Disappearing Hong Kong publishers have put them on the international agenda. Journalist Ian Johnson got the opportunity to interview HK publisher Bao Pu on his critical books about China and his kidnapped colleagues for the New York Review of Books.Read More →
President Xi Jinping might have refused to provide a name for the unborn child of Facebook´s Mark Zuckerberg, it does not seem that his company is fully excluded from a return to China. Business analyst Shaun Rein explains what such a move might need in AsiaOne.Read More →
Artist Ai Weiwei and journalist Ian Johnson met in Berlin for a wide-ranging interview after Ai was allowed to leave China again. Ai Weiwei talks about the role of politics in his life, in the New York Review of Books.Read More →
Journalist and author Ian Johnson interviews Nick Holdstock, who recently published his book China’s Forgotten People: Xinjiang, Terror and the Chinese State for the New York Times. Terror attacks, and the government heavy-handed response have often blurred the image of Xinjiang´s natives.Read More →
China has seen a wave of new internet companies, actually succeeding. A surprise after Google, Facebook, Twitter saw them locked out. Business analyst Ben Cavender tells in Quartz what the trick is: complying with the Chinese government. Names? Evernote. LinkedIn. Uber.Read More →
Author Zhang Lijia of “Socialism Is Great!”: A Worker’s Memoir of the New China taught herself English while working at a rocket factory in Nanjing. For World English she recalls how she managed that job and discovered the advantages of being a non-native English speaker.Read More →
Journalist Ian Johnson interviews for the New York Review of Book one of the famous Chinese documentary filmmakers, Hu Jie, whose films have never been shown in China itself, covering subjects like Mao, the Cultural Revolution and the Great Famine. A life of dealing with tough issues.Read More →
Books need a book number to get published and sold in China, although every store would have a little counter of banned or not approved books. But censorship rules have become stricter enforced over the years and when an autobiography of Li Rui, a retired party official, got confiscated at an airport, his daughter decided to take the case to court, writes journalist Ian Johnson in the New York Times.Read More →
The environmental documentary “Under the Dome” by Chai Jing has become more influential, even after Chna´s censors banned it from the internet. Not only because between 100 and 200 million already watched the documentary, says author Zhang Lijia to Bloomberg. The government can no longer brainwash the people.Read More →
Finally the government takes pollution serious, long after its citizens noted the dangers, concludes journalist Ian Johnson in ChinaFile, after a smog documentary was taken off the internet. But censors acted after 100 million Chinese watched the much-praised movie, that sparked off an unprecedented debate.Read More →
State media hailed a deal between Apple and the Chinese government to give access to Apple devices, including the source codes. An unlikely scenario, tells business analyst Ben Cavender to QZ. Read More →
Facebook has suspended the account of the exiled Chinese author Liao Yiwu, writes journalist Ian Johnson in the New York Times. Not or the first time, the censorship of the internet giant hits the wrong person. Liao opposes the move: “I didn’t knuckle under the Communist Party, and I won’t knuckle under Facebook.”Read More →