Best quote of the show "Digital Douchebaggery" by Kaiser

I'd also throw a shout out to China Financial Markets (Michael Pettis)

and

James Fallows

Great podcast, lots of fun to listen to -- and thanks for the kind words about China Beat!

I have to confess, it did feel like there was a bit of the 'ol "back in the good old days" whining going on. In truth, I think the Chinese foreigner blog scene is still in its infancy. Sure, there are a lot of blogs about business, news and law - but what about if I want to read about the Beijing art scene, or China punk scene, or fashion world, or food world, or dance world, or graphic design world, etc.etc. there are few in each, but not the dearth you'd find in cities like New York, London, LA, Sydney etc.

I bet there's a lot of great blogging going on about these topics in Chinese - but until they're translated into English - the rest of the world is never going to get a glimpse of all the amazing things going on in China.

oh no...

the china blogs are not dead

they are just beginning....

五毛党

It depends what you want. You also have to appreciate the transcient nature of many expats - stay for a couple of years then leave. The long lasting blogs are therefore the more business related ones. China Briefing's blog (www.china-briefing.com/news) is widely read for example, but doesn't even brand itself as a blog, and it's certainly not social commentary. Yet commentary is part of what it is. Consequently you're in situation where a new blog starts up, the guy either can't continue to find something useful to say, eventually loses interest in maintaining it, or leaves China. Plus there's no money in it. The expat written blog social model is problematic in China, and the only way to do it as a sustainable option is as a marketing tool that requires financing and dedication. Not many either have the money or the resources. The rest are amateurs, and it shows. None of them that you mention were able to sustain their blogs. Are they really missed? Probably not.

Is the main problem that said blogs, while profuse, still only manage to eke out a relatively small number of translations from the Chinese press?

If bloggers were more serious about the journalistic aspects of the craft (it's a craft, isn't it?), wouldn't there be more people engaging in more regular translations of stories which the mainstream media is hawking and characterizing?

For instance, if Reuters' Chris Buckley is smashing out an article every other week which characterizes the aggressive mood of the PLA based upon a couple of quotes from a long Liaowang （瞭望）article, isn't there some way to chop that puppy up and get the whole primary source translated and in the public domain? Perhaps that's far too reactive a model and impinges on people's time and the freedom that is what makes blogging fun.

I enjoy the good humor and occasional snarkiness in the blogosphere as much as the next chap, but don't we have some kind of a collective responsibility to at the very least throw some documentary dirt (or, when it's warranted, a liter of gasoline) on whatever fires are burning in broader discussions of China?

Otherwise, isn't the alternative that readers are forced to rely on Xinhua English or English Global Times or China Daily, or the characterizations of foreign reporters, for their daily dose? Just a few thoughts about relevance.

@orbital ask these sites (Shanghaiist, etc.) for an advertising quote and you'll know how they make money. It's not exactly "big business", but certainly profitable.

This topic reminds me of many others. Others where the Old Garde looses grip of "their" concept, see it go in directions they don't like and decide to declare it dead. Fortunately, as often is the case, the opposite is true. Chinablogs are evolving past their initial concept, freeing itself off the dead-weight and it's creators and leading a promising life of it's own.

@orbital I don't recall the exact numbers, but it was indeed in the area of RMB50.000 or more per week, depending on the website.

Scary as it may sound, when I recruit foreigners in China, there are many willing to work for 10-20.000RMB/month.

I think you should have a word with Chris Devonshire-Ellis. He was mentioned (sort of) by your reader who suggested China Briefing as a model. As far as I know, he has the only blog (China Briefing) that has successfully evolved into a full-on publishing business with books and magazines. So he obviously has a business model for his blogs that work and make money. I think holding events may have something to do with it, I've been to a couple and they've been busy with people.

@richardsaintcyr,

Great site, and thanks for sharing. It is rare to see a lot of quality blogs these days without an explicit focus on advertising and generating revenue. I've just fixed the links in your post incidentally, so people should be able to click through if they're curious.

Best,

--david

The problem with 99% of blogs is that they require little capital to set up, and are written by people as an outlet for their ego. Because there's no financial commitment, once they get bored they drop it - which is mainly what has happened to the blogs you've sited as AWOL. There's also, as has been mentioned, little incentive to continue as they are not (with maybe a rare handful of exceptions) financially rewarding. The blog community is also unregulated, which means anyone can get online and post whatever they want. Too often this has resulted in inappropriate behavior, name-calling, flame wars, or deliberately seeking to damage individuals and even businesses. Hiding behind proxy servers, posting under aliases all diminish blogging credibility. With some minor exceptions, the "professional blogs" such as China Briefing, Time, WSJ and so on have realised that blogging is only a means to a greater picture - using blogging to promote other services or products. The remainder essentially get by in attracting views by posting unscrupulous gossip, rubbish and nonsense under their so-called version of "Free Speech". Most of it is in fact trash talk, innuendo, name calling and spiteful behavior. Blogging is the lowest form of media, and while one or two good ones are out there, it'll only be a matter of time before they either give up due to lack of incentive or reward, or evolve into a more mainstream type of media. Blogging is entry level journalism, the best will move on and up, the others will all inevitably die off. It's a process of evolution you're describing, not an extinction. It will happen to you - Messrs. Moss, Goldkorn and Kaiser Kou as well. Blogging simply isn't viable, credible or sustainable in itself. It has to and needs to evolve into something else or die.

A new "China blog" in English!!!

http://adsofchina.wordpress.com

...keep the dream alive.

China Briefing is a great example of why blogs are dying. That blog just takes one or two of the news issues of the day and regurgitates it so as to draw readers to its site to spread the news about its accountancy business. I actually preferred the days when China Briefing was a hard copy magazine because at least then we could stick it in the urinals and piss on it.

The days of originality in China blogging are over and it is this lack of creativity that has killed the blog more than anything else.

@justahunch,

barrister's a long-time user of ours, so I think we can vouch for him. Not sure about the others.

--david