A new form of sociality among Chinese youth: the Elastic Self

February 13, 2014 by Tricia Wang

Editor’s note: our very own Tricia Wang will be giving a livestream presentation of her dissertation research this coming Tuesday. Here’s what it’s about.

The sudden availability of social media and open-market capitalism is creating new spaces in China that are shifting norms and behaviors in unexpected ways. This research investigates and explains the phenomena of semi-anonymous interactions among Chinese…

Continue readingA new form of sociality among Chinese youth: the Elastic Self

Phone maker Xiaomi’s incredibly charismatic (and trilingual) Twitter account

October 17, 2013 by Jason Li

Much has been stated about Xiaomi as the rising star in China that’s making premium-but-affordable phones with its own UI for Android. But it seems like they’re also a formidable force on social media.

The tweets below come from their official account:

…

Continue readingPhone maker Xiaomi’s incredibly charismatic (and trilingual) Twitter account

Hong Kong’s First Online Petitions Platform

October 14, 2013 by Jason Li

Full disclosure: I worked on the design for this project.

Online petition platforms have taken off in the English speaking world, but what about a Chinese petition platform? In the US and UK, the government both run official petition platforms (remember the Death Star petition to the White House?) and there are a whole…

Continue readingHong Kong’s First Online Petitions Platform

Ethnography of Tech

The Free Lunch case for inefficient, redundant design

January 24, 2013 by Jason Li

In her talk for The Conference 2012, Designing for Trust: How China’s Free Lunch avoided The Curse of Kelvin (embedded above), Tricia Wang makes the case that the inefficient data entry and publishing sequence pictured below is the culturally appropriate and only effective solution available.

The case study she gives is of journalist Deng Fei’s Free Lunch project, which…

Continue readingThe Free Lunch case for inefficient, redundant design

Is Twitter Catching Up To Weibo?: Multimedia and Emoji in Western Social Media

December 23, 2011 by An Xiao Mina

The new Twitter interface, courtesy of fly.twitter.com.

There’s an interesting article in Penn Olson recently about Twitter’s new redesign and just how much it resembles Sina Weibo. It’s been circulating around a few tech circles I follow:

Twitter’s slick new redesign has brought it – visually and practically – closer to…

Continue readingIs Twitter Catching Up To Weibo?: Multimedia and Emoji in Western Social Media