China is not yet one week back from lunar holidays, and the fallout of the coronavirus is not yet clear. We have seen major events being relocated, delayed or even cancelled, speakers being stuck inside or outside China, and potential audiences unable to move around. Meanwhile we are exploring an alternative option, that might help some event organizators: follow the lead from China, and get your speaker online.

Even when the virus might reduce its destructive path over the next two weeks, resuming events might be affected till the end of April, early May. Those are – with June – our most busy months in helping event organizers to get the right speakers in place, before the traditional summer break kicks in.Read More →

Not only high costs are stopping Chinese women from getting more children, as the government wants them to for offsetting the dramatic aging process of the country, writes journalist Zhang Lijia, author of Lotus, a novel, on prostitution in China,  in the South China Morning Post. “The reality is far more complex. One important reason, in my view, is that women have changed. They don’t care to be only the reproductive tool of the family or the state,” she writes.Read More →

Beijing-based Journalist Ian Johnson describes the governmental corona-action in Beijing and explains why it has more to do with lack of trust in the government than health, in the New York Times. “Considering the underlying distrust, it’s hard for the government to say what many epidemiologists are saying: This outbreak is serious but not catastrophic.”Read More →

Foreign media mostly focus on China’s crackdown on religion, but it’s approach has become much more nuanced, says journalist Ian Johnson, author of The Souls of China: The Return of Religion After Mao, at the New York Times. Two truly global religions, Islam and Christianity, cause China’s leadership most trouble.Read More →

Analysts watched the ‘announcement’ of a first trade deal between China and the US with amazement. Former US trade negotiator Harry Broadman points out that typically you wait till you have something in writing, in both languages, to avoid hiccups before the signing, he explains to Reuters.Read More →

The successful social platform Tiktok got into hot water when it comes to its relation with China, now the company goes international. Former Baidu communication director Kaiser Kuo looks at The Ringer how Tiktok thrived, like others, in this climate of uncertainty, fuzziness and unpredictability that is key for China’s internet.Read More →

The number of rich Chinese families has dropped, although only slightly, says this year’s Hurun Wealth Report, according to the China Daily. Both a dropping economy and the trade war triggered off the effect, says Rupert Hoogewerf, chairman of the Hurun Report, now in its 11th year.Read More →

Private companies have a hard time getting bank loans, says economist Arthur Kroeber to Barron’s. But that is nothing new, he adds, the problem is that state-owned companies get loans too easy. That division is more important than the level of China’s debts, he adds. “Too much attention has been paid to the debt problem.”Read More →

China’s central government has been trying to sinicize religion, and that had especially a major effect on Christianity, writes journalist Ian Johnson, author of The Souls of China: The Return of Religion After Mao. For the New York Review of Books, he reviews Jesus in Asia by R.S. Sugirtharajah, but starts with a thorough overview of Beijing’s efforts to curtail Read More →