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"Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude. El perdón ..."

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 05:00:00 GMT

Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude.

El perdón no es un acto ocasional; es un actitud permanente.

–Martin Luther King (via nchenga)

can you be any more beautiful? just a tad of lovely broth to finish off the most perfect of foods. bask in your own delight, dear pho bowls!

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 20:45:01 GMT

can you be any more beautiful? just a tad of lovely broth to finish off the most perfect of foods. bask in your own delight, dear pho bowls!

(via Blue Lotus)

mathematical computation #2:

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 22:46:33 GMT

mathematical computation #2:
arrow love + pho love = LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE

(via SOFTSERVEGIRL)

I feel pretty, Oh, so pretty, I feel pretty and witty and bright! And I pity....

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 07:53:25 GMT

I feel pretty, Oh, so pretty, I feel pretty and witty and bright! And I pity. Any girl who isn’t me tonight. I feel charming, Oh, so charming. It’s alarming how charming I feel! And so pretty …

(via whitneybee)

Highest Polluters in California: Using free GIS tool Map Builder

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 05:00:00 GMT

The Center for Investigative Reporting has release a map of California’s top polluters. This was built with Map Builders, a free GIS mapping tool. I’m excited to give this tool a try!

The top 100 carbon dioxide-producing facilities in California generated 101,890,944 metric tons of CO2 in 2007, according to data recently released by the California Air Resources Board. We’ve mapped that data to show where the 100 largest polluters are located. Power plants and oil refineries appear to be the largest culprits. The data is self-reported to the air resources board. (from California Watch)

Thanks @Javierest for posting this on twitter!

computational mathematics: happy pho eaters + happy faces = happy stomachs ∞ happy lives.

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 20:06:00 GMT

computational mathematics: happy pho eaters + happy faces = happy stomachs ∞ happy lives.

(via David K. Werk)

"Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world. ..."

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 16:10:04 GMT

Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.

De pequeños actos, cuando se muliplican por millones de personas, pueden transformar el mundo.

–Howard Zinn (via teresawu)

I am such a messy messy pho eater that I definitely need Bib Technology to ke...

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 05:08:22 GMT

I am such a messy messy pho eater that I definitely need Bib Technology to keep me clean - but I think messiness means that you did a good job digging into your pho! adriene took this photo of me while I was eating pho.

fuckyeahpho:

It is very important to wear proper eating technology devices, such as paper napkins to cover your lavender silk dress from the excited splashes created by PHO eating. If not you could possibly leave with a shirt that says more about your PHO than it does about your eating practices!

Tricia and {pussy power} (via SOFTSERVEGIRL)

go ahead, top it off with a chili pepper. I DARE YOU!

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 23:56:49 GMT

go ahead, top it off with a chili pepper. I DARE YOU!

(via knightbefore_99)

Wow. phở tái (pho tai) : 2 bowls under $2 in Vietnam (?) (!) can you say EXCITING? When can I go and get me some?

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 23:19:44 GMT

Wow. phở tái (pho tai) : 2 bowls under $2 in Vietnam (?) (!) can you say EXCITING? When can I go and get me some?

(via smather)

Beijing Gulou area transformed to "time museum"?

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 06:12:06 GMT

Danwei's Must-Read China News

Shared by Graham
ugh

The Beijinger blog writes:

Disturbing news in the Chinese press has bar owners around Gulou (aka the Drum Tower) feeling nervous. Plans have been announced to “restore” the area around the tower to the style of the Ming and Qing Dynasties and build an underground “Beijing Time Cultural City,” comprising restaurants, parking spaces, and a museum about timekeeping...

"Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties. La creatividad req..."

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:00:00 GMT

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

La creatividad requiere el valor de dejar ir de lo que se sabe con certeza.

–Erich Fromm

Internet Survival Guide for Traveling Where Privacy Isn't Respected - Google - Lifehacker

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 08:32:05 GMT

lifehacker.com

Ed. note: On Tuesday, Google responded to cyber attacks aimed at Chinese human-rights activists by ending search-result censorship in China. An anonymous reader with experience living where privacy isn't respected writes in with tips for keeping your data safe in these situations.

5 Cool About:Config Hacks To Make Firefox Browsing Smoother

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 08:31:49 GMT

www.makeuseof.com

There's no doubt in anybody's mind that Mozilla Firefox is one of the best browsers out there. It also has the honor of being the biggest rival to Microsoft's

Hilarious video on social media experts speaking on social media’s power to harness social media for our sociallly mediated Lives.

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:10:59 GMT

Hilarious video on social media experts speaking on social media’s power to harness social media for our sociallly mediated Lives.

After watching this video I suggest you read Ryan Shaw’s post on “Social Media Won’t Improve History”. Thanks zadi for posting this!

zadi:

Haha! The truth about social media experts/gurus. I can’t even begin to express how accurate this is… and funny.

Watch this clip if you are ever having any existential crises about anything ...

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:07:11 GMT

Watch this clip if you are ever having any existential crises about anything and everything. It’s a short animated clip made by Trey Parker & Matt Stone featuring a small segment of an Alan Watts lecture

Wood Porn#2

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:00:17 GMT

Gnat Gnat

Found on a random Facebook page. Looking everything in this scene.

Wood Porn#1

Out-of-Work Architects Turn to Other Skills - NYTimes.com

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 01:44:53 GMT

www.nytimes.com

A troubled economy and the implosion of the real estate market have thrown thousands of architects and designers out of work, forcing them to find or create jobs.

Photographer Accused of Shooting Wolf in Captivity

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 23:53:47 GMT

ANIMAL

Shared by djacobs
I don't understand how this is faking.

A Spanish artist has been accused of faking this extremely awesome photo of a wolf, not with any Photoshop phoniness, but with a zoo animal. José Luis Rodríguez won a $16k prize from the Veolia Environment Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition for his shot of a supposedly wild wolf jumping a gate, but is said to have broken the ...

Muji and Lego

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 23:51:41 GMT

Lost At E Minor: For creative people

Shared by triciawang
this is soooooo cooool!

Muji & Lego recently released a joint product that consists of a box of Lego pieces that also comes with sheets of paper — with a particular hole-punch (not included), the paper and Legos can be combined into some cute creations.

My Suggestions for Making Google's Services More Relevant for Non-Elite Chinese Users (involves some ethnography!)

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 23:30:38 GMT

I originally posted this on Cultural Bytes, my fieldwork blog. Here’s the first part of it. You can read the rest here.

Google announced on its company blog that Chinese hackers had attacked its users and as a result Google.CN may leave China due to the security breaches.

While unfortunate that Google.CN may be shutting down, my ethnographic work in China revealed five things that aren’t being told in the current story:

Many Chinese internet users don’t find Google to be very useful. Therefore, a Google withdrawal would not have any immediate impact on the daily Chinese internet user because most people search with Baidu, the reigning search engine in China.
Many Chinese internet users prefer Baidu over Google because using Baidu makes them feel more “Chinese.” Baidu does an excellent job at tapping into nationalistic fervor to promote itself as being the most superior search engine for Chinese users.
Chinese internet users don’t know how to get to the Google site. While they may “know” of Google, it’s a whole other matter when it comes to typing or saying Google’s name.
Google is primarily used by highly educated netizens. And even these users prefer Google.COM over Google.CN.
Google is not successful at reaching the mobile internet market.

I arrived at these insights after I spent over 300 hours conducting participant observation and informal interviews this past summer with government policy-makers, academics, youth, migrants, and low-income users. I was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) (more info) to be a research scholar at the China Internet Network Information Center 中国互联网络信息中心 (CNNIC), located in Beijing, China. The center is overseen by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT). CNNIC manages the hardware aspect of China’s internet and produces quantitatively oriented research on internet usage in China. Their data provides policy direction for party ministries, information for private companies, and statistics for the government. While my main focus was not on Google (more info on research), the topic frequently came up and I started realizing that the non-use of Google provided a lot of cultural insights into the practices of Chinese internet users.

The blame for Google’s lack of success in China cannot solely be placed on this most recent episode with Chinese hackers. Other complications have started long before this occurrence, such as the myriad of ways in which policies work to favor Chinese companies over international ones, the difficulty in competing against government paid search results on Baidu, and the impossibility of providing consistent service when the government shuts down access to the entire Google site for few days. All of these reasons lie beyond Google’s control.

There are, however, other explanations that do lie within Google’s control in which they have failed to execute. The 3 main factors are: achieving brand recognition, creating a successful marketing campaign, and understanding usage contexts of non-elite internet users. Google should hold themselves accountable for these factors.read the rest on Cultural Bytes

The Containment of Black Bodies: Feed Black People KFC Fried Chicken and They will Stop Dancing

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 22:44:00 GMT

The Containment of Black Bodies: Feed Black People KFC Fried Chicken and They will Stop Dancing

I am appalled at the this commercial and am shocked that KCF denies how this commercial is racist.

This commercial plays on white anxiety of “posturing” among black people to be seen as legitimate and “down.” This commercial also annoys me because it tells a narrative of white people as leaders and black people as followers.

In this KFC commercial of a cricket game, the white man feels awkward as he is unable to “get down” and bond with all the other people in the stadium - who happen to be black. He is sitting while everyone is grooving happily to the music. He looks around and covers his face with his hands in exasperation. Alas! The white man has an idea! He will appease the energetic, dancing, music/marimba crowd with FRIED CHICKEN from KFC!

When the black people take his fried Chicken - the music stops, people stop dancing - alas them black folks are quiet. The white man smiles. He appears to be comfortable now that the black people have stopped dancing and have given him approval for bringing the fried chicken. Notice the black woman below him, looking at him in awe.

WTF WTF WTF!

“Feeling awkward because you’re the only person with your particular racial make up in a group is called white privilege. Most racial minorities find themselves the only or one of the only members of their group all of the time. Calling the situation “awkward” just suggests that white people are, or should be, uncomfortable around black people.” Lisa Wade from Sociological Images.

An Australian professor claimed that Americans were overreacting to the commercial and over-interpreting the KFC Fried Chicken association with black people - essentially saying that the US’s racist take on the commercial was ethnocentric. But let’s just set aside the association of fried chicken and blacks, and let’s just focus on the interaction between the white man and the black crowd. It’s still RACIST!

I don’t know even know where to start in my analysis of this. Let me start with a few thoughts that come to my head:

portrayal of blacks as loud in juxtaposition to the quiet white man
portrayal of the black bodies as one that is constantly moving, dancing, and uncontrollable, and as bodies that needed to be “controlled” - harks back to days of slavery where dancing among blacks were seen as dangerous
portrayal of the white man as providing the “secret” to “calming” black people down
portrayal of white people not understanding black people’s culture but blacks as willing to understand white people’s ideas/things
the insinuation that stillness (with the help of KFC fried Chicken) over activity is a preferable state for containing black people
white people are unable to bond with blacks
white people feel awkward among blacks
using food to appease blacks - Colonists and slave-owners believed that if they just fed the people that they were oppressing, they would remain subservient
And let’s not even get started on the location of this commercial in Australia - hello any sensitivity to Aboriginal people or Torres Strait Islanders?
And what’s up with portraying West Indians as listening to quasi-Caribbean marimba shaking music? I guess I should be happy that they didn’t use hip-hop.

Companies often make engage in racist marketing. I had similar reaction when I saw Canon’s advertisement of Tribal Masai in a German airport a few years ago.

BBC News - China shopping centre builds 'car park for women'

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 21:00:57 GMT

news.bbc.co.uk

Shared by kristen
Deathly stupid.

A shopping centre in China's Hebei province designs a women-only car park with wider spaces and bright colours.

Wood Porn#1

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 20:43:04 GMT

Gnat Gnat

Shared by triciawang
looks like a coffin!

It’s so pretty.

Well done you

Don't Leave China Google! My Suggestions for Making Google's Services More Relevant for Non-Elite Chinese Users (involves some ethnography!)

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 06:58:00 GMT

Google announced on its company blog that Chinese hackers had attacked its users and as a result Google.CN may leave China due to the security breaches.

While unfortunate that Google.CN may be shutting down, my ethnographic work in China revealed five things that aren’t being told in the current story:

Many Chinese internet users don’t find Google to be very useful. Therefore, a Google withdrawal would not have any immediate impact on the daily Chinese internet user because most people search with Baidu, the reigning search engine in China.
Many Chinese internet users prefer Baidu over Google because using Baidu makes them feel more “Chinese.” Baidu does an excellent job at tapping into nationalistic fervor to promote itself as being the most superior search engine for Chinese users.
Chinese internet users don’t know how to get to the Google site. While they may “know” of Google, it’s a whole other matter when it comes to typing or saying Google’s name.
Google is primarily used by highly educated netizens. And even these users prefer Google.COM over Google.CN.
Google is not successful at reaching the mobile internet market.

Google has failed at brand recognition. They have not been successful at making their services relevant for the average Chinese internet user nor have they made it easy for people to recognize, say, or even type in their name on a keyboard.

People didn’t even know how to correctly pronounce and agree on the pronunciation of the name “Google.” When I was with a group of 5 youth, I asked them if they used Google, instead of getting an answer we launched into a 10 minute conversation trying to figure out the correct name. While it was clear that we were all referring to Google, the IT company, it was not clear which characters to use for its name. Google does not have an immediately recognizable name like Apple (Pingguo) or Yahoo (Yahe) or Baidu. I, like many other Chinese people still refer to Google by its colloquial name, GouGou - doggy (狗狗). While Google did consider GouGou as a name, in 2006 it announced that its new name would be Gu-Ge” (谷歌). But the name didn’t stick and so many people still continued to refer to Google as GouGou. Gu-Ge is supposed to mean “harvest songs”— romantic referral to a “fruitful and productive search experience, in a poetic Chinese way”. I guess that Google excecs thought, “Hey if Chinese peasants sings happy harvest songs for their productive crops, then Chinese netizens will use Gu-Ge for happy productive online searches!” Hmmmm…Back in 2006 I argued that the new name was quiet “a semantic stretch.” Even worse, it conjured up images of “slow and remote agricultural scenes,” said Jin Ge, a researcher on Chinese online gamers. The new name was so unpopular that Google fans started an online petition in 2006 for Google to abandon Gu-Ge. Google didn’t listen. The lesson? When your market cannot pronounce, remember or correctly identify your name, you’ve got a major problem—especially when your names invokes images of sterile hinterlands or groins, grasshoppers, and shaving breasts.

The confusion over Google’s Chinese name also has other consequences: people were unsure of how to type in the name “Google” on the computer keyboard. When I asked people to take me to the Google site, I received a lot of similar responses of uncertainty.

Some youth would attempt to type GouGou (the colloquial name for Google) and they would reach GouGou.cn or GouGou.com thinking that they were at the Google site because it looked similar to Google’s bare aesthetics even though the corporate symbol is a dog. Since many people, even me, still refer to Google as GouGou, it’s not a surprise that people thought that they were at Google’s site even though they were at GouGou.com. Others would type “Gogel,” which lead to nowhere.
Those who typed Google with just one “O” (Gogle) would get to the Google site only IF they typed in .COM. domain. If they just pressed the enter key after typing in “Gogle” it would take them to Gogle.CN, which is a phishing site. This is even more confusing because Gogle.CN is designed to look like Google’s bare aesthetics. If you click on “Login 登录” in the top right corner where the Gmail login is usually located on the real Google site, you’re taken to a page that says Gogle.CN Login but its page is titled Google! As you can see in the picture below and where I’ve circled in pink, it’s really misleading! I’ve noticed that most computers default to the .CN site in internet cafes, so this could hypothetically happen quite often if Chinese users try to go to Google and they type in the name with one less “O.”
IF youth did get to Google’s site successfully by either typing in the name correctly or going to Google.com, Gogle.COM, or Guge.COM/CN, it would usually be on their 5th or 7th or even 8th try - that is if they hadn’t given up yet and by then it was just clear that they were doing it because I had asked them to show me how to get to the Google site. It was quite obvious that going to the Google site was never part of their internet routine.

It’s not the case that people are unfamiliar with Google. People know of Google, but they don’t want to use it because it’s associated with being “Un-Chinese.” Part of Baidu’s success lies in its successful marketing campaign against Google, using nationalism as one of their publicity strategies. It’s been working well. The campaign is so effective that netizens associate the use of Google with being unpatriotic. In this infamous Baidu commercial from 2006 (below), Baidu wins an intelligence contest over the its unnamed foreign competiter who is represented by the white male actor. Baidu succeeds in “knowing more” in the back and forth banter over the meaning of the scroll. Even the white man’s Chinese female lover decides to leave him for the Chinese scholar who “knows more.”

I don’t think Baidu is playing unfairly because American companies often tap into US nationalism with “Buy Made in the USA” campaigns. Google just needs to be more creative in using more strategic marketing to overcome its negative cultural stigma in China—a stigma that is actively nurtured by its competitor.

But here’s the thing, solving the marketing and brand recognition problem is relatively simple when the bigger problem is that Google’s services are not useful!

Youth didn’t see how any of the services offered by Google were easier to use than the ones that they were already using. This is because Google operates in an e-mail paradigm while other services operate in a messenger paradigm. One time when I was checking my Gmail account at an internet cafe, a youth asked me, ” how do you leave pictures and messages for others?” I would say, “just send them an email.” But here’s the thing - youth don’t have to send emails when they are using MSN Messenger. There’s a major disconnect in communication culture. Messenger-like services don’t operate on an email paradigm. QQ and MSN users can go to a friend’s MSN Live profile or QQ box to leave a message or post a photo. You can check on each friend’s page to see their last update. It’s like a mini-facebook for every MSN user but just for your own contacts. If a friend wasn’t online, youth didn’t send them an email. Rather, they would click on the user’s name and write a direct message that would be sent immediately but read later when the recipient logged in at a later point in time.
One teenager asked me how I shared music with Gmail. I tried to explain that I used Dropbox and I put the file my public folder and then give the url to my friend. By the time I was done with my explanation, she looked totally confused. I asked her how her and her friends shared music. She said, oh I just put it in my QQ box and my friends can go in and download it. My way didn’t make sense for them and my method didn’t even involve Google. QQ and MSN make it easy for youth to exchange files without emails and without having to own your own computer. We need to understand what it means to live in an instant messaging paradigm as opposed to an e-mail paradigm.
By the way, this is also what I’ve observed outside of the US in Mexico, where my most recent fieldwork continues to show that the primary online communication method are messenger services, not email.

Mobiles are becoming more popular and other companies are doing a better job of delivering mobile content and services. For example, several high school students showed me how they could access MSN Messenger and QQ chat on their cellphone for mobile internet. I asked them why they chose to use these apps. Some youth told me that they were already on the phone when they bought it (some were used), and others told me that it was really easy to download when you go the MSN or QQ site at an internet cafe. One of the most important reasons is that most people already have a MSN or QQ account. So when they begin to use mobile internet, the transition to using mobile MSN or QQ Messenger is an obvious one.
For many of these low-income youth, mobile internet was used more frequently than internet cafes. They didn’t have a computer at home but what they did have was a cellphone that always had a signal. Another example is that cellphone companies have partnerships with Baidu or QQ Tencent to deliver mobile content. People would often show me a SMS of the latest news updates from Baidu. They told me that when they bought the cellphone, the vendor would help them sign up for the services. Google needs to think about how to cross into mobile services because other companies have deep relationships with mobile carriers to ensure that a new mobile user receives content from their company.

So who is using Google in China? Google is primarily used by elite Chinese users while Baidu is mainly used by non-elites. What’s the difference between elite and non-elite users? Elite users are those who are highly educated and can speak or at least read English. Interestingly, the biggest fans of Google were Chinese academics age 18 years and older. They used Google Scholar, Google Translation and Gmail for the same purposes as Western users. They relied on Google for their research and said that there was no site that even matched Google’s services. The way that Chinese professors, researchers, and academics work is more akin to the way that Westerners manage their relationships and projects. Therefore, the adoption of Google among highly educated Chinese is not surprising. Highly educated Chinese users organize and prioritize information in ways that are much more similar to Western users than non-elite Chinese users.

Sometimes you will hear me say, “I cannot imagine life without Google!” And it’s true - I can’t imagine living without my Gcal, Reader, Apps, Voice, Docs, and etc. Chinese academics who read English would often say the same thing when we talked about Google, frequently professing their love for Google. For these intellectuals, they didn’t feel less “Chinese” for using Google. My impression was that they felt more informed, could access media beyond China, and were more aware of global discourses (this includes celebrity gossip).

While Google may have a loyal following among Chinese academics, they only make up a small percentage of the population. If Google wants to become a more popular search engine in China, it has to do a better job at reaching non-elite users. Google isn’t going to get anywhere as the search engine for the intellectuals of China.

Google has built an empire of services that work for Western contexts and values. So it’s no surprise that their most loyal fans outside of the US are elite users who share similar class and occupational backgrounds with Western users. To reach new users with an entirely different set of cultural practices, Google has to rethink and reinvent itself for the Chinese market. Sometimes, one size does not fit all.

It’s one thing if Google’s difficulties could just simply be attributed to government interference, and bad marketing and publicity. But that’s not the case. Their services just simply are not useful for most Chinese users. I suggest that Google dedicate itself to understanding the Chinese market in a socio-anthropological way. They should be hiring Chinese and non-Chinese ethnographers, sociologists, and anthropologists. They should be working in teams with human-computer interaction designers, programmers, and managers. Google should invest in long-term fieldwork for teams to immerse themselves in non-elite environments.

I hope Google doesn’t leave China because both sides would lose. I would like to see the Chinese government ease off of Google. And I would like to hear from Google committing itself to creating such overwhelmingly great and relevant services that makes Chinese netizens want to use their apps.

Competition and collaboration are essential factors for an innovative market.

The last thing that China wants to communicate to the world is that it does not offer a fair playground for companies to compete against each other or against government-cozy companies. One of the keys factors to sustain and increase China’s growth this century depends on its ability to attract capital. It doesn’t look good when the largest IT company does not want to work in China.

The success of China also depends on its ability to innovate. Historically, the culture has favored followers over leaders. While this is slowly changing, companies like Google are a positive influence on the Chinese work culture because the company promotes a culture of innovation, research, and transparency. What this means is that it values risk-takers and creative minds. Working at Google gives many Chinese researchers, programmers, and managers an opportunity to engage with companies that have different protocols and values than local Chinese companies.

And lastly, collaboration is critical for innovation. If Google and the Chinese government cannot work through this together, then China would be signaling to the world that it just pushed out one of the world’s most innovative IT companies. If Google stays in China, it should think about how to become a leader for IT innovation in China. Some good ideas to consider can be found in Isaac Mao’s open letter to Google to “save [the] Internet in China.” Mao suggests that Google create a VC fund, develop anti-censorship tools, and improve Adsense. I am a big fan of his first suggestion of creating a VC fund as a way to nurture new Chinese IT companies. This is an excellent idea that would infuse the market with innovative companies that are more closely aligned with Google’s culture. With Google running a R&D like VC fund, it would diversify the players in the Chinese internet landscape, increase Google’s industry alliances, and nurture its ties to other IT leaders that may have deeper connections to other sectors

Whatever the outcome, we should not be misled to think that everyone is on the same page in the Chinese government. Like all large institutions, there are different alliances and divergent opinions. The Chinese government is not a unified front that necessarily agrees across all levels on its censorship policies. I believe that there is a lot of opportunity for change. I worked with a lot of smart and open minded people who were willing to explore different positions. The question is that are those talented people in the position to bring things like innovation, competition, and collaboration together.

In the beginning of this post, I said that that if Google were to leave China, there would be no immediate impacts on the average Chinese internet user. However, the long-term impacts would be devastating. The Chinese IT industry would lose such a critical player. The Chinese government would appear more hostile towards international businesses and privacy protocols. The citizens of China would have less access to unfiltered information. And the world beyond China would lose a critical link to the country. I hope that a compromise can be reached.

Desperately Seeking China VPN

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 15:15:11 GMT

Thomas Crampton

In the wake of Google’s clash with Beijing, it is interesting to note that more and more people are searching for VPNs in China. (Actually, people started searching even before Google’s clash, so there may have been a tightening of the Internet even before Google went public.)

How do I know? Due to a poll I did a few months ago about The Best VPN for China, my blog is one of the top results...

How to Access Twitter and Facebook in China

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 14:29:12 GMT

Wangjianshuo's blog

I setup my connection to Twitter and Facebook via SSH tunnel again. When the original tools to access Twitter, and Facebook failed, I just lost interest to setup proxy. Now, I am back and just accepted the 109 Facebook friend request. (My rule: Accept everyone in jianshuo@Facebook, but be very selective on Kaixin001.com. Here is how I did it.

The process is pretty straight forward, but it is...

London's Olympic stadium to be made out of recycled guns and knives

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 12:29:03 GMT

Coudal Partners Blended Feed

London's Olympic stadium to be made out of recycled guns and knives

FT on cultural differences in Chinese internet use

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 09:49:00 GMT

Putting people first

Western companies are struggling to bridge the growing gap created by the evolution of a cyberspace with Chinese characteristics. Kathrin Hille explains some of the cultural (and political) differences in today’s Financial Times.

“[Chinese people] tend to roam the web like a huge playground, whereas Europeans and Americans are more likely to use it as a gigantic library. Recent research by the...

we all love our pho, and I have to admit this is ONE TASTY looking bowl. But ...

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 05:33:36 GMT

we all love our pho, and I have to admit this is ONE TASTY looking bowl. But the raw egg? I draw my line there - raw meat is the NORM in my bowl of pho, but raw egg (?) woah, that does not cut it for me!

(via noodlepie)

Research team 'virtualizes' supercomputer

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 21:12:47 GMT

PhysOrg.com - latest science and technology news stories

A collaboration between researchers at Northwestern University, Sandia National Labs and the University of New Mexico has resulted in the largest-scale study ever done on what many consider an important part of the future of computing -- the virtualization of parallel supercomputing systems.

Mendeley on a Digital Mission to Texas

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 16:08:49 GMT

Mendeley Blog

Great news! We’ve been picked by Chinwag and the UKTI to don our cowboy boots and Stetson hat before jetting off to the great Lone Star State on a Digital Mission.

“39 of the UK’s leading digital companies have been selected for the second annual Digital Mission to South by South West interactive (SXSWi), taking place in Austin, Texas from 11-17th March 2010. [...] The successful companies were...

Nokia’s design and user experience library

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 08:22:56 GMT

Putting people first

In recognition of the importance that good design and user experience plays in creating successful products and services, Forum Nokia has renewed and extended it support available for those looking to improve the quality of their mobile applications. Central to this effort has been the launch of a new User Experience program and resources for designers.

Most useful of all is the launch of the

"Giving up doesn’t always mean you are weak. Sometimes it means that you are s..."

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 15:00:00 GMT

Giving up doesn’t always mean you are weak. Sometimes it means that you are strong enough to let go.

Rindarte no siempre significa que tu es débil. A veces significa que tu es lo suficientemente fuerte como para dejar ir

–Author Unknown (via quote-book)

Ooohh Eating Pho in a designer Pho-Bowl!

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 15:00:00 GMT

Ooohh Eating Pho in a designer Pho-Bowl!

I would love to try this pho bowl by Omid Sadri at Yanko Designs! My only concern is that it wouldn’t hold enough basil, mint, onions, and mint for me! oh and of course the sprouts.

Does anyone have this bowl? If you do please let the readers of Fuck Yeah Pho know how useful you find this pho-bowl. Thank you Pho Fever for bring this bowl to our attention!

Open Street Map Project for Crisis Mappers in Haiti

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 09:07:00 GMT

Open Street Map, Haiti Wiki

via mikehudack:

“The volunteer-driven Open Street Map project has become a central data source for the Crisis Mappers. It is regarded by many as the most up-to-date map of the area. It combines UN damage assessment, digitized imagery, Public Domain Topos and other base data. In the wake of the tragedy Google quickly released Haiti data gathered from its MapMaker program. DigitalGlobe has made its satellite imagery of Haiti freely available as well (as did GeoEye). Shortly there will be a free iPhone app with maps of Haiti coming to the App Store. Andrew Johnson and Jeffrey Johnson (no relation) have adapted an existing iPhone app (www.gaiagps.com) to provide offline maps to for relief workers. It combines Digital Globe (1m resolution), GeoEye (.5m resolution updated on 1/13), and OpenStreetMap (constantly being updated).”
—

Haiti: OSM and Sat Imagery for Free iPhone App - O’Reilly Radar

Internet cafes in China: The Closest Thing to a Playground for Migrant Children

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 08:16:00 GMT

I did some preliminary fieldwork at the Xinke Migrant school in Wuhan. Here is a story that I think illustrates the misunderstandings about “internet addiction” among youth in China and why government initiated policies limiting internet use among youth will not be effective. These policies aim to curb internet use among youth in public internet cafes, not in private homes. Middle-class and upper-class families have computers at home for their child, therefore most massive internet cafes are used by low-income populations.

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About the school: The XinKe school is for children of rural-urban migrants in Wuhan, China. Since migrants don’t have a residential permit (hukou) to be in the city, they are not allowed to attend any of the public schools or access any government-subsidized social services. Therefore, schools for migrant children have opened up around Chinese cities to serve this new population. Many of these schools are unstable, understaffed, unsanitary, and under-qualified. The XinKe school is government certified, therefore they are slightly more legitimate than other non-certified, essentially illegal, migrant schools.

Each student has to pay around 600 yuan ($75) each quarter to attend the school. If students were to attend the school in their birth village, they would not have to pay for their education. The government made high school in rural areas free of charge in 2007. Yet, with rural economies faltering all around China, migrants are pushing forward into cities with their children, regardless of the costs associated with being “illegal” in a city within their own country.

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My story: The principal of the school told me that students often sleep in class because they are not living in places with good shelter. The principal also said that one of his biggest concerns was the negative consequences of internet addiction among the students. He told me that youth, as young as seven years old, would spend eight hours a day at cyber-cafes playing online games instead of using the internet to do their homework.

When I asked students why they spent so much time in the cafes, they repeatedly told me that they thought it was fun; it was a place for them to play with their friends on and off-line. They told me that they often shared a computer between 2-3 friends and would spend the time playing games. If you think about this, this is a very physical process that involves the body in a physical place. Inside the cafes, you often see 2-3 kids (genders don’t mix) around one computer. One kid is playing a game, while the other two are giving advice, yelling at him, or trying to take over the round. There bodies are touching due to the spatial constraints. Kids will grab each other’s arms, try to take over the mouse, and point at the screen. What I’m describing here is a lot of bonding and touching that takes place off-line inside the internet cafe.

The key is the off-line part: the internet cafe for the kids are equivalent to an outdoor playground. In Wuhan, public playgrounds are rare. Therefore, the internet cafe serves as a digital and physical playground for youth to spend time together in place.

I then spoke to the parent of a child who had been spending a lot of time at the internet cafe and was receiving low marks in his classes. I asked whether or not this concerned her. Interestingly, she told me her and her husband were well aware of his internet habits, but they were partially relieved to know where he was spending his time. They were happy that he wasn’t hanging out on the street with local street gangs or engaging in activities that could get him trouble. While they weren’t happy that he wasn’t doing his schoolwork because of his time spent at the café, they could at least feel assured that he was safe and in one place at all times.

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This story illustrates how parents justify the time that their kids spend at the cafes despite the negative impact on their education. Although government laws try to prevent youth from spending excessive amounts of time online at internet cafes, the laws will not be as effective when low-income parents think of the internet cafe as the most ideal “babysitting” site that is affordable and safe. Parents only have to spend 10-20 yuan a day for their kids to spend all night or day at the cafe. The cafe has a bathroom and sells instant noodle.

And for the kids - they just see this as a fun place to hang out. They’re not just gaming with strangers online. The cafe is a physical place where friendships are negotiated face-to-face.

If the government wants kids to spend less time in internet cafes, they should think about building more public spaces for low-income families. They should improve the access to education for non-hukou residents in migrant destination cities.

*****

In the first picture (top left), the principal is trying to reach a mother of a ten-year old child who has been spending every afternoon at the internet cafe. The picture on the top right shows the internet cafe that the student goes to every night. It is a one-minute walk from where he lives with his family. The picture on the bottom left shows the student being reprimanded by the teacher for not doing his homework. The picture on the bottom right shows the student’s classroom.

More pictures of the Xinke school for migrants here on flickr.

Don't worry, you can still sext in China

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 08:00:00 GMT

Shanghaiist

Hey sexy texters, feel free to whip out your phones and tell your respective others how much you like bedtime moves. What? Worried that it'll somehow get your SMS service turned off by the folks at China Mobile and the Public Security Bureau? Thankfully, it turns out that news of those proposed regulations against sexting aren't quite true... at least for now.

Over the weekend, a short...

New Product: Microsoft Mischief, an interactive student/teacher teaching tool for the classroom

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 07:41:59 GMT

The new Microsoft Mischief seems like an ingenious extension of powerpoint! I would love to see this technology being used in the classroom.

This product is being marketed as a tool for teachers in less unevenly developed countries.

One of the things that came to my mind was that other than the basic tools needed (computer, projector, stable electricity for at least 1 hour), do classrooms need to have desks/tables that are smooth enough for the wifi mouse? Many of the classrooms that I’ve seen in under-served areas don’t even have a desks with a smooth surface. The picture on the left is taken from a school that I visited in Wuhan, China. It’s a school for children of migrant workers. Many of the desks were mottled with holes and missing pieces of wood. So I wonder how smooth a desk surface needs to be for mice to work on it?

Regardless, this is a totally awesome tool and I can imagine it being useful in classrooms all around the world regardless of the income-level of the school or region. And I like that this tool was built for a classroom with just one computer.

I don’t always think that more computers = more learning. One of the things that I’ve noticed in classrooms where each student has their own computer is that the computer can come between the student and the teacher. And if teachers want to control or monitor what their students are doing while they are teaching, they either have to walk around and look their students’ screens or use a remote screen where they can see every students’ screen. But by doing this, it interrupts what they are teaching.

Well I can’t wait to hear from teachers what they think of this tool.

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Exceprt from the developer, Neema Moraveji’s site,

We put normal mice on each desk of a classroom and connect them to a single computer. We connect a projector to that computer so all the children using those mice are looking at the same large screen. The teacher controls (and creates) the social activities on the computer easily and scores of students can join in simultaneously.

From the student’s perspective, they are engaged with the teaching content because they can reach out and ‘touch’ it, playing with their friends on-screen and completing the activities. The children enjoy the fact that everybody can see everybody else’s on-screen avatar, making it a shared experience.

From the teacher’s perspective, she remains in control of the class but can easily switch on interactive activities that keep students engaged and allow once quiet children a voice. Mischief reads normal PowerPoint files and makes them come to life, so creating new activities is easy: just add slides and clip-art.

Paper: Mischief: supporting remote teaching in developing regions; authors: Neema Moraveji, Taemie Kim, James Ge, Udai Singh Pawar, Kathleen Mulcahy, and Kori Inkpen
April 2008

"Live your daily life in a way that you never lose yourself. When you are carr..."

Sat, 16 Jan 2010 02:32:36 GMT

Live your daily life in a way that you never lose yourself. When you are carried away with your worries, fears, cravings, anger, and desire, you run away from yourself and you lose yourself. The practice is always to go back to oneself.

Viva tu vida diaria en una manera que nunca te pierdes. Cuando estás llevado a cabo con preocupaciones, miedos, ansiedad, iras y deseos, te escapes de ti mismo y te pierdas. La práctica es siempre volver a una misma.

–Thich Nhat Hanh (via reluctantbuddha)