There's a few things that I ran across on the Chinese web today that caught my eye. First is Isaac Mao's re-ordering of the "Rules For Elementary School Students" published by the Ministry of Education in 1981 and revised in 2004. He makes changes like taking the #1 rule and making it #10. Read his post (in Chinese) for the full reasoning behind the re-ordering; it's good. Isaac got a cynical reception at the Danwei post where Adam S interviewed him at the Bloggercon, but I admire him a lot and I like to support him. My translation:

Revised Revised Rules for Elementary School Students

1. Love nature, cherish your living environment.
2. Be honest and trustworthy, one in word and deed, correct your shortcomings, and be responsible.
3. Love unity, unite with your classmates, help one another, and care for others.
4. Be filial to your parents, respect your teachers, and be courteous to others.
5. Work hard, be frugal and thrifty, do on your own what you are able to do.
6. Have self-respect, self-esteem, self-confidence, and develop healthy and civil habits.
7. Hold life dear, be safe, excercise your body, and keep good hygiene.
8. Love science, study diligently, question and be curious, delight in investigation, take part in social practice and beneficial activities.
9. Respect the law, increase your awareness of the law, honor school discipline and punishments, show respect for social ethical values.
10. Love the motherland, love the people, love the Chinese Communist Party.

Another is this article copied on the Pro-State In Flames weblog about an earlier essay in the Xinmin Evening Post entitled "New Heroes Rush The Bund, An Elite Not Delimited By Hukou" containing an inflammatory quote that had the Shanghainese up in arms, something about speaking Shanghainese in Lujiazui being a mark of low-class because of the high concentration of non-Shanghainese that live and work there. From the post:

The article's publication lead to protests by the Shanghainese people. Even retired former national government leaders [*coughJiangZemin?cough* -Micah] expressed concern over the matter in a phone call to the Shanghai Municipal Committee Secretary Yu Zhengsheng. Yu himself gave the order to resolve the problem, and yesterday the Xinmin Evening Post convened a panel to discuss the issue, and also published an apology admitting that the essay "violated our relationship with the Shanghainese people."

At the Chinese Bloggercon in Guangzhou last November, I sat down to lunch one day with my frequent acquaintance at these tech events, Aether from Tudou. One of the people at the table was a stocky, jovial guy with a quick wit and clearly respected by his tablemates. Impressed, I later found out from John Kennedy that this guy blogs under the name Hecaitou. Adding him to Google Reader, I've found him to be one of the Chinese language weblogs to which I look forward to slogging my way through each new post. Take a look; today he has an insightful piece into one facet of the current crackdown on online content:

It's like the guy who got 20 years of hard labor in Xinjiang for "dirty dancing" in the 1980s. Today when he gets out he sees all the "saunas" and "KTVs" and all he can do is let out a long sigh: Fuckin' A, nowadays prostitution gets you a fine of a few thousand; me, I did a dance and got 20 years.