Who needs articles when pretty charts like this will do? A helpful infographic from G+ gives you the lowdown on the social media situation in China, and how it operates under the yoke of government control. more ›

Despite being blocked, Google+ still has the power to ruffle feathers here in China as news outlets have been abuzz recently concerning Google's deletion of thousands of Google+ accounts that were not using real names. As interesting as that may be, the real story here lies not in why "JrzyShoreGrrll1993" or "sher@mie:)" should keep their profiles, but rather in the numerous internet activists who have a much less stupid reason to use a pseudonym. more ›

Baidu.com, China’s search engine Goliath, has combined forces with three major American record companies to develop what is hoped to be a breakthrough against music piracy in the People’s Republic. more ›

The best swimmers in the world are in Shanghai for the FINA (Fédération International de Natation) championships. Some of them, like Michael Phelps, were in Beijing for the Olympics. Back then, Facebook and Twitter were allowed. more ›

Alright internet business trend dorks, let the hyperventilating commence: "China's sovereign wealth fund is reportedly looking to buy a stake in Facebook. Business Insider, citing a source at a fund that buys stock from former Facebook employees, claimed yesterday that the Chinese buyer hopes to see if it could buy a stake large enough 'to matter' of Facebook, the most popular social networking website in the world with 700 million users. Citibank is trying to acquire as much as US$1.2 billion worth of Facebook stock on behalf of two sovereign wealth funds - China's and another from the Middle East. China Investment Corp, the nation's sovereign fund, was not available for comments. Mark Zuckberg will probably visit Shanghai in September, which will be his second trip to China. In 2010, the 27-year-old Facebook CEO met with leaders of the top Internet companies in China, including Baidu, Sina, Alibaba and Tencent." [Shanghai Daily] more ›

This neat little infographic from Endelman Digital maps out the social media habits of internet users all across Asia. The data used comes from PC-based internet users only, leaving out the very substantial chunk of Asians staring at the internet through their phone or at an internet cafe. But anyway, it's pretty to look at, and gives a nice clear peak at user habits, as well as Facebook's slow and steady world domination. (Penn Olson points out that Facebook actually does surpass Wretch in Taiwan, with 58% online penetration.) more ›

To get rich from the internet is glorious: China's biggest social network Renren Inc., is aiming towards a valuation of $743.4 million U.S. dollars for their American initial public offering. According to Bloomberg, at nearly three quarters of a billion, the amount is twice as much as Facebook's future IPO, as valued by Goldman Sachs: more ›

In light of the rumors raging over a Facebook China partnership with Baidu, we decided to check in on the recent China numbers from SocialBakers (a site that monitors Facebook users by country.) Back in February, we saw users more than double following Mark Zuckerberg's visit in December. This month, the numbers are way, way down. Not a gradual drop off, mind you. On April 5, about 40% of Chinese Facebookers disappeared. more ›

Wow. All that speculation, the flirtation, the obsession, but we never thought it would actually happen. Could it be true? According to Sohu and others, yes it could, and probably is. Following all the rumors and Mark Zuckerberg's recent trip to China, Facebook has now reportedly signed a deal with Baidu. more ›

Whether or not you think the whole will-they-wont-they Facebook China flirtation is a total pipe dream, there is no arguing that a jump in Chinese Facebook users is a good sign for the social media giant. And that's just what we've seen. In the last two months alone, users in China more than doubled from about 300,000 to over 700,000. The only explanation come up with so far is that Mark Zuckerberg's China visit in December inspired a slew of new Facebook devotees. more ›

Unsurprisingly, the Chinese government has censored much of the material available online about the uprising. more ›

Reports of sightings of Facebook founder and newly-crowned Time Person of the Year Mark Zuckerberg in Beijing abound on the internet today. Twitter user @lhiver swears: "I kid you not, I saw Mark Zuckerberg while passing the Yonghegong Lama Temple this morning on my way to work." Sina Tech on Weibo reports: "Baidu employee Wang Mengchen took the following picture during lunch of Robin Li (Baidu founder) and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Looks like they were having a great time!"
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Just in time for Mark Zuckerberg's rumored China visit (he and his gf travel 2gthr every Dec!!1 ZOMG! lol so romantic) Tech Rice brings us a look at just how Facebook might fare against the local competitors IF (and it's a big if) the market were free from intervention and there was no censorship or invasive meddling among the internetz by the government. Still, they make some interesting points worth noting, considering most have approached Facebook's China rumblings with reactions mostly fluctuating between dismissal or disbelief. Boiled down, here's what Tech Rice has to say: more ›

Resonance China points out a fun little graphic, apparently from Ogilvy's China social media team, demonstrating the typical users for five of China's most active social networks. more ›

Could Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, be coming to China? Forbes thinks so. According to their blog, Zuckerberg recently took to Facebook Questions to ask "What are the best mandarin [sic]-speaking cities to visit in China?” and “What are the must see/things to do in Shanghai and Beijing?” hinting that he might be planning a trip to this side of the world soon. Although in all likelihood, the trip might be for pleasure (his long-time girlfriend, Priscilla Chan, is Chinese American), Zuckerberg has shown more and more interest in the Chinese market. The Facebook CEO reportedly receives daily Mandarin language lessons and has been devoting much time to learning about Chinese culture. 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 ›

“We have to carve off China. That one is extremely complex and has its own dynamics... Our theory is that if we can show that we as a Western company can succeed in a place where no other country has, then we can start to figure out the right partnerships we would need to succeed in China on our terms." more ›

News of the new "Facebook Places" - a competitor of sorts to location check-in service, Foursquare - is burning up in the States. It doesn't really matter to us here in China, considering both Facebook and Foursquare are blocked.... but in case that depressed you - if you're into letting the internet know exactly where you are, there is a veritable horn o' plenty of Foursquare clones ready for your using. more ›

Good Day !! more ›

The rumor about Facebook coming to China seems to be picking up steam with more and more Western publications picking up Sina.com's original anonymously sourced assertions. What's interesting is that almost everyone thinks it's a bad idea. Not only will they be facing a ton of competition from much more established social networks/clones, but people are asking what will it mean for privacy and, of course, censorship. Facebook itself has said it didn't have specific plans, hemming that, "We are interested in China, just as we are many other countries, and while we are studying and learning about them all, we have no specific plans for China at this time." more ›

Yes, Facebook is blocked over here, but if you have a way of circumnavigating the GFW (and honestly, most of you probably do now), you're probably on Facebook all day anyway. Now you can use your Facebook to comment on Shanghaiist posts! No more creating or signing into your Shanghaiist commenter account - just click connect with Facebook and comment away. Try it out, and while you're at it, join our Facebook group or become a fan! more ›

The latest Facebook Global Monitor report released by Inside Facebook has revealed, rather unsurprisingly, that China heads the pack of three countries that actually lost more active users than it gained for the month of September (the other two being Iceland and Cyprus). When Facebook was banned in July, the social network had one million monthly active users. That figure collapsed to half a million in August, before shrinking further to 41,000 in early September, and now as of the beginning of this month, only a measly 14,000 remain. Totally authoritative anecdotal reports suggest that these 14,000 diehard Facebook users comprised mostly of smart Shanghaiist readers who know where to get their VPN and other desperate expats who just miss their friends back home. more ›

• China's Alibaba Adds Social Networking to E-commerce [PC World] "China's Alibaba Group has started mixing social-networking functions into its leading e-commerce platforms, a move it hopes will convince users to spend more time and money on Alibaba Web sites. Alibaba is crafting social-networking platforms specifically to complement two of its core operations. The beta version of a Web site with Facebook-style applications and a Twitter-style feed is being grafted onto Taobao.com."
• China, the world's factory--a photo tour [CNET Asia Blogs: The Tech Dynasty] "These images are from WethicA, a company that audits factories with an eye toward child labor, workers rights, health & safety, and wages. From the WethicA newsletter: "We are posting real untouched photos of factory working conditions from about one year ago. We have decided this summer to show you an important part of the job we do during audits by telling you why these pictures have been taken. Actually, an audit is much more investigative than ticking boxes off a questionaire. One has to walk in with an open mind ready to question everything in these situations and not only ask a list of predefined questions.""
• China's turning children against me: Kadeer [ABC News] "The children of exiled Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer have gone on Chinese television criticising their mother. Two of Ms Kadeer's children and her brother were at first reported as having written letters blaming their mother for orchestrating recent violence in far western China. Now the two children, along with another son, have recorded interviews with Chinese television for a special program."

• Lottery hacker wins detention [SINA English] "A hacker has been arrested after breaking into a lottery database in an attempt to win millions, an official at Shenzhen Public Security Bureau said. The man surnamed Cheng, a software engineer of a high-tech company which contracted with the lottery management center to work on a system upgrade, was arrested by police on June 12. He is accused of hacking into the system and falsifying entries for five winning tickets. Those tickets were among nine that won the top prize in the "Dual-colored Ball" lottery on June 9. Each ticket was worth roughly 6.6 million yuan ($966,000)."
• Obama science adviser insists talks with China will not bypass UN process [Guardian UK] "Bilateral talks between the US and China will not replace the need for a global climate deal at Copenhagen, according Barack Obama's most senior science adviser. John Holdren also said that, though there was much legislative work still to do in Congress, he was confident the US would be in a position to sign up to a successor to the Kyoto Protocol by the end of the year and would do it within the United Nations framework."
• More than 240 Chinese detained in Russian clampdown [China Daily] "China Thursday called upon Russia to guarantee the rights of Chinese businesspeople and workers after reports said more than 240 Chinese had been detained in recent days. Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said Beijing had not yet received official notification from Russia about the reported detentions."

With China "commemorat[ing] something that never happened with prolonged online moment of silence," as someone cleverly put it, now's a good time to get stocked up on as much Great Firewall scaling advice as possible. Just a few weeks ago, we detailed some ways to climb up outta heah for free. more ›

• Facebook blunder betrays NZ millionaires [ABC] "Interpol is still trying to find a couple of cashed-up Kiwis, believed to be living it up in Asia, after they were mistakenly given $8 million ($NZ10 million) by Westpac. Rotorua service station owners Leo Gao and his girlfriend Cara Young fled New Zealand with about $NZ3 million after they discovered the money in their bank account. But their chances of being caught have increased after they were joined overseas by Ms Young's sister, Aroha Hurring, who posted details about their location on her Facebook page. Police believe the trio are in China after Ms Hurring foolishly updated her status to say she was drinking the local Asian beer and enjoying the heat."
• Taiwan Firm to Offer Google Phone in China [WSJ] "HTC Corp. plans next month to start selling in China a smart phone based on Google Inc.'s Android operating system, the first Google-based phone in the world's biggest wireless market, HTC Chief Executive Peter Chou said in an interview. The new HTC phone is a version of the company's Magic model, unveiled in February, that has been customized to incorporate software from China Mobile Ltd. China Mobile is the world's largest mobile operator, with nearly 500 million accounts."
• In Chinese city, WWII enemies are now partners [LA Times] "Looking back, Japanese businessman Tomatsu Ito says, he might as well have moved to Mars rather than a few hours' flight away to China... Often desperate, he would phone JianHua Yang, his second in charge at the branch office of an Osaka, Japan-based software company. Yang is a Dalian native who, like many here, speaks Japanese. Their budding bicultural friendship symbolizes a trend here: Ito is among thousands of Japanese flocking to this bustling port on China's eastern seaboard. Resentment still runs deep in China over Japan's 40 years of often brutal colonial rule in this region in the early 1900s, but Dalian has become a singularly welcoming oasis."

Uh oh! Looks like Shanghai's got another mystery event coming its way - and like the disasterously daft and not quite punk last one, it emerged first on Facebook. Unlike that last one though, there doesn't seem to be a big name and a 500RMB charge, just the promise of dancing and drinks at a "REAL WAREHOUSE" right before the Dragon Boat Festival Vacation, put on by the Shanghai Insurgency. Okay, we admit - our curiosity is a little piqued. more ›

In the off chance you see a Shanghaiist article you think is just dandy... or perhaps infuriates you enough for you to need to send it to all your friends, consider our easy instashare option. Located right next to the recommends star, the little widget opens up with options that will add the story to all the major link sharing sites - digg, stumble upon, reddit, facebook and now tweet! After all, what's the fun if the only people who know about the post are you and nanheyangrouchan? more ›

UPDATE: And just a few minutes later, according to @Neocha, Shanghai Midi is canceled. Apparently there was a permit issue? more ›