每次在科幻电影或电视剧，美国支配的星际探险。我要问，为什么？为什么所有人一直说英文啊？现在在世界会说普通话的人有1.042十亿人，是世界15百分的呀！每天都有更多人开始学习。这不同于广东话和别的汉语方言 。相比会说英文的人只有508亿人。在未来中文应该是星际的语言，不是英文啊！我也觉得中文是比较未来派的语言。

就看在科幻里的外星写作：

无论如何每个“外星语”看起来中文！这指出地球应该用这样的语言：中文！

还要给你们看看一个例子：这是《星际旅行》的《克林貢》語：

呵呵，差不多就是注音符号呀！那个外国人想中文看起来很酷的所以一直摹写。

原来（美国的）《星际旅行》开始在1966.现在我要在2009启程（中国的）《太空旅行》已经是太晚了！我在写信的电视剧本。谁要跟我一起写？就联系我啊！我中文写的就蛮好得呀。

中国应该是第一个真的未来探险太空。100年之后，可能每个美国人说中文。

P.S.：

What’s he saying? = 他说什么?
I don’t know, he looks dangerous, let‘s shoot him! = 我不知道，他看起来邪恶，因该开枪！

The first episode in a new series, watch as the comical Wang Fujing wanders from place to place meeting many interesting people along the way.

首发一个新的系列，看滑稽的王府井流浪地点见面许多有趣的人在道路上。

Here is an alternate link in case it doesn’t work:
下面是一个候补链接如果这个的情况下不正常工作：
http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/y66gil7jdF0/

It is easy to criticize the contestant on the show from the audience side. This time, let’s take a look at it from the contestant’s perspective.

Bantering with the contestants, it was easy to understand their take on the whole event. They are all really nice and friendly guys with attractive personalities. Most of them seem to realize the relative impermanence of their fame, and are glad just to have this opportunity. Given the criticism they receive from some people and media, I think they themselves are aware that that they may not be the most talented people, but are grateful to have such an opportunity.

In contrast, the backup dancers, especially the female ones seem to all have quite a big head. They give the impression of “I am a superstar, I am so special”, which was quite the opposite of the main contestants. I have found this throughout my experience that the main stars are usually the humble ones.

There exists a condition that seems overly prevalent in entertainment. Once a person is in front of the camera, they are on a higher level than normal people. This is one of the reasons the marketing for shows like this works so well. Get a reasonably good looking guy or girl, package them up in marketing, and they will be an idol, talent or not.

One way or another these boys got very lucky and are riding the giant marketing train of Dragon TV until such time as they are discarded for the next packaged idol. At that time, I think most of them will be happy to go back to their hometown and return to a normal life.

Here are some more behind the scenes shots:

It seems China is copying everything nowadays. Whether it is DVDs, designer labels or songs, you can find a copy of everything in China. This time though, they have copied the popular “American Idol” show. Though, unlike the American Idol show, the success of the men is apparently not judged on their talents.

The name of this show? My Hero! The Chinese version being 加油好男儿, meaning “Come on Good men”. (加油 literally means “Add oil” which is a expression like “come on!”) The show has raised a lot of controversy because the men boys are seen as simply pretty boys, with no real talent other than to look good on TV.

Watching show is sometimes hazardous to your health I think, but it is one of the highest rated shows on Chinese TV, with a recent 5.3% rating, beating out ever the Supergirls show.

Here are some shots from the other day while on the set at a rehearsal:

One way or another, I think it shows the power of marketing in China. There is a lot of genuine talent out there, but with a good marketing team singers don’t need to know how to sing, actors don’t need to know how to act, all they need is a pretty face and a good marketing strategy.
Everything lives and dies by marketing in China. That’s why I chose it as my profession here. Especially in entertainment.

It’s not quite what you might be thinking. China has been bitten by the reality TV bug. In one of their first installments they are staging a competition to determine the next “kung fu superstar” along the lines of Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee. They are holding this in the “Shaolin Temple” in Henan, the “birthplace of kung fu”. Yes, because it seems to make the kung fu more authentic. Here is the company line:

The Global Chinese Kung Fu Star TV Competition follows the international success of similar musical competitions such as Pop Idol in Britain, American Idol in the United States and last year’s Super Girl in China, which had a 400 million-strong audience.

So like American Idol, only the contestants get to beat the crap out of each other? I hope it’s like Ultimate Fighting Championship meets Super Voice Girls. Now that would be worth tuning in to!

Also, in the tradition of low quality fakes making cheaper to produce representations of other products, an “Apprentice” copycat has been launched in China. The role of Donald Trump will be played by… wait for it… all of China! Yes, the audience will serve as the savvy business guru. I am sure all those high school graduates and housewives will be well suited to this task. Anyhow, expect to heard throngs of people yelling “你被炒了”, or in English, “You’re Fired”. Yes, you are fired, and your penalty is you haev to fight in the kung fu reality show.

For Shanghainese, many will spend the holiday glued to their TV sets. Is it some special event coverage or some hot new celebrity? Nope, it’s just they were too busy to get in some good quality watching before. A recent survey (another one of those mysterious governmental agency surveys) indicates that almost half of Shanghai residents will be doing just that this Chinese New Years.

Quote from Shanghai Daily:

The survey also found 45.6 percent of Shanghai residents will use the holiday mostly to watch TV series, for which they don’t often have time.

Seems the whole “family values” thing can wait until they finish watching yet another serial about some Chinese heroes in ancient China fighting some typical bad guys. To me it seems that about 50% of all Chinese TV shows are about this. I think I prefer my West Wing. Anyhow, happy Chinese New Year everyone!

You can’t keep up with the entertainment industry in China and miss “Dashan” (大山). Almost a household name since the late 1980’s he is the epitome of a foreigner gaining fame in China. It seems he is more popular in China than Brad Pitt is in the US.

His exploits are mostly limited to Beijing, but that does not stop his fame from reaching all across China. As most foreign guys can probably attest to, we have all been compared to Dashan at one point or another while in China. Mostly along the lines of: “He doesn’t speak Chinese as well as Dashan!”

In 1988, the man who would become “Dashan” (literal translation - “big mountain”) was living in a foreign student dorm at Beijing University when he was first invited before the cameras to cohost a major student talent show. Legend has it that it was only when strangers greeted him in the street the next day that he realised it had gone out live - in fact 550 million people had been watching nationwide, and Rowswell had just become the first foreign host of a major event in Chinese television history.

Back in the US or Canada, there is probably no chance of someone like Mark Roswell gaining the fame he has in China. His main draw is the fact that he speaks perfect Chinese. In fact, better than many locals! I don’t want to bring in what this says about the locals, but this opinion is theirs, not mine! In short this means that while he is “world famous” in China, this does not really transfer past it’s borders. Don’t expect Mark Roswell to be a name you see on any US produced TV shows or movies anytime soon.

The article goes on to explain well the mass of the TV industry in China:

China boasts the largest TV audience in the world, thanks in part to a communist infrastructure that saw TV as a means of direct communication with a vast population. Today, state broadcaster CCTV claims an audience of more than 1 billion; content comes courtesy of some 200 stations, offering viewers a total of 2,900 channels.

And as the Chinese economy whips itself into ever better shape, TV is becoming increasingly commercial, says Chris Gelken, a UK journalist who has recently completed a three-year stint in the country as news anchor with English-language station CCTV9. “Competition for advertising dollars is driving a fierce ratings war,” he says, referring to an industry reportedly already worth $3.4bn a year.

As a result, where once the programming agenda was dictated by an ever-shifting party line, these days programme makers are far more attuned to ratings - and consequently, sandwiched between imperialist-baiting war movies and old-school news reports from the factory floor, glossy melodramas now document the movements of the new urban middle class, playing out their lives over branded cups of Nescafé.

I am not sure where these 2900 channels are, but I certainly get no more than about 40 on my Chinese cable service! Perhaps they mean through illegal satellite channels? It is interesting to note how the shift is occurring now from a governmentally dictated lineup to more ratings oriented content, as the stations battle for advertising dollars. This is a step in the right direction away from tight government regulation and towards freedom for producers.

Yes, Shanghai now has the first test network of FTTH. No, it does not stand for Fantastic Television Treats for Home, but in fact for Fiber-to-the-Home. It is used to provide services such as HDTV, VoIP, Broadband Internet and networked computer games. I am not sure what this means in terms of IPTV and how the two will co-exist.

Another government group - The Ministry of Information Industry (MII, pronounced “Mission Impossible 1“) - has projected the amount of FTTH consumers will break 20 million by 2008. They have said that the test network has been set up in a “Residential area” of Shanghai, so that really narrows it down. Well, I can at least tell you it is not in my area.

This whole thing brings to mind the old concept of the Integrated Services Digital Network that tried to accomplish exactly the same thing as FTTH is doing today. Really, it was the same thing, but they seemed to be about 25 years too early. ISDN was first introduced in the early 1980’s, and was not widely accepted until the early 90’s, but never really got off the ground. It seems that having all your services on one line was a ridiculous proposition, mostly due to poor adpotion and high cost.

Nowadays, computers and connections are so inexpensive; it seems about time for something like this to come forward. It’s about time we had phone sex, internet porn and the Playboy channel on the same line!