The global economy is undergoing a transformation widely recognized as the 4th industrial revolution made possible by data driven intelligent systems. Policy makers around the world are searching for new regulatory and governance frameworks to help societies manage the potential and risks these new systems bring to society. China is at the forefront of this[…]
2020 was a year of extreme highs and lows for the fortunes of technology platforms in China. From the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic they were central to sustaining economic activity during lockdown and maintaining a ‘new normal’ as the country re-opened. Their dominance over life in China seemed emphatic. By the end of the[…]
As COVID-19 quickly spread throughout the world since January 2020, the uncertainty concerning the origins and features of the virus provided a fertile ground for misinformation and conspiracy theories to thrive. Different from those popular COVID-19 conspiracy narratives in the West, on Chinese social media the conspiracies that gained traction were ones that faulted the[…]
The pandemic triggered a new wave of misinformation and conspiracy theories, about everything from the source of the virus and its epidemiology, to containment measures, to the science behind prevention and treatment. This ‘infodemic’ has serious consequences for public health, with diverse strains playing on fears and prejudices in different contexts and countries. What can[…]
After strict lockdown measures went into place in China, nearly all commercial activity shifted online. E-commerce expanded its reach in the form of rural live-streaming (村播): farmers-turned-online-hosts selling fresh produce and the nostalgia of the countryside to tens of millions of urban consumers glued to their smartphones at home. The exchange is simple. Using apps[…]
In 2018 Xiamen and Fuzhou, two cities in Fujian province, a region on the coast in the southeast most famous for its historic trader links and global diaspora population, became one of just a handful of cities in China with their own city-level personal credit scores (个人信用评分). These are algorithmically created scores, using data gathered[…]
Any article talking about China’s journey with Artificial Intelligence (AI) has to begin with the board game Go. More specifically, the face-off between Lee Sedol, winner of 18 world titles and widely considered to be the greatest player of the past decade, and Google’s DeepMind-AI-powered Alpha Go. In a now landmark match, Alpha Go didn’t[…]
It’s 2017. The world is increasingly looking eastwards for the latest technology and policy developments emerging out of Asia. When it comes to China, news of advances in AI and mobile payment systems battles for attention with thought pieces about social credit rating and circumvention tools. In July, a roadmap for AI development targeted China[…]
I. The Remarkable Story of Everyday O2O Commerce in China Let’s say you were planning to visit China ten years ago. You would have your visa and flights booked, perhaps even a hotel. But the preparations wouldn’t end there. You’d have withdrawn plenty of RMB in cash, which you’d need for just about everything, except[…]
While China’s new surveillance policy purports to be a “credit system,” it in fact considers nearly every aspect of public and private behaviour in determining each citizen’s social score. These data points are not random, and have historical and cultural significance to the Chinese people, including the concept of “saving face,” or maintaining a good[…]