PandaPassport.com – China Blog

One day after it’s Friday May 2nd release here in China, Ironman has been spotted online on youku.com

Update: It is, however, dubbed in Chinese. Thanks for pointing that out Dan. I didn’t watch it, as I’m hoping to see it in theatres.

It was uploaded at around 1pm, on Saturday May 3.

That was way fast!

Here’s a screenshot:

And while I won’t link to it directly, here’s how you say Ironman in Chinese: ???

With the political climate in China as heavy as it is these days, I’ve been finding refuge in Battlestar Galactica. For anyone whose head has been spinning over this whole Tibet/China/France mess, consider this a good shot of morphine for your brains. Excellent show.

I’m not gonna say where I’m watching it. But Battlestar Galactica in Chinese is [????????], so a quick google search will certainly turn up some “interesting” results.

On a related note, here’s a video I just stumbled across on youku of a David Letterman Top 10 List, featuring the cast members of Battlestar:

So Steven Spielberg has quit his role as “artistic advisor” to the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Here’s the response from organizing officials:

We have taken note of media reports. Mr. Spielberg expressed his wish to make a contribution to the Beijing Olympic Games, and was given a certificate of appointment as one of the cultural and artistic consultants to the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad. We express our regret over his recent personal statement.

Preparations for the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the Beijing Olympic Games are moving along smoothly and we believe excellent ceremonies will be presented to the world.

The Chinese government has made unremitting efforts to resolve the Darfur issue, an obvious fact to the international community which holds unprejudiced opinions on this issue.

The Olympic Games is a sports event that belongs to the people of the world and the successful hosting of these Games is the common aspiration of citizens from every corner of the world.

Linking the Darfur issue to the Olympic Games will not help to resolve this issue and is not in line with the Olympic Spirit that separates sports from politics. Source

And what do regular Chinese people think about Spielberg dropping out? Well, I can’t say for sure. I have yet to hear this come up in water-cooler conversation. Everybody’s mostly talking about Edison Chen.

But if the movie page on youku.com tongiht is any indication, Chinese people are certainly not boycotting Spielberg in return. Indiana Jones movies are all the rage right now.

Here’s the trailer for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull:

And for anyone wondering how to say Indiana Jones in Chinese, here ya are:
????

Chinese video sharing sites are great. They’re like youtube, only way faster and you can watch way longer clips.

Now one of the bonuses of these two features is that you can watch full length productions on there (often as high as 1 hour long videos), without having to wait for them to load as you sometimes might on youtube.

Of course, given that it is China the more “relaxed” approach to (Hollywood’s) intellectual property often results in many movies and TV shows being posted on there that many people would not agree with. Personally, I think we could do worse that expose a previously isolated country to our American culture through our pop media. And the citizen journalism that happens on there is a huge plus as well. But that’s another discussion…

Another reason why such movies and TV shows can fly under the radar is thanks to the stealth cloaking often referred to as Mandarin Chinese. Most people in America just can’t read the interface, and so box offices won’t lose any revenue as a result of these videos being online. (Of course it was a different story when TVlinks started embedding the Chinese videos on a site where English speaking viewers could find them!)

Anyway, to get to the point — if anyone was itching to check out these video sharing sites, but doesn’t read Chinese or doesn’t have Chinese software installed, here’s something you can try.

Here are the links to some of them, run through Google Translator: Read the rest of this entry »

Fact 1:
Google.com is a search engine where you can type text you wish to search for.

Fact 2:
Here’s some random Chinese text:
??????07???????[???] site:youku.com

Fact #1:

Here is a search engine, where you can type in some text if you happen to be looking for stuff. It’s called google.

Fact #2:

Here’s is a string of text, that can be typed anywhere, or copied and pasted if that’s more convenient: “knight rider” season1 site:youku.com

“Knight Rider. A shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man who does not exist.”

Classic…

So youtube is banned.

There are gonna be a ton of expats in China looking for alternative ways to waste their time. Fortunately, I consider myself somewhat of an expert in wasting time, and I do have some great recommendations. 5 in total.

Number 1: DailyShow.com

Jon Stewart is great. Until just recently, there was no real decent place to watch him online. Or Stephen Colbert. There’s an ongoing lawsuit between Viacomm and Youtube, due to their videos ending up on where they shouldn’t have. Until now, with the exception of Comedy Central’s site and iFilm.com, there was no place to check them online. Until now. Every Daily Show ever is now archived for your viewing pleasure. DailyShow.com. Gotta love it.

Number 2: 6.cn, Foreign TV shows

If you click on playlist, like so:

And then scroll down to the Overseas Television section, like so:

This will instantly take you to TV heaven. Browse the newest or the hottest laowai TV, depending on the mood you’re in.

Number 3: Real books are for suckers. Try Audio books

Go buy yourself an iPod or some Chinese iPod knockoff, and soak up some edumacation via these audiobook sites – here, here, or here.

Number 4: You prefer radio, do you?

Try iHeard.com, musicovery.com, or Social.fm. Pandora’s a no go for outside the US these days, and you probably know last.fm already.

Number 5: My Silly Tumblr Media Site

You could always try my accumulated tv links, which is good fun as well. When I find stuff, I’ll click a button on my browser and it goes on automatically. I’ll add a few a week. If you’re interested, sign yo’ ass up via RSS.
Update: After much thought, I’ve decided to take this down.

Hope you find at least one of those links useful.

If you know any other neato links, post them in the comments.