Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Unit 1, Lesson 2 Question

Do you believe that a widespread and cataclysmic event such as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution could occur again in China today? Why? Why not?

I strongly doubt that a confluence of ugliness of the magnitude of the Cultural Revolution could occur in China today, the main reasons being the Western cultural influences that have crept in over the years, and the speed and ubiquity of communications.

In the early 1960s, the state had very firm control of information; one knew pretty much what one was told by an operative of the government. Nowadays, camera phones and laptop computers with internet access are very common. The Chinese government still tries to control the sorts of online traffic coming into the country, but the effort is akin to trying to plug a sieve with your bare hands.

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Cruising the newsfeeds...

So much going on, and there's no hope of seeing all of it!

This article at Bloomberg.com sort of jumped out at me.

China is making inroads in all sorts of places.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

First blog post!

Behold! Post the First!

Go me!