The Taiwanese are clearly fed up with the scourge of dog crap that has until now rendered the streets of New Taipei City virtually un-walkable. To combat the odorous problem, the government is granting citizens the opportunity to collect and exchange sacks of crap for lottery tickets, one ticket per "doggy bag." Like any other lottery, each ticket enters into a raffle, but in this rare case, the drawn ticket-holder can win a bar of gold worth Taiwan $60,000 or around $2,000 USD. Literally turning shit into gold! more ›

The nightmare is now officially over, hooray! Vending machines that dispense gold bars will debut in Beijing on the 23rd of September, with bars weighing up to 2.5 kilograms. The machines will apparently work just as normal ATM's do, only with the added sense of security that comes from leaving an ATM with an assault-grade brick of gold in one's back pocket. The machines will accept cash and credit cards in exchange for gold, and will be available in upscale clubs and private banks. Which is great, because we always thought putting an expensive cellphone on a table at a bar to show off was so October to mid-December of 2009. At last, an alternative. Rejoice. more ›

Benjamin Boukpeti: Picked up the first medal for Togo bronze in the men’s slalom kayak event but the French-born sportsman has only been to Togo once as a child to visit his paternal grandmother! According to Reuters, Boukpeti "only decided to compete for Togo when it became clear he was too old to make it into the far more competitive French team". more ›

Share with us how you see Shanghai, or China! Post your photos on Flickr, tag them with "shanghaiist", and we'll select one favorite image per day. Or you can simply email your photos to photos at shanghaiist.com. more ›

With 276 metric tonnes of gold produced in 2007, or over a tenth of the world's supply, China may now be the world's largest producer of gold, but as Tony Cheng of Al-Jazeera finds out, it will not be the world's largest exporter anytime soon because all that gold is being snapped up by the Chinese at home... more ›