Information/Technology - 99. page

On September 16, China’s first high performance supercomputer Shuguang 5000A came off the assembly line in Tianjin. Shuguang 5000A made China the world’s No. 2 country after U.S. to have independently designed and produced supercomputer with computing speed over 100 trillion times per second.

Tianjin based Dawning Information Industry Co., Ltd, Shuguang 5000A’s manufacturer is planning to develop supercomputer with computing speed over 1000 trillion times per second by 2010, according to Xinhua. The company was set up in 1995, with the R&D supports from Chinese Academy of Science and National Research Center for Intelligence Computing System (国家智能计算机研究开发中心).

Source: Xinhua, October 7, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-10/07/content_10159871.htm

On September 29, Paris based journalist rights organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemned Beijing government’s three-month ban of a financial publication because of its report on poor management of assets of Changde, Hunan office of Agriculture Bank of China. The China Business Post sells 400,000 copies weekly. According to the publication’s website, the violation is “a regulation that bans the media from publishing an investigation into an event in a province other than that in which it is licensed.”

RSF called for an end of the ban and the media censorship of reports of toxic milk scandals. It also revealed authorities in July prevented an investigation into the toxic milk coming out so as not to tarnish China’s image before the Olympics.

Source: BBC Chinese, September 30, 2008
http://news.bbc.co.uk/chinese/simp/hi/newsid_7640000/newsid_7644000/7644028.stm
Reporters Without Borders, September 29, 2008
http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=28764

Li Yongzhi, chief physician for Chinese Astronauts credited Chinese medical treatment for the good health conditions displayed by Chinese astronauts. Research study collaboration between the University of Louvain in Belgium and the China Astronaut Research and Training Center suggested that Chinese astronauts showed better health conditions compared with astronauts from Russia and Europe, especially in their cardiological system. “Their heart condition has hardly changed after they came back to the earth”, Li said, “The secret is that our astronauts have been taking a type of Chinese medicine which prevents heart attacks in zero gravity environments”. In addition to Chinese preventive medicines, the China Astronaut Research and Training Center also applied Chinese massage and acupuncture treatment to the astronauts.

Source: South Chinese Morning Post, September 23, 2008
http://olympics.scmp.com/GCO_Simpchi_Article.aspx?ArticleID=1000001616&OtherID=1000001617&Section=china

Twenty-one websites were winners in the preliminary contest for Best Self-Disciplinary Websites, according to the Internet Society of China. The winners include www.people.com.cn, www.cnr.cn, www.baidu.com, www.cctv.com, www.china.alibaba.com, and www.xinhuanet.com. The twenty-one winners were selected due to exemplar compliance with the State law and regulations on Internet censorship. Internet Society of China (ISC) was established in 2001 and considered State’s arm in enforcing Internet censorship. In June 2004 its members were “invited” to sign self-discipline pact in order to prevent the spread of anti-government information, porn and anything else that might threaten "national security (and) social stability."

Source: Internet Society of China, September 5, 2008 http://www.isc.org.cn/ShowArticle.php?id=9905

Rizhao Harbor located in Shandong Province will invest 10.2 billion yuan to expand into an advanced large scale deep-water harbor with 200 million tons in traffic and handling capacity by 2010. Rizhao had reached a 100 million ton handling capacity as of August 24, a 16.8 percent growth from the previous year.

Rizhao holds a strategic geographic position in the nation’s economy and transportation network. It is the largest ore importing harbor, 4th largest coal exporting harbor, and the largest in-transit harbor for concrete, grain, wood, and nickel ore.

Source: Xinhua, August 26
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-08/26/content_9715117.htm

In a recent annual academic conference held in Lanzhou City, Gansu Province, Lu Yongxiang, President of the Chinese Academy of Sciences warned that China has entered into an energy state of emergency where it had to rely on overseas sources to supply 50 percent of its oil demand in 2007. Lu said that the energy shortage will slow down the economic growth.

According to  statistics released by the National Energy Administration, China became the second largest energy producer as well as the second largest energy consumer in the world in 2007. Due to its large population, China’s energy consumption per capita level was only at 62 percent of the world’s average. China’s energy elasticity index was 0.7 in 2007 which was seven times higher than Japan who has the same compatible scale of  production volume as China.

Source: Xinhua, August 20, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-08/20/content_9531330.htm
China National Energy Administration, August 20, 2008
http://www.gov.cn/jrzg/2008-08/20/content_1075206.htm

At the Olympics opening ceremony on August 8, the 9-year-old Lin Miaoke took center-stage and sang an ode to the motherland, but the voice heard around the world belonged to 7-year-old Yang Peiyi, said Chen Qigang, the ceremony’s music director, in an interview with the State media on August 11. According to Chen, Yang was yanked at the last minute because her looks were deemed not suitable by a senior Communist Potliburo member. "It was for the national interest," said Chen.  

A google search shows websites inside China that had previously reported on the lip-syncing now return errors stating the web page is no longer available.

On the day of the Beijing Olympics’ opening ceremony, with the help of a meteorology expert from Russia, the Chinese Meteorology department launched 1104 rain dispersal rockets at 21 operation sites in Beijing between 4:23pm to 11:39pm to stop a storm cloud that was coming from the southwest. The Chinese Meteorology experts claimed that it was the largest organized and best executed weather modification operation used in Olympic history and the first ever used in China.

The weather forecast called for a rainy weather forecast for the Olympic opening night with 90 percent humidity. Rain had been cited as the biggest threat to the Olympic opening by the chief director of the ceremony Zhang Yimou days ahead of the opening night. The weather services said that Baoding City of Hebei Province, to the southwest of Beijing received the biggest rainfall of 100 millimeters Friday night, and Beijing’s Fangshan District recorded a rainfall of 25 millimeters.

Source: Xinhua, August 9. 2008
http://www.bj.xinhua.org/bjpd_sdzx/2008-08/09/content_14075111.htm http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-08/09/content_9079637.htm