In terrible news for unmarried hussies nationwide, artificial hymens have been withdrawn from online sale after Chinese doctors warned the perfidious products could cause serious infections. more ›

That Chinese mines are still the world's most dangerous is confirmed once again with a second deathly and dusty accident this week. Only this time, the story has a little smudge of tragicomedy to it. more ›

As doubts continue to surface about the video that has gone viral over the last few days which showed passersby rush to aid a pregnant woman who collapsed in Luxun Park on Sunday, Erma Shanghai Co, the company that employs several of the people seen in the video, has now finally admitted that the video was staged. But only part of the video was staged, not all of it, and the company had no part to play in planning the video, said a spokesperson. more ›

On Monday, Yueyue's mother appeared on Sina Weibo under a verified profile to counter rumours in the Chinese media reports that the little girl had succumbed to her injuries from the horrendous double hit-and-run that has since captured nationwide attention. more ›

The recent scandalous story involving a naked mistress leaping from the second story of a hotel in Nanjing to escape the wrath of her wife's lover has been revealed to be fraudulent. more ›

Think the RMB25 cut-wash-blow at your local salon is a bargain? Think again. Chinese news reports are now saying that a lot of the shampoo used in hair salons around China are just cheap blends of thickener, fragrance, shampoo powder and water costing between 0.4-1.2 yuan per kilo. In some of the more extreme cases, experts have found the shampoo to contain mercury, sulfur or benzene. This could either damage your hair, cause you to go bald, or even give you cancer. more ›

These full face masks molded from silicon are now available all over Taobao for the low price of 800RMB! So if you've always dreamed of being a Chinese man, you are one step closer to that dream. more ›

Sadly my wallet can't accommodate a watch priced from $240+ when a cheap Casio will do the same job sans the cool LED lights and head scratching when trying to tell the time. more ›

Many of us here at Shanghaiist were so-called "kids of the 80s." So, it should come as no surprise that we were among the thousands for whom that decade's most famous slab of clay has come to mind in the time Haibao has existed. Whether or not the coincidence is intentional or accidental is a moot point anyway: Gumby is green. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for the mascot of Xinxiang Haibao Electrical Appliance Company: not only is he blue, but he also wears a cape, much like nü-Haibao does in the videos where he patrols Shanghai's streets for fakes, weapons and all things evil. Thankfully, the company reports it has "never had so much free publicity" - and after all, isn't public interest what branding is meant to generate anyway? 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 ›

With less than a year left to the Expo, Shanghai is getting ready to show off its splendor to the expected hordes of visitors. We're sure that no one staying here can have managed to escape the Haibaos that have been popping up all over town, or the many renovations under hand. more ›

• Organized crime ramps up film piracy efforts [Hollywood Reporter] How much terrorism have you funded? "Organized crime is taking on a larger role in film piracy, according to a new report from the RAND Corp. being released Tuesday. And though it could point to only a handful of examples where the profits from piracy have been used to support terrorist activities, the report warns that the terrorist connection could increase in the future."
• China food security 'grim' [Reuters] "A new food-safety law, approved on Saturday in an accelerated process since the milk scandal came to light in September, attempts to fix a fragmentary regulatory system which officials blame for recurring problems."
• China hails “online democracy” as Wen goes live on the Web [China Media Project] "So why do China’s leaders continue to talk about Internet technology as though it is an exciting and viable new alternative to that old-fashioned democratic technology — the voting booth? Because, at risk of sounding like a broken record, the Internet is the perfect distraction. It is a far-reaching medium symbolic of change that party officials can use to push the perception that political change is happening in China and that leaders are more responsive to citizens."

Yet another fake of everyone's favourite racist toothpaste. more ›

On February 11th, a Chinese couple from Zhejiang, while shopping at the famous high-end retail group Galeries Lafayettes on a Paris tour, was accused of using a counterfeit note, then brought to a police station, questioned and searched “insultingly” then accused a second time at the same cashier of using a fake banknote, although it had been proven genuine by a bank expert. more ›

If you have friends and family from overseas who are planning to visit for the Olympics, you may for their own sake want to subject them to a friendly frisk before they board their homeward flight. According to reports picked up on by Shanghai Scrap, the World Customs Organization is going to leave no stuffed panda unturned in its fight against counterfeit Olympic goods. The head of the WCO, Christophe Zimmerman, seems to be out for scalps, saying that: "Even if you are found with the smallest item, even just one item, you will face at least a fine. Of course, if you stock up then it will be more serious." more ›