We suppose this was inevitable, but it still irks us. The collaborative experiment between UK newspaper, The Guardian, and crowd-sourced translation website Yeeyan to publish selections of Guardian stories in Mandarin has been shut down by Chinese authorities. Yeeyan 's website - which also publishes other material, like translations of books and TV shows - also got the axe. The Guardian is seeking an explanation, said Editor-in-chief Alan Rusbridger, who called this "a very disconcerting development... We hope this move does not represent an attempt to suppress independent-minded journalism, and that the Chinese authorities can reassure us that Yeeyan and the Guardian will be allowed to resume publication." We won't be holding our breaths on that one, guys. more ›

• A crowd-sourced translation of The Lost Symbol: is this copyright infringement? [Danwei] "His last book, The Da Vinci Code, was wildly popular in China and propelled translations of his earlier novels onto bestseller lists as well. The latest thriller, which follows the further adventures of intrepid symbologist Robert Langdon, should sell well over here too. Once it's translated, that is. People's Literature Publishing House expects a Chinese edition to be on shelves sometime in 2010. Chinese Internet users can't wait that long, so Yeeyan, a collaborative translation website, has launched a project to crowd-source the translation of The Lost Symbol into Chinese. They've already posted the prologue and the first two chapters."
• Baidu CEO touts growth of China's search engine [Cnet News] "Baidu CEO Robin Li, on a rare visit to Silicon Valley Wednesday, explained the rise of his company's search engine in China before a group of students more interested in entrepreneurial tips than censorship. Li ended a trip to the U.S. Wednesday at Stanford University, speaking to a crowd of several hundred students about the lessons he learned shepherding Baidu through the first dot-com bust and growing it into the Google of China. Baidu has 76 percent of the Chinese search market, he said, which consists of 338 million Internet users: larger than the entire population of the U.S."
• 11 indicted over factory brawl in S China [Xinhua] "Eleven people involved in a toy factory brawl on June 26 that left two employees dead in south China's Guangdong Province have been indicted for intentional injury and group affray, procurators said Wednesday. Xiao Jianhua and four other suspects were indicted for intentionally assaulting people during the Xuri Toy Factory brawl, the Shaoguan Municipal People's Procuratorate said."