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Flickr Pick From Japan

Paul Frankenstein · 12:00

“Nishiki Ichiba(Kyoto) #3″ by osanpo

1 The case of luXuesong: LuXuesong, a teacher in Jilin College of the Arts, was suspended from her teaching post with political reason in May. She played a movie that was censored by government in her class. After this incident, she posted what she has been treated with on a BBS. It immediately became the hottest topic in Chinese Internet. Not only netizens but also some key figures in academics gave support to her. A blogger told that soon after he wrote about the Lu's case, a man commented on his blog on behalf of the school. The blogger was very puzzled with how the school authorities found his blog and commented.

2 Baidu IPO: Baidu Inc.,the “China Google”, was on IPO in Nasdaq yesterday. It amazingly jumped 354% in its first day. However just few days before its debut on stock market, it is being sued by two local companies over copyright infringement, as The Horse Mouth reports. Baidu's mp3 download program has been very controversial for allegation that it provided its user with millions of copyrighted files for free. Baidu defended itself that it was just responsible for searching the file while Baidu did not upload any of the files.

3 Alleged spying: Ching Cheong,a Singaporean journalist was charged with espionage activities in China. He was detained when he was trying to get insight into the Tiananmen massacre in 1989. However Simon World thought that the trial on him would be insignificant and soon after conviction he would be released by government.

4 New online game regulation: China's Ministry of Culture issued a new regulation to puts restriction on online multi-players game. Children under the age of 18 would no longer be allowed to play game which include Player Killing(PK). It also offered a list of suggested games, most of which are light and easy to play. Online game has grown into a social problem in China. Many teenagers, especially students gave up their school or job and even committed crime like robbery and stealing because of gaming.

5 Ban on foreign satellite broadcaster: China proposed new regulations restricting foreign capital to invest Chinese market, in an effort to tighten control over the country's cultural heritage. However Somebloggers pointed out that recently FTChina, subsidiary of Financial Times in China, managed to avoid the restriction and officially announced its Chinese website in the name of HongKong investors, HongKong Financial Times Ltd.

6 More bad words found: China Digital Times found another list of banned words in QQ, a popular instant messenger. They also gave a full translation of the 1041 filtered words. Some of the words are very obscure like name of a folk singer. It was very ironical that although the government claimed that its firewall system was mainly to block pornographical information but only 15% of the banned words are sex-related.

7 Chinese Blogger Conference: A detailed time table has been published by the organizing committee on the official website. Also the the themes and persons engaged in discussions and speeches have been determined.

2 comments · »»

The human cost of one penny less

Rezwan · 03:01

‘Dateline NBC' investigates the human costs in the developing world behind the bargain shopping trend of the Americans and the competitive deals of the big discount stores.

The investigation goes to the source of the goods these store offers. In Bangladesh, a female worker, Masuma gets more like 17 cents for sewing as much as 80 stripes on pants in an hour, a perfectly legal wage, and more than many Bangladeshis like her earn. But she can barely live with that wages.

MSNBC arranged to bring her to the US, to a store where these pants are sold. She was shocked to find the selling price ($12.84) of one striped pant, more than she could imagine. She said the price of the pants left her feeling taken advantage of. If she was paid 25 cents an hour instead of 17, a 50 percent raise, she could lead what she considers a decent life.

When a US customer on that store was asked in front of Masuma, whether she would by the pant if it was 25 cents more, she declined. She said that she feels for Masuma, but she is counting her pennies as well. It’s the debate over globalization in its simplest form.

One Bangladeshi garments executive claims:

A few years back, I told Wal-Mart, “Give me one cents more a piece, one cent. I will use that money for these poor people.’ Wal-Mart's reply was, ‘No, give us two cents less.'

So the industry gives in to the competition, shattering millions of workers' (like Masuma) dreams:

“They make us work so hard, and they cheat us so much and we're human beings. I'm not an animal. I'm a human being. Of course I'm angry. This is really shocking.”

Will they ever be heard? Will we still be counting our pennies?

4 comments · »»