3. A whole lot of Baidu workers are working across the clock and borrowing pc chips from different departments to prepare for the launch of Ernie Bot, Baidu’s reply to ChatGPT, this coming Thursday. (Wall Avenue Journal $)
4. Shou Zi Chew, TikTok’s CEO, has sought closed-door conferences with at the least half a dozen lawmakers in Washington, DC. He’s scheduled to seem earlier than a congressional listening to concerning privateness and nationwide safety issues about TikTok later this month. (Forbes $)
5. China could management 32% of the world’s lithium mining capability by 2025, the funding financial institution UBS AG estimates. (Bloomberg $)
6. China reappointed Yi Gang as the pinnacle of the central financial institution, signaling continuity in its financial insurance policies. (AP)
7. The “996” overwork tradition in China, embraced by tech firms a couple of years in the past, isn’t going away simply. An government at a Chinese language auto firm just lately requested its authorized division to determine “methods to keep away from authorized dangers” in asking workers to work on Saturdays. (Sixth Tone)
Misplaced in translation
In central China, a younger entrepreneur is reimagining retirement houses by educating the senior residents methods to play e-sports. As Chinese language gaming publication ChuApp stories, Fan Jinlin, a 25-year-old in Henan province, took over his household’s retirement home-based business after faculty. He began creating video content material concerning the lives of the residents and shortly attracted thousands and thousands of followers on Douyin, the Chinese language model of TikTok.
In February 2022, he started constructing an e-sports room in his fifth retirement dwelling and recruiting seniors who’re eager about video video games. Zhang Fengqin, a 68-year-old retired financial institution clerk, is one among them. She noticed the information on Douyin and utilized. Quickly, she grew from somebody who didn’t even know methods to use a mouse to a proficient participant of Teamfight Ways, a preferred recreation that doesn’t require fast reflexes as a lot as strategic considering. In the end, Fan needs to construct an expert staff to play in tournaments, however to attain that, he would want at the least seven members like Zhang. Proper now he solely has three.
Yet another factor
The quantity 2,952 has disappeared from China’s social media platform Weibo. Why? As a result of President Xi Jinping prolonged his rule for an additional 5 years final week, having acquired 2,952 votes approving the extension—with zero opposed and 0 abstaining—in China’s ceremonial legislative physique, the Nationwide Individuals’s Congress. Whereas everybody knew Xi would get a 3rd time period, the truth that there was not a single opposition vote nonetheless obtained folks speaking about how pointless the process was. Just some days later, Weibo blocked search outcomes on the quantity.
