An inside look at one of China’s first Taobao villages
Posted on by Jason Li
Toysoul 2017: a focused and curated Asian toy fair
Posted on by Jason Li
This was my first year at Toysoul, but the fair’s third year in operation. Billed as the “Asian Toy Fair,” this Hong Kong-based mostly-vinyl toy festival comprises products and designs from Greater China, Japan, Korea and Thailand. In sharp contrast to the more established ACGHK, Toysoul was a more…
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My Beloved Mother: A Comic Book Epic About Human-Android Discrimination
Posted on by Jason Li
My Beloved Mother (机器妈妈) is a science fiction tale of dystopia about the frayed relationship between a boy and his android mother. Originally serialized in 漫友·动画100, the comic has won multiple awards, been re-published in Malay and English, and helped launch the career of its creator, Wang Xiao Yang. Today, we turn back to the clock to look at the…
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Follow the Magpie, a rare stream of primary research about social media in China
Posted on by Jason Li
Christina Xu, Tricia Wang, and Pheona Chen just launched a new newsletter about the conversations and trends happening on the internet in China today and we should all subscribe now.
In their opening essay about the project, they write:
Our goal is to create something…
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Peak bike-sharing in China?
Posted on by Jason Li
From Samantha Culp‘s Instagram:
Compared to four months ago, I’m seeing many more of these signs (on private buildings/driveways) as cities try to manage the chaos of the bike-sharing boom
…it’s just that there are too many of the shared bikes (competing startups flush with…
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Original Indie Comic Con in HK #3: A window into Hong Kong’s bustling indie illustration & manga scene
Posted on by Jason Li
Last Sunday heralded the third Original Indie Comic Con in HK (第三屆原創誌交流展). Hosted on the eighth floor of a co-working space in an industrial part of Kwun Tong, Hong Kong, the one-day convention was small but bustling, and showed off an often-overlooked side of Hong Kong, where the comics scene has long been derided as being in…
The Virtual China Archives: blogging from heady 2006-2008 days of the Chinese internet
Posted on by Jason Li
88 Bar began life as a blog for one of the Institute for the Future’s research programs. This was back in 2006, and our blog was called Virtual China. With it, Lyn and I set out to document our “exploration of virtual experiences and environments in and about China.” Many of our posts had an excited “look…
Sci-fi Short Stories with Chinese Characteristics
Posted on by Jason Li
Invisible Planets
edited & translated by Ken Liu
Tor Books, 383 pp.
未来镜像 Touchable Unreality
edited by 姚海军 & Neil Clarke
China Machine Press, 398 pp.
Science fiction in China is finally enjoying its moment in the spotlight again, more than three decades after it…
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How the V&A Museum is collecting & preserving WeChat for the 100-year future
Posted on by Jason Li
On “discovering” Shenzhen and the 459 car brands in China
Posted on by Tricia Wang