Gadget Republic proclaims that this means it's "goodbye Twitter" forever in China. We think the verdict's still out on that. Still, it's good to know if you had been planning on getting your feet wet in the Weibo world, but had been dismayed by the language barrier. Unfortunately, no similar app for Android users yet. Also see: Digicha's Sina Weibo guide.
Sina Weibo now has an English iPhone app
Fan of the Angry Birds iPhone game? Play it IRL in Guangzhou
Because those damn pigs deserve to be knocked around by irate poultry outside of a tiny smartphone screen too! What's next, a carnival booth of Bejeweled? How about a real life version of Fruit Ninja?
There's an App for that: Driving in China
The App Store has 1000’s of paid or free applications which are useful to anyone planning to live in or visit China. Every week or so I plan on introducing a few applications in this ‘There’s An App For That:
.’ section. Today I’m covering driving with 3 free applications from the App store available for download now!
Get Exploremetro's Shanghai subway iPhone app for free!
Congratulations Matt! Our good friend at Exploremetro has managed to get a million people to download his iPhone app - and he's decided to celebrate by giving it out for free! Just for the next two days though. In case you own an iPhone and were on the fence about picking this up, now's the time to give it a twirl. You would have to empty your pockets of 99 cents otherwise!
Around Shanghai: Abbey Road reopens, beer gets chic and iPhone apps!
- Abbey Road, the vaguely Beatles-themed pub which shut down for just a little while to "refresh," will be opening up again on January 7 AND they're extending their daily happy hour to 8pm. Opening party is this Friday (you get one free drink if you go).
- There's been significantly more dark ales and microbrews popping up in China, which means (glee!) we might finally be getting some beer culture. We'll believe it when we see something better than Reeb in the Kuaidi. [CNNgo]
- To make up for ragging on the USA Pavilion Expo team yesterday, here's a cool little fact about them: One of the Shanghai Expo Inc. trifecta, Nick Winslow, supervised the special effects for Star Trek - The Movie and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. [Urbanatomy]
Lenovo oPhone video shows a distinct Apple flavor
While the system seems pretty cool, we feel like we've definitely seen that OS somewhere else.
The semi-not-really-legal way to purchase from iTunes: Taobao
Sure, here in China there's legitimate download sites and there's mp3.baidu.com, but if you've ever wanted to straggle the fence between legality and piracy, there's a way to do that too. Taobao has long been harboring many iTunes store gift voucher hackers, selling $200 USD (1,368 RMB) gift cards for as little as 18RMB.

