八八吧 · 88 Bar – Page 12 – A group blog about Chinese tech, media and design

Your surrogate-cool-cousin guide to creativity and karaoke in China

July 23, 2015 by Jason Li

In case you haven’t noticed, organizational designer and ethnographer extraordinaire Christina Xu has joined us here at 88 Bar. She was responsible for our articles about Chinese people looking at QR codes, Chinese public mascots, amongst many others.

Just today, she’s announced her latest endeavor: Multi…

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Hong Kong Book Fair 2015: a hodgepodge of concepts, publishers and distributors

July 16, 2015 by Jason Li

Panoramic photo of entry way — The view upon entering the book fair from the main entrance

Unlike book fairs elsewhere, the Hong Kong Book Fair targets the general public. Instead of a fair where publishing companies to get together to negotiate rights and licenses, the Hong Kong Book Fair is a giant discount-books supermarket, where visitors are encouraged to buy in bulk. Many do by…

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Ethnography of Tech

Uber in China: A Driver’s View

July 6, 2015 by Lyn Jeffery

Photo of taxi driver — Photo from 2 dogs (not one of our interviewees)

China’s major cities are seeing fierce competition for drivers to join ridehailing platforms like Uber and China’s homegrown leader, Didi Kuadi. I just spent a few weeks in China using the “People’s Uber” service, the cheapest Uber service that uses private cars, and interviewed 10-12 Uber…

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Our very own job board for tech/media/design in Asia

July 2, 2015 by Jason Li

88 Gong screenshot

We’ve been pretty quiet about it, but a while back, Tricia and I got together with our friend Adrianna to launch 88 Gong – the world’s first job board for tech/media/design gigs in Asia. Since its inception, we’ve had over 400 postings featuring jobs from not only China but also India, Singapore, Malaysia and countless other places. Plus, we’ve been…

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Upcoming event: memes, puns and selfies, a look at Chinese digital culture

June 25, 2015 by The Editor

Illustration draft — Illustration by Jason Li.

Our very own An Xiao Mina will be hosting an evening at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco next week (July 2). From their website:

Writer, critic, artist and technologist An Xiao Mina has designed an interactive program that will explore the visual culture of the Chinese Internet. First,…

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Ethnography of Tech · Multi Entry

Pictures of Chinese People Scanning QR Codes

June 23, 2015 by Christina Xu

1*XwlXJZqagZI68_mfljFeug — A government-sponsored billboard in Hangzhou showcasing a suite of apps and services for tourists.

On the way back to Shanghai from our fieldwork trip in rural Guizhou, Tricia and I decided to go shopping at Guiyang’s Hunter City Mall. Guiyang is the capital city of the poorest province in China, but it’s…

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Starting Up in Shenzhen

Robots, Diaper Monitors and Putin: What We Saw at Maker Faire Shenzhen 2015

June 22, 2015 by Jason Li

Photo of Maker Faire mascot

Now in its fourth year, the Maker Faire Shenzhen was bigger than ever. Aside from ever-larger booths and robot sculptures (see above), there was also a much larger corporate presence from sponsors, and, given Premier Li Keiqiang’s recent interest in “maker culture,” probably a great leap in government support. In short, Maker Faire Shenzhen has grown up.

As…

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Like Apple, Xiaomi has its own cult followers

June 15, 2015 by Jason Li

In light of Mary Meeker’s recent statistic from KPCB’s 2005 Internet Trends report (slide 163):

XiaomiStatsKPCB — I want to focus on the ramifications of last two rows in this article

I wanted to revisit Stratechery’s previous article about Xiaomi’s ambition to become a high-end, all-purpose consumer electronics brand for China.

First they…

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Starting Up in Shenzhen

Hardware Makers Thrive in the Grey Area of Chinese IP Rights

May 27, 2015 by Jason Li

From bunnie’s blog:

About a year and a half ago, I wrote about a $12 “Gongkai” cell phone… that I stumbled across in the markets of Shenzhen, China. My most striking impression was that Chinese entrepreneurs had relatively unfettered access to cutting-edge technology, enabling start-ups to innovate while bootstrapping. Meanwhile, Western entrepreneurs often find themselves trapped in a spiderweb…

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Ethnography of Tech · Multi Entry

Three Moments With WeChat

May 13, 2015 by Christina Xu

On the morning of his wedding day, my cousin’s fiancé waited impatiently for Likes so that he could retrieve his bride.

Inside the apartment building, he and his groomsmen would have other trials to face: drinking vile concoctions of vinegar and wasabi, doing pushups, and liberally bribing everyone for hints to impossible trivia questions. But…

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