Is China the external drive of the French built environment?
“Could China be the USB external hard-drive of the French built environment?”
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Chinese websites mourn
Chinese corporations and multinationals doing business in China toned down the colors on their websites after the devastating Sichuan earthquake. Most opted for black.
Although white more commonly signifies death and mourning in China, black is a more effective way of expressing grief on the white background of a Web page.
China’s Chicago, etc.
What do Chongqing, Wuhan, Ningbo, and Dalian have in common? They’re China’s second-tier cities. And they’re booming:
They are attracting more and more tourists as well as investors from home and abroad. These cities are endeavoring to form their own unique character, attempting to evolve into Chinese versions of Chicago, Hawaii or Bangalore.
In an article from the Economist issued on July 28, 2007, titled China’s Chicago, the author writes, “Deep in the heart of China, the hilly riverside city of Chongqing is burning with ambition and wreathed in a shroud of smog. Visitors are astonished by the scale and pace of its growth: shopping malls, expressways and a throng of skyscrapers, including one that looks like the Chrysler building. Work on a US$200m opera house is under way.”
Why now?
All these cities have the same advantages: cheaper labor costs, higher-speed development; more favorable local policies, fresher air and less traffic jams.
Photographs of Dalian by SnoShuu.
Chinese company City8 enters online mapping fray
Using home-grown technology, a Chinese firm has upstaged the likes of Google and Microsoft with a mapping service featuring 360-degree street-level imaging of extraordinarily high resolution.
The Sydney Morning Herald covers City8’s entrance to the online mapping fray [web site and a sample street level view]. The catch? City8 has been around since 2005 and has done street level mapping since 2006, nearly a year before Google dropped Street View on an oversuspecting public.