Catshanghai

In Shanghai, it is illegal to cross the road at red lights and unauthorised crossings even though this is often safer than the alternatives. Last year I was fined 10 RMB for jaywalking across Huai Hai Lu, but Shanghai Daily has reported the penalty can be as high as 50 RMB depending on your attitude [...]

The Kronos Quartet is an eclectic chamber ensemble with attitude, but they didn’t manage to show enough of it until the second half of their show at the Shanghai Concert Hall last night. The first set featured Iraqi folk songs, Sigur Ros’s Flugufrelsarinn, selection of Chinese classics and Terry Riley compositions.
Wu Man is known to [...]

There is always a lot of discussion on the ShanghaiExpat forum about the best places to buy electronics and IT goods in this city. Some people like to go and haggle at the electronics markets at Hong Kong Plaza and Xuijiahui whereas I know folks who are worried about buying poor quality counterfeits. Given that [...]

I almost couldn’t make it, because the booking office told me yesterday that all the tickets had already sold out. Today, I rang the office again and I found that there are plenty of tickets still available. They have only sold all of the 100 RMB tickets. How many times have people tried to book [...]

“Knowledge is power” or so that is what written on the walls in multiple languages throughout Shanghai Library. As I was queuing up this afternoon to get my membership card, I was feeling neither knowledgeable nor powerful. You see, I am rather tired this weekend and the instructions for joining the library are not [...]

The BBC is going to suspend its Jam edcuation platform after complaints to the European Commission that the service is having an adverse effect on small software suppliers. Dominic Savage of the British Edcuation Software Association expressed the industry’s concern that the BBC was duplicating their activity. Jam was providing Internet learning resources to support [...]

I have just come across this article on the New York Times Reader about Google privacy issues that I blogged about on Sunday. Here is my response that was written using the reader’s annotation tool. It would be good if you could post annotations straight to blogs, but that feature is not yet supported.
Google Changes [...]

You are in downtown Shanghai on a rainy afternoon and it is impossible to find a taxi. Here are a few hints to get you home quicker.

Don’t stand close to other people.
This increases competition and cab drivers don’t like arbitrating a struggle between commuters fighting to get in the taxi.
Hail with purpose.
Shanghai people wave towards [...]

It is good to see non US technology news getting wider coverage. I just saw this story in the BBC. I know a lot about US based tech news from podcasts and mainstream media, but I feel I know next to nothing about what happens in China and that is a shame considering I live [...]

Below are some of the winners in this year’s annual Bloggies, which is like the Oscar’s for blogs or weblogs. I must go and check out PostSecret. They won three awards. Well done Post Secret. Well done Lifehacker too. I read Lifehacker everyday.
Best Web Application for Weblogs - Youtube
Best Asian Weblog - Tokyo Girl Down [...]