Tea Leaf Nation

Move aside you B.R.I.C.s and P.I.I.G.s, Chinese netizens are chattering about S.I.C.K., or Syria, Iran, China, and (North) Korea, the four countries in the world where Facebook is restricted. These four countries were called out by name in Facebook’s preliminary prospectus recently filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as places where “access to [...]

Mark Zuckerberg, eat your heart out.  12306.cn may not sound like the most alluring, or easy to remember, website, but starting on January fifth of this year its average daily page views have exceeded 1 billion, making it one of the world’s most trafficked sites.  No, it’s not the next Facebook or Google.  It’s the [...]

The narrative behind some of the world’s most coveted consumer electronics has turned even grimmer. On January 2, over 150 workers in the city of Wuhan, Hubei province, threatened to jump en masse from a factory roof, alleging that the manufacturer reneged on promised pay. It took the intermediation of the city mayor, backed by a [...]

High speed train accident kills more than 30 – it could happen to travelers Real estate prices take bumpy ride – it could happen to owners Wukan villagers protest over land grab – it could happen to peasants Stock market crash wipes out small investors – it could happen to investors School bus accidents pop [...]