A few links to start off your day: China claims that all government agencies will be using legitimate software by the end of 2012. Uh-huh. If they're for real, Microsoft is going to have a pretty sweet year. In an Op-Ed for the NY Times, Georgetown professor Victor Cha predicts that China will move towards effectively adopting North Korea as a province to prevent any possibility of growing US influence. A piece by Damien Ma in the Atlantic this week covers the rise of social media in China, and whether or not it can become a force for making the government more open and accountable: more ›

Greenpeace Asia says rainforests in Hainan have been disappearing at the alarming rate of about 200,000 square metres every day over the last decade due to illegal logging and the growth of new plantations. That's led to a precipitous decline in the natural habitat of the Hainan Gibbon, and the situation is so bad now that there are just 23 of them left in the wild. more ›

Tired of unsuspectingly walking out the door on those days where China's atmosphere makes Jupiter's gaseous cloud layer look like a biosphere in Costa Rica? Now with new real-time air quality tracking twitters, sites, and apps (all city-specific), you can monitor the skies without holding your licked finger to the wind, and know exactly which days it might be better to stay in instead of going on that 10 km bike ride. more ›

Let's do a quick recap of all the major food safety news so far this year: We've got cadmium in our rice, steamed buns that are actually recycled, "beef" that's actually pork, epilepsy-causing eels, cancer-causing fruit juice, cholera-inducing frogs, worm eggs in our mineral water, and exploding watermelons. If all that's still not enough to make you want to stop eating and drinking for the rest of your time in China, here's more. more ›

“Sandstorms can actually be called ‘coal dust storms’,” said Greenpeace Climate and Energy Campaigner Dr. Sun Qingwei. “Coal ash is a very tiny and light particle, easily picked up by wind. Winds traveling at 8 meters per second can already disperse coal ash up to 150,000 square kilometers from their origins in open-air dumping sites. And winds in a sandstorm are even stronger, with speeds of at least 25 meters per second - thus they can spread coal ash much farther. This means that even people who live far from thermal power plants in eastern and southern China must face the threat of coal pollution at their doorstep.”

Greenpeace released a striking photo gallery last week entitled "The dirty secret behind your jeans and bras." It chronicles the working conditions and pollution in two of Guangdong's main textile hubs, where most of the world's jeans, bras and underwear are made. Greenpeace had a look at the human and environmental impact of the industries, and the results were pretty bleak. more ›

From Greenpeace China: "Pesticides aren't your problem? Well unless you buy organic food the chances are you are eating a cocktail of toxic chemicals when you tuck into fruit and vegetables. Greenpeace China tested fruits and vegetables from supermarkets and wet markets in Beijing Shanghai and Guangzhou over the past few months and found traces of 50 different kinds of pesticide residues including two banned chemicals. Pesticides are linked to cancer, neurologicial and fertility problems."
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China's first national census on pollution was not the bearer of the best news yesterday. It revealed that, toppling China's notorious factories, farms have become the biggest single source of the main water pollutants, countrywide levels of which stood at over twice the original government estimates. more ›

• China's internet 'spin doctors' [BBC] China is using an increasing number of paid "internet commentators" in a sophisticated attempt to control public opinion. These commentators are used by government departments to scour the internet for bad news - and then negate it. They post comments on websites and forums that spin bad news into good in an attempt to shape public opinion.
• Why Western Media Mistakes Matter [ChinaGeeks] Every time we post something critical of a story in the Western media — which, for the record, isn’t that often, about 20 posts of our total 197 — this question gets asked. Yesterday it was commenter Hemulen, who phrased it thusly: "I don’t understand why you spend so much time criticizing Western media for not getting everything exactly right and being 100 per cent accurate." It’s a valid question, or at least, one to which the answer might not be readily apparent. After all, the Chinese media routinely commits graver ethical sins as a matter of policy. Shouldn’t we be going after them, instead?
• HIV prostitute' blog hoax zooms on cyber-privacy [China Daily] "A blog that falsely proclaimed that a Hebei province woman is HIV positive was a hoax by an ex-boyfriend intent upon revenge - and a case study into the debate about people's right of privacy in cyberspace. The woman, Yan Deli, a native in Hebei province, tested negative for HIV/AIDS Monday by the local disease control center. Police of Rongcheng county in Hebei province said the blog with indecent photos and words was written by Yan's ex-lover surnamed Yang, in a bid to get revenge on Yan. Yan met Yang in Beijing."

A new report commissioned by Greenpeace, the Energy Foundation and the WWF estimates that the environmental and social costs of China's coal usage hit RMB1.7 trillion last year, or about 7.1% of the country's GDP. Speaking on the report, Yang Ailun, Greenpeace's climate and energy campaign manager, urged the government to recognize “the true cost of coal [and] create incentives to develop cleaner, sustainable energy sources." more ›