I am in Hong Kong for CNY, it's always good to get out of Shanghai every once in a while.  I've been taking the bus more in HK, it's so convenient, and everything here makes more sense than they do in SH.  It is extremely obvious that things in SH are not properly planned out, and is no wonder that I get pissed at someone somewhere in SH at least once a day.

And the people in HK seem much nicer, they line up, say thank you and also will let people such as elders or people with the right of way go ahead of them.  I almost forgot about being nice, until on the bus, a few of the passengers gave the bus driver some red pocket money (lai see / hong bao).  I cannot imagine people in China, especially the Shanghainese, doing that to complete strangers.

Having said that, I need to get me some lai see!

Gong xi fa cai / Gong hay fat choy ... Happy Chinese New Year and I wish you a Happy and Prosperous Year of the Dog!

The recent news of Google adjusting their search engine for China is an intelligent and very necessary move for Google if they are to survive in China's changing Internet landscape. In a country where Internet usage growth is soaring, everyone in China that uses the Internet knows Google right now. I would argue that to "Google" something, is also as familliar to the Chinese as it is in the West. And if you don't believe the hype about Baidu.com, then you should believe the hype, because Baidu.com is also widely used. I took an informal survey among my local friends and everyone also uses Baidu. But Google's latest move, should keep Baidu's stock tame and maintain Google's foothold in China.

"Searches for the Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama and Taiwanese independence all seem to have results omitted..."

Google.com still works for me right now, but when it kicks in, I suppose there are some tricks to try instead of using Google.cn.  This includes the two following links:

http://www.google.com/options/index.html
http://www.google.ca/

If foreign companies expect to make a tonne of money in China, then they must follow the rules. And if they do make a tonne of money, they'll still be harassed, but only because the Man expects you to share.

If you still don't get it, it can be simply put that in China's eyes: "This is my house, and if you don't like it then you can get the F*&K out!"

With that, I'd like to wish you all a Happy Chinese New Year and prosperous year of the Dog!

I just found out recently that our Diesel Launch event last November, got an award for Party of the Year in Shanghai. It was voted by a Shanghai local media agency and is being given an award tonight. In addition to that, Diesel's HQ, also voted China as best party internally. I must admit myself, it was one of the best ones that we did last year. Completely off the hook. To celebrate, some of the Diesel management from HK are flying up to Shanghai to receive their award. Party at Shanghai's Bon Bon tonight. Bon Bon is a new club that opened recently in Shanghai and is affiliated with God's Kitchen. Even though it's become a popular club in SH, I still prefer my dose of Hip Hop and R&B.

More pictures of the Diesel party can be found here.

If you ever get a chance, the book 1421 is a great read. I've written about this book before, but there's been more talk recently about China discovering North America before the Europeans.

http://www.1421.tv/

Awesome book.

I started reading the website techcrunch recently.

"TechCrunch is a weblog dedicated to obsessively profiling and reviewing new web 2.0 products and companies. TechCrunch is written by Michael Arrington"

I have had more time to browse the net lately and have had interesting times stumbling onto different websites. Techcrunch brought up this one website, that I thought was particularly interesting: 1000tags.com After reading about the milliondollar homepage (basically some kid who made a million bucks selling a million pixels of adspace on his site for $1 each pixel) 1000tags.com is kinda similar with a web 2.0 twist.

I'm not a techie, although I would say my computer ability is above average. I have tried to learn more about this tagging phenomenon that some companies (like my Flickr site) have used to organize information. It remains to be seen how this will benefit the web though, a seemingly mass disarray of information. It's tough to imagine it's ultimate benefit however, if information is to be uniformly categorized since people routinely use different words in the English language to describe different things. I think it works best with words confined to specific meanings or feelings, for example branded items like Gucci, or Prada, or in the context of a certain discipline, where grapejuice is really grapejuice. It's also great in communities, where someone using the term "friends" as a tag, for example can share the word with their friends, who know that they themselves may exist in the "friends" tag when browsing through pictures. But in the grander scheme of things, the word friends, could also mean the show "Friends" or could be a book about making friends, or could be a study on the social phenomenon of friends, the information provided could be seemingly endless.

But perhaps that's an angle to capitalize on, where you know that certain esoteric terms are related to certain elements of a particular group that you are targeting. I read this question earlier from the 1000tags.com website:

"... write about what your thoughts are regarding "paid tag clouds", whether you see Google offering paid tag clouds instead of paid text ads in the future"

I seriously don't think so. If Google's mantra is to organize the world's information, tags will only do well to mess it up. Different people from different places will have different interpretations of tags. Blue is sad, the colour blue, and the brand Blue Navy.

It will be interesting to see how the Chinese may adapt tags in the future. Some Chinese characters have many meanings all somewhat unrelated to each other. The Simplified Chinese character for BREAD (面) for example can also be understood as FACE, FLOUR, SURFACE, RESPECT and used in combination with another Chinese character could mean a couple different more.

And the conclusion of this post, you'll see that if you visit the site 1000tags.com, there is an offer for a free tag if you write about tags... I'm giving it a shot.

A.D.D Brand Slut.  That's what my girlfriend calls me, because of my enthusiasm for the brands that we work for here in China. To my defense, the brands we work for are some of the world's coolest, and their histories and cultures coupled with their explosive growth in China makes everything that much more exciting.  Our recent Cartier, M.A.C. and Diesel events are testament to that.

But being here for 4+ years, it does take its toll. Coming to China for most people is a 1 year endeavour. Many (especially women) can't last too much beyond a year. The allure of Shanghai does capture the eyes of many, though, and before you know it another year has passed. It's one of those go, go, go cities, where people just seem to come in and out like a revolving door. New people, new ideas, new money all the time. And yet, in the 4+ years that I've been here I often wonder if staying is in my long term interests. As exciting as it sounds, and as envious as some of my friends may be of the free-wheeling nature of the wild wild East, I look and envy my friends who took the more stable route. Some have moved in with their girlfriends, some married, some with kids, some paying their mortgages and having that family... the grass is always greener on the other side.

And yet, there is something out there that still beckons my name... what the hell is it?