CN Reviews’ 2nd Anniversary: thanks to our blog friends

Two years, 503 posts, and 4,298 comments ago, we started the CN Reviews blog journey. Al Gore often quotes an African proverb as relevant to climate change: “If you wish to go quickly, go alone. If you wish to go far, go together.”  Well, I can’t think of any better quote to describe blogging.

We have indeed gone together, during these two years. While thankful to our commenters and especially my fellow writers, I thought it would be worth sending link-love to the top 20 blogs that have linked to us and sent traffic our way.  In our peripatetic musings these past 2 years, they have offered us intellectual bread and water, gave us shelter, protected us from evil trolls, and otherwise kept us on our odyssey. Now if only we knew where we were going…

Thanks:

• EastSouthWestNorth (url: zonaeuropa.com) by Roland Soong – See Roland’s CNBloggerCon 2009 post on “Is Dialogue Possible?” and his 2008 CNBloggerCon prepared remarks.  Roland, we are fellow travelers on your journey to encourage East-West (and Mainland, HK, Taiwan) dialogue. Will Roland ever provide RSS feeds to all sections?  Time will tell.  Twitter: @eswn
• China Law Blog (CLB) by Dan Harris – Never thought I’d find a “law” blog interesting, but like a good lawyer, CLB goes beyond the law to highlight topics on China business and society that help those who do business in China or with Chinese partners.  In one sentence, I’d say CLB is about “sh1t that goes down in China and how you can avoid it.”  Consequently, this is an important blog to read! Twitter: @danharris
• chinaSMACK – IMHO, the launch of chinaSMACK is the most important event that has happened in the world of English-language China blogs in the last two years–who else new has expanded audience to English-language China blogs?  Why read something that resembles the college course on China you slept through, when you can indulge your inner voyeur by reading hot, viral stories in translation?  If you’re feeling 很黄很暴力 (hen huang hen baoli, very yellow very violent) come to chinaSMACK.  Then go to ChinaHush, who has gone beyond imitation to becoming a pitch-perfect complement (nice work, Key) to Fauna’s SMACK and in some ways even more interesting.  Fauna, when am I going to see more than 1/2 of your face?  You tantalize.  Twitter: @chinasmack
• Danwei (Chinese mirror Danwei.tv) – Sometimes a bit erudite for my techy, petty bourgeois tastes, Joel Martinsen, Alice Xin Liu, Eric Mu, and Jeremy Goldkorn do great work in bringing China to the world.  Too bad all the thanks they get is a nice URL block from the Net Nanny.  Lessons from observing Xu Zhiyong and Jeremy: no good deed goes unpunished in China.  Twitter: @danwei, @axliu, @goldkorn
• ChinaOnTV – Wasn’t expecting to see ChinaOnTV in our stats, but we had partnered with them to put together some interviews around May 2008. I also think they have a bug generating traffic in our direction!  Thanks for working with us, Johnson Q and Thalia! Twitter: @chinaontv
• China.Alltop.com – OK, its an 1-page China blog aggregator.  But we’ve been honored with above-the-fold linkage since the inception of the page.  So thanks Guy Kawasaki, Neenz Faleafine, and Christine Lu for your trust in us.  Twitter: @neenz, @christinelu, @guykawasaki
• The Peking Duck – Richard Burger’s blend of political, economic and social commentary is is many ways the archetypal China bridge blog.  Richard, I’ve learned a lot from you, and from the battle royale that often happens in your commentstream.  Twitter: @thepekingduck
• Shanghaiist – When we talk about what we want to be when we grow up, Shanghaiist often comes up. Elaine Chow, Cary Hooper, Kenneth Tan, and contributors, thanks.  Twitter: @shanghailaine, @shanghaiist, @singaporeano, @CaryHooper
• Fools Mountain -  The Yin to Peking Duck’s Yang, Fools Mountain contains political, cultural, social and economic commentary that some would consider to be largely “pro-China.”  Instead of the archetypal Western (mostly-male) blogger in China, Fools Mountain is mostly people (apparently mostly-male) of Chinese heritage living in the West.  Its an important blog that also has a very active commenter community.  Kudos to you:  Admin, BXBQ, Tang Buxi, and the rest of the blogging team.  Twitter: ????
• Wangjianshuo – I consider Jianshuo to be one of my blogging mentors, and have enjoyed following his blog since about 2005.  My original desire was to build CN Reviews into a blog community of both native English speakers and native Chinese speakers like Wang Jianshuo who blog in English.  But with 338 million Intenet users, there appears to be only one (or maybe a small handful) of Wangjianshuo’s.   Anyway, many thanks for your encouragement and your friendship.  Twitter: @jianshuo
• Wall Street Journal China Real Time Report – The China Real Time Report nee China Journal is probably the best China business blog run by a mainstream media outlet.  The Wall Street Journal also has some of the best overall China coverage out there.  Folks I follow online and in print:  Andrew Batson, Sky Canaves, Loretta Chao, Ian Johnson, Shai Oster, Juliet Ye. Twitter: @ChinaRealTime,  @WSJChina, @skycita, @AndrewBatson
• ChinaGeeks – We’ve already made clear our bromatic feelings for fellow blogger Charles Custer, of China Geeks, and his compadre Chris Hearne.  ChinaGeeks is the up-and-coming commentary blog of the China blogosphere.  Charter 08, Racism in China, Hu Yaobang, Ai Weiwei, May Fouth, Gaokao in translation, Chinese patriotism…I especially appreciated your perspective in the month prior to the 20th anniversary of the TAM incident.
• Global Voices Online China – GVO just turned five…congratulations!  Read their story over at co-founder Rebecca MacKinnon’s blog RConversation or over at Global Voices itself.  Some folks that have done good work at GVO China: Bob Chen, Oiwan Lam, John Kennedy, and many newer contributors that I’m not that familiar with.
• China Digital Times (CDT) – Led by Sophia Beach and Xiao Qiang, CDT is an aggregator blog that covers a broad range of social and political topics about China. Twitter: @CDTimes, @CDT
• James Fallows – He’s provided a nuanced perspective on China to Western audiences.  I especially appreciated his series on Gaokao that gave me some insights into the Chinese educational system.  I also appreciated his perspective on Chinese diversity, individualism, internal political competition within the Party, relative openness of the Chinese economy in contrast to other East Asian economies, etc. in this Aspen Ideas Festival exchange between him and Chimerica-fearmongering, castle-owning Niall Ferguson (video).  Honestly, I am trying to get through Niall’s arrogant style to get to the substance of his argument, which is worthy of some consideration.
• Time’s China Blog -  This blog shut down 9/18 (see Simon Elegant’s farewell post with comments replete with haters and spam).  Thanks for your support.  Twitter: @austinramzy
• Lost Laowai (LLW) – Mostly the brainchild of Ryan McLaughlin, LLW is a group blog serving the expat community in China.  Thanks, Ryan! Twitter: @lostlaowai, @thehumanaught
• GraniteStudio – Jeremiah, thanks for including us in your 以文會友 list!  GraniteStudio is wide-ranging and provides a historical perspective to current events.  Twitter: @GraniteStudio
• Imagethief – Will Moss brings humor, good-hearted irreverance and general interestingness to the often heavy topic of US-China relations and mainstream media gaffes on both sides of the Pacific.  Twitter: @imagethief
• Ifgogo.com – Guo Qirui (aka Aw Guo, or Awflasher) started this group blog to encourage Chinese to blog in English.  Over the years, I’ve become friends with several authors:  Lisa Lee, Cat Chen, and Aw himself.  I wish there were more Chinese bloggers Twitter: @awflasher, @CatChen

Thanks!

Gansu Expressway photo courtesy: Chinadaily BBS