

And those reports were published by China's state-run media. On November 3, Xinhua listed He Kexin as being 13, referring to her as "this little girl" (an apt description for any of China's diminutive gold medalists). A May 23 story in China Daily listed He as being 14. Gymnasts must be 16 the year of the Olympics to be eligible to compete. He's birthday is officially listed as January 1, 1992, a rather eye-opening date we must say, signaling that either He is truly 16 or someone is a very lazy liar. He helped China win its first ever women's team gold on Wednesday. China's denies the age-fixing allegations (the ages of two other Chinese gymnasts have also been questioned) and the offending state-media stories have either been "fixed" or erased from the internet. The questions remain: How much of an advantage do you get from using underage gymnasts? And is it better to say you lost to a bunch of really young looking 16-year-olds or to admit you lost to 13-year-olds, some of whom are reportedly missing teeth? [Source] more ›