New Traditional Industry Leaders Meetup

This is an interesting gathering – a group of CEOs of Internet companies in Shanghai agreed to meet quarterly. We joked the industry has become a new “traditional industry”, because it has been labor intensive, unlike the traditional internet business model.

Here is the final photo:

From the left to right are:

Afu, CEO of JJDD.com

Zhang Tao, CEO of Dianping.com

Bill Yao, CEO of PPTV.com

Mike Liang, CEO of Anjuke.com

Jian Shuo Wang, CEO of Baixing.com

It is good to catch up, always.

Drawing

As expected, people don’t come promptly, so I used the time to draw the corner of the room.

IMG_9001

Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup in New York

It is official, and it is, as always, last minute, that I am going to host a small Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup in New York on Saturday (Oct 8, 2011), which is tomorrow, at 5:30 PM at the following location:

Starbucks

665 Broadway (cnr. E 2nd Street)

New York, NY 10012

It will last for one hour until 6:30 pm.

About the Meetup

This blog has been running for 9 years, and we have meetup from time to time. The first was in 2003 in Shanghai, and few times later (like this one in 2008). It also happened in other places in the world, like San Francisco, and Palo Alto. This is the first time it comes to New York. But as always, as a person who is incapable of planning anything in advance, it is always in the last-minute announcement style.

If you are planning to come, please quickly post a comment either via Facebook, or using the old comment function (I am still thinking about how to integrate them together). It is OK if you show up without comment – it is in extremely informal way.

Q: Why Meetup?

A: Why not.

Q: What is the topic?

A: How to leverage it to help people more.

Q: How many people?

A: I don’t know. Previous meetup varies from one person to more than 20.

Q: Shall I attend?

A: Yes.

Tsinghua & Jiaotong University Alumni Gather

I am just back from the Tsinghua Alumni gather. It turned out to have many Jiaotong (or Chiao-Tung) guys there.

Charlies obviously didn’t tell me that I because one of the youngest person in that room, with some alumni leaving university before I was born. I felt embarrassed to be put into the speakers’ seat with two outstanding entrepreneur (Steward) and VC (Jackie). I hoped I was somewhere in the crowd.

This is the third big gather I attended during the trip, with another Stanford one next Monday. I love the valley because the different organizations connect people together, and the exchange of ideas create value.

To who visited this blog for the first time because of this event, sorry that I didn’t bring enough name card (to be honest, I only had 1 when I entered the room). Since you are here, no name card is needed. My email and phone number is on the homepage. Friend me on Facebook.

P.S. The unexpected gift is, I found my school mate Kunlong Gu who I haven’t seen for 11 years. Very excited.

Meetings Today

Since talking with industry insiders have been my full time recently, I talked with many great people today. I met with Zhongwei Lee, president of Shopex over lunch. He is an expert on sales management, and business model. Then I talked with Carsten – we found out that we are in the same building (Hao Ran Hi-Tech Building), but we never met each other (even not in elevator), and in the afternoon, I met with John Chow (yes, the famous John from Johnchow.com). I finished my day with great conversation with Jack Gu, CEO of PPDAI.com, the C2C Lending platform in China. He mentioned that he has unsubscribed his broadband Internet plan at home and switched to dial-up. I think it is a fantastic idea to free up some time at night.

Weather

Today’s weather is terrible – heavy rain. Looking from the platform of our office to Pudong direction, you can hardly see anything further than 2 km. Terrible visibility. This winter of Shanghai is maybe the rainiest winter in Shanghai – I do miss the sunlight, but Shanghai has not officially entered raining season yet (it is around April to June).

Planting Trees

Today is the National Tree Planting Day. Many people go to plant trees. From twitter, I heard someone says: “Check out TV tonight. All the party and government leaders must be planting trees before camera tonight.” I smiled. Yes. Today, as in the last decade, you don’t really need to turn on TV to know that is on the news today. It is always the same format. You don’t miss too much if you don’t watch it…

Fengshui

Recently, I am started to pay attention to the Fengshui – it is a mystery for many people, including me. But I felt I have found some rules within it, and start to understand some of it. I just wrote a blog in Chinese titled: A Water Glass on the Left Hand. I may write about it in my English blog some day when I understand it more…

Expats More Need Community

I just attended the Lunch 2.0 organized by George, invited by Gang Lu and Calvin. As I described in my last blog International Events in Shanghai, I was surprised to find out it is a pure international event – the expat entrepreneur community meetup.

The conversation is in English – I delivered short 5 minute speak along with my old friend Zhang Tao (CEO of Dianping.com, and host of this Lunch 2.0), and new friend David Feng of Citiology. The attendants, as I expected, are mainly expat entrepreneurs in Shanghai

This leads me to think about community needs in a city. It seems to me expats need community much more than local people. The scene here I saw in Lunch 2.0 reminds me of the similar Chinese engineer meetup in the Silicon valley. It seems it is much more easier to organize such groups in a foreign city.

People has the need to talk with people of the similar background. In US, Chinese people traditionally tend to live in China Town, and int he recent twenty to thirty years, people from mainland China going to US are mainly students for higher education, and there are many groups connecting them, like the Huayuan Science and Technology Association..

In Shanghai, it seems the same is also happening. This time, the community seems to be around the young entrepreneurs, rather than students. Many years ago, when I just started my blog, I also joined some of the expat community, and at that time (early 00’s), expats in Shanghai are mainly professional managers in big international organization, like Microsoft, Motorola, or P&G. They are not interested in doing business. Their topic is mainly about where to shop, how to hire a nanny, and is it safe to to here, or there, is it safe to eat this or that, or is it safe to …..

Good. I see the change, and expect more changes happen.

Going to Attend Shanghaiist Party

I am going to attend the Shanghaiist.com’s Christmas Party on Saturday. Dan Washburn kindly sent the invitation, and people at Shanghaiist.com have been my friends for a long time.

Here is the party detail. I believe Shanghaiist.com and this blog shares a lot of readers (the expat community), and if you also consider to go, see you this Saturday night.

  • What: A Very Shanghai Christmas, a holiday party presented by Shanghaiist and Cotton’s
  • When: Saturday, December 20, 8 pm ’til late
  • Where: The new Cotton’s at 294 Xinhua Lu, near Dingxi Lu
  • Music: Early on, all your holiday favorites. Later on, DJ El Nomo (of Bananas fame) on the holiday wheels of steel.
  • Santa: He’ll be there! Get your photo taken on his lap! For free! (Professional portraits taken by Stephen Yang.)
  • Special Drinks: Holiday-inspired cocktails and beers from American Craft Beer Partners.
  • Movies: Watch some holiday classics!
  • Fireplaces: Two of them!
  • Outdoor Seating: In December? You bet. Assuming no rain, portable heaters will be brought out to the garden.
  • Entry: RMB 50, includes one beer from American Craft Beer Partners.

The Wonderful 2008 Meetup

Today, we had a wonderful Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup. Thanks everyone for coming!

The meetup was held in the Starbucks Jinyan Store. It is a Saturday afternoon. The helpful and kind staff told me that after Olympics, many people appeared out of their home, and came to the Starbucks. 100 table in the outside area was occupied. We were lucky to have a corner on the second floor, so about 20 of us can gather and had wonderful conversation here.

Who Came..

As expected, Christina Hou, Christina’s friends (sorry, what is your name in written, I just cannot remember it clearly after I am back. :-(), Michelle, and Auastasia (from Moscow Russia) showed up. Then we had Jeremy. This morning, I received a comment from Jeremy Friedlein after I posted the entry stating I am expecting 3-5 people:

3-5? I will bring 14.

He really meant it. He is a director of an oversea training program, and he really brought about 14 of his students from the CET program. His team was a wonderful addition to the meetup since they came from both China and US, and from different states from the United States. Many of them just arrived in Shanghai 2 days ago, which makes it possible to share their really fresh impression of the city.

What We Talked

The talk started with the question, “what is a meetup”. Let me explain it again here. It is a very, very, very (please pay attention to how many “very” I used) causal gathering of my blog reader’s community. I intentionally didn’t do any promotion – just an entry about WHEN and WHERE I will be in from time to time on my blog. The notice is often posted within 10 days before the meetup (not too long lead time), and I didn’t send any emails out about it. The goal is very simple – to have really causal readers of my blog to gather together and to share the excitement of being in this city and being connected through a little blog.

Because of the casual nature of the meetup, I never really know how many people will come for each meetup. Sometimes just myself (as once in San Francisco), and sometimes there are many people coming. I don’t want to control the event by myself (Well. I admit the only way I control it is to decide how long in advance I post the notice, or the expectation I set for the meetup before hand). I am happy that every time, there are some surprise for me, and for my readers who came.

When we talked many topics from self introduction, to live in this city, from the feeling of first few years/few days after coming to this city, to the culture shock, or T.I.C moment, from why I started my blog (The top question in my FAQ list), to what is my plan for this blog in the future (my answer was, no plan except keeping blogging), from places to visit in Shanghai, to the recent Olympic Games.

The Photo

Here is a photo we took at last with almost everyone in it.

Photography by Tang Jinyao

In the photo, I am in the middle – yes, I just had my hair cut and get fatter a little bit. On the right hand is Russian girl Anastasia. Jeremy is at the back and Christina is on the far left end. There are certainly many other people in the photo who I remembered their name or not yet. Looking forward to know each of you more in the future – we have a blog (and comment section) to talk online, don’t we?

Mr. Tang, Mr. Lee, and others from ICS

I left Tang and his team from ICS to the end, but not the least. This meetup is specially, since the program of A Tale of 3 Cities came to the meetup to document what is happening there, and interviewed some of my readers, and me. We shoot some outside city scene from 1:00 PM to 3:00 PM before the meetup, and wrapped up everything a little bit after 6:00 PM, longer than expected. If you want to know what is going on during the meetup, tune to ICS (International Channel Shanghai) channel at 9:30 PM on Saturday, Sept 6, 2008, which is exactly 7 days from today. Everyone who came should be able to see yourself on TV then.

Tang is a wonderful person. He is reporter and editor of the program A Tale of 3 Cities. He is very passionate about his program that he spent a lot of time talking with me and took the time to walk along with me in the Wujiang Road. He helped to facilitate the meetup and arranged the TV shooting with the Starbucks (interestingly enough, not as most brand, Starbucks PR does not like their logo to show up in TV program, which they asked as a criteria to let us in. Strange). The whole afternoon was a wonderful experience for me – amazing afternoon. Thanks Xiao Tang.

Mr. Tang Jinyao from ICS. Photograph by Jian Shuo Wang

Next Meetup

If you missed this meetup, don’t worry. I will arrange such meetup in the future. I will post notice in advance, so if you want to be part of it, just pay attention to my blog, or subscribe my RSS to stay up to date. However, don’t ask me to notify you via email or other ways. I’d like to, but I just feel it is not easy to keep track of such commitment and it is very easy for me to fail to notify you. So come back often and check this blog. As my typical style shows, the I often post meetup in last minute (several days before it, instead of planning it way in advance).

I am traveling to the America from Sept 13 to Sept 22, and I will be in San Francisco (including San Jose, Palo Alto, SFO), and Seattle (and nearby places). I will definitely be at Microsoft campus in Redmond in the afternoon and dinner of Sept 17. Maybe I will find some way to notify my readers when I am there. As always, to meet with my readers in person is always my favorite experience.

Thanks everyone for coming! You made my day!

Blog Meetup on August 30, 2008

Tomorrow, I will have a small meetup in Pudong Starbucks Jinyan Store. Now it seems 3-5 people are coming. It is good enough, so we have some time to chat about life in Shanghai. Since it is just tomorrow, let me irritate about the logistics, and a special news. The following is organized in a Q&A format.

Q&A

Q: What is the meetup?

A: No particular goal, just free chat. Since I many got request for meetup, and my typical answer is, I will arrange meetup from time to time on this blog, so we have some opportunity to meet in person. It also provide a chance for the reader community to know each other.

Q: Who will come?

A: I don’t know. Sometimes just myself, and sometimes, there are more than 20 people. Who knows. People may show up or not. I have no idea before that.

Q: What about the cost?

A: It is pretty AA (go dutch). You may want to buy a cup of Starbucks yourself. I get there in advance, and take seat to sit down.

Q: Where is the Starbucks we are meeting up tomorrow?

A: It is at the south side of the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum, on the other side of the river – there is a pedestrian bridge over the river.

Q: How to get there?

A: Highly recommend to take Metro. Use Metro Line#2 and exit at the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum. Then go east or west to get around the museum. You will see a river, and a big Starbucks logo. Cross the river, and you are there. If you take taxi, tell the driver to bring you to the Jinyan Road 锦严路 (near Jinxiu Road, and Huamu Road).

Q: What is the weather tomorrow?

A: Heavy rain. If you cannot come due to the heavy rain, it is absolutely fine. I will be there at 3:00 PM.

Q: What if I cannot find you or get lost?

A: Call my mobile 13916146826.

Special News

I got message that crew of ICS (International Channel Shanghai) is coming to the meetup and they want to interview some of my readers there, of cause under your permission. If you want, you can appear on the ICS.

Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.

Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup

Emm… What was the last time of Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup? That is maybe one year ago in Palo Alto (recorded here) in Sept 2007.

I am planning to host another Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup 10 days from today.

Arrangement

Time: 3:00 PM to 6:00 PM

Date: Saturday, August 30, 2008

Location: Starbucks at Jinyan Road, Pudong, Shanghai, near the Science and Technology Museum. I have an article about the place here.

How to get there: Please also check the same article for instructinos.

What is a Meetup?

For my readers who don’t know what a meetup is, you can check the Q&A of my first meetup here: Wangjianshuo’s Blog Meetup. To be short, it is just an opportunity for the readers community to get together. It ranges from one person (just myself) to many, and I don’t know who will show up until that date.

For previous meetups, please see this archive page: meetup. If you plan to drop by, you are welcome to leave a comment below.

Looking forward to seeing you there and then.

Flickr Meetup This Saturday

Shanghai Sky sent me a note in Flickr about the Flickr Meetup This Saturday (tomorrow). I’d like to spread out the word.

Time: Saturday, May 12, 7:00 PM

Location: La Bella Cafe, 127 Yongfu Road, Shanghai

If you are interested, you are suggested to go. Here is more about the photo competition/auction/charity/event/group…

BTW, I love the phrase of “China Next”. There are a lot for us to expect for the next stage of China.

China Next: China’s Future

PhotographyShanghai Flickr Meetup/Charity Photography Competition

Date: May 12th, 2007

Location: Labella Cafe, 127 Yongfu Road

7:00 PM

1. Description

a. China Next: China’s Future. A photography competition raising money

for Shanghai’s underprivileged students.

b. The Shanghai Flickr Meetup group is organizing a charity auction

event。 Flickr members submit their digital photographs under the

theme “China Next: China’s Future” as seen by the photographer. The

winning photographs will be printed, framed and then sold at auction

for charity during the event. The competition is open to anyone (to

enter get a free account at www.flickr.com and post entries at

www.flickr.com/groups/chinanext.

c. For this event, the Shanghai Flickr Meetup group will be raising

funds for Shanghai charity Shanghai Sunrise. Shanghai Sunrise aims to

help remove Shanghai families from the poverty cycle by providing

education scholarships for disadvantaged students.

d. All funds raised from the auction will be donated to Shanghai

Sunrise. Our host of this event, La Bella Café will donate 30% of the

evening’s takings to Shanghai Sunrise. Kodak China has graciously

donated the printing and framing costs for the chosen photographs.

e. This competition is open to all photographers. The photograph

entering the competition can only be submitted via the Flickr system

at www.flickr.com/groups/chinanext/. You can register for a

free account at Flickr.com.

2. Competition and event schedule.

a. Competition entries can be submitted from Friday 6th of April 2007.

b. The competition will close on April 27th 2007 6pm Shanghai

Time (+10 UTC).

c. Our guest judge will make a shortlist of selected photographs from

the submitted pool according to the guidelines outlined below.

d. Flickrites owning the short listed photographs will be notified by

Flickr Mail by May 2nd 2007. To proceed to the printing process, the

short listed candidates must provide the organizers with high

resolution images by May 5th 2007. This can be done via email or FTP

transfer. The photographs will then be printed and framed by Kodak

China. The photographic auction will be held at the La Bella Café in

Shanghai on May 12th, 2007 from 7pm.

3. The Judging Process

a. The judge is a renowned professional journalist

b. Our judge will select 9 photographs that most closely match the

theme, and what appeals to them the most. The judge will also choose

one of their own photographs for the auction event. These 10

photographs will be printed and auctioned.

c. The judge will also select an additional five (5) runner’s up

photographs in case the owner’s of the selected photographs cannot be

contacted or produce a high-resolution image of their winning image in

time for printing.

d. The remainder of the photographs submitted to the competition will

be streamed during the charity auction for everyone’s enjoyment.

4. Awards

a. You get the warm and fuzzy feeling that you had one of the 10

winning photographs. Sorry, this whole event is for charity and all

the time, effort and materials involved in this event are donated.

b. If you wish, your Flickr name or real name and a short biography

will be placed next to the photograph when it is exhibited. We will

also attach a similar biography label on the rear of the framed

photograph as well.

c. If there are any inquiries regarding people wanting to purchase or

reproduce your images, we will direct them to your Flickr account.

5. Specifications for submissions.

a. It has to be a photograph (no artwork or photographs of artwork).

b. You must own and possess the photograph you submit!

c. We only accept digital files for this competition. The file can

come from either a negative scan or a digital camera.

d. Please submit a digital image of a minimum of 800 pixels in length

for the judging process. Bigger, the better for judging.

e. If you are selected as a winner, you must be able to supply the

organizers with a minimum of 3000 x 2000 pixel image in TIFF format

(.tif) for the final print. If you can’t supply this larger file

size, we can’t print your photograph (and will choose another

Flickrites’ entry).

f. Each Flickr account can submit a maximum of 3 photographs for this

competition.

g. Both color and black and white photographs are eligible.

h. Submission to be made by Flickr in

www.flickr.com/groups/chinanext/ group.

i. If the photographer cannot produce a high-resolution photograph by

May 3, another short-listed candidate/photograph will be chosen.

6. Use of images and copyright

a. We respect your rights. Any images submitted to this competition

remain yours. Copyright and all other rights remain that of the

photographer.

b. By submitting your photograph to this competition, you agree that

you are the owner of the photograph and submit this for use within the

competition. The organizers accept no responsibility for fraudulent

submissions.

c. By submitting your photograph, you understand that your image may

be used by the organizers for promotional purposes of the auction

event, such as printing for auction, or use in a slideshow at the

event. You also agree that by submitting your photograph to this

competition, you agree that one (1) sole print may be produced for

fundraising purposes only by auction for this specific charity auction

event.

d. We will try and respect your wishes in the printing and

presentation of your images. However, some minor image adjustment may

be required during the printing process to make your image look its

best on paper or card. Any adjustments will be done by a professional

photographer and printing technician with your wishes taken into

consideration.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/chinanext/

Back from 5G Review

I was hesitating whether to attend the 5G Review today when the clock shows 2:00 PM. Finally, I decided not to be too lazy. It seems I should go out of home in this sunny Saturday.

5G Review is a meetup about Internet, media and other emerging industry.

Location: UBB Coffee, 4th Floor, Lansheng Massion, 8 Middle Huaihai Road.

Time: 2:00 – 5:00 PM every Saturday

Participatoin: free of entrance, but need to notify organizer at http://groups.google.com/group/5gshanghai, or ask an exsisting member to bring you there.

The topic for today is: The Blue Ocean or Red Ocean for Blogbus…

I enjoy to have my friends talk about insight of the business, and start to think about my own questions, and answers.

Chat with Tina and Jin

Although I missed the lecture about International Space Station, I didn’t miss a great meetup with Tina and Jin.

Silicon Valley is a great place to meet people – smart people, entrepreneurs, VCs, and techies, geeks… I didn’t really get it for the first few trips to the Bay Area. Although I visited most high tech companies, the most fun part of being in the Bay Area is to spend time with People! Tina and Jin are obviously among the interesting and inspiring people in the valley.

Started with a Short Drive, and Entered a Closed Cafe

Jin joked why Stanford students work hard since all the restaurants and bars, and cafe close early. We went to one on El Camino Real only to find out it is closed. Closure of business at 6:00 PM seems an unreasonable time for me. It is especially so for a tea house.

Then we moved to the University Ave., THE street of Stanford. Last time I went there was with RC. There ARE some bars there, and they are pretty crowded, with even long waiting lines outside. Stanford students do have some place to go on Friday night.

I settled down at Coupa Cafe. Elliott put it as the first recommendation when we choose the meetup place for tomorrow. It was really nice!

Topics

We chatted a lot of topics, and many of them are interesting. For example:

History of Palo Alto -> Stanford -> Foreign International companies in China -> Trespassing -> Vote of BART extension -> Six Apart and Husband/Wife business -> VCs -> Sand Hill Road and VCs on it -> HYSTA (Hua Yuan Science & Technology Association) -> Community and Circles of Friends of Innovation/Startups -> GSR and NLVC -> Life in the Bay Area -> Logistic of McDonald/P&G/Starbucks -> Failure and Success of Microsoft China -> Google in China? ->Stages of a Startup -> Types of VCs (Grand Hytta type?)…

Anyway, there are a lot of topics, and I should definitely write some articles to summarize the thoughts of my visit to the Valley. I start to feel the value of the Silicon Valley – the inspiration, the people, and the network just stress people to think (think out of box), and generate new ideas one by one.

Let me write it up.

Tomorrow? Whole Afternoon in University Cafe

Tomorrow, I will have lunch in Buck’s Restaurant at I-280 and Woodside Road. After that, I will be at this location from 1:30 PM to 5:30 PM:

University Café

271 University Ave

Palo Alto, CA 94301

In case anyone want to drop by, you are welcome.

Update November 11, 2006

I may leave University Cafe earlier, like 5:00 PM. If anyone plans to come, please notify me in advance by posting a comment on this page. I will check it before I leave the University Cafe via GPRS (roaming mode) on my mobile phone.

Three Meetups in a Day

Chen Yun

In the morning, went to Xujiahui and met Chenyun. His IT Union has been running for a long time. We met each other in early 1998, when I was still in SJTU, and was involved in the start up Hotsales.net. Time flies, and when we meet again, 8 years past. (BTW, when we are used to time in years, does it mean we are getting older?) I offered my help if I can. Old friends are always best friends.

5G Review (Shanghai)

5G Review is an event by Donews.com. I wanted to help to ramp up the event to help people in the IT field to get together. Of cause, Lao Hwa helped most, and I am not a not-so-active participant. The topic for this afternoon is “The Future of Media”. The most impressive talk is from Yang Hui. I totally agree with her point that importance of content generator is more and more important in the Internet age.

Hengge, Michael, and Elaine

Immediately after 5G, Hengge called, and I drove back home to meet them. We had wonderful dinner at the India restaurant and chatted for a long time. :-) Well. It is just impossible to record all (or even any of) the learning. Nice to know Elaine works for IKEA, my former favorite funiture store.

It is late. Go to bed.

Zzzz…

Mashup Camp China

We didn’t expect the Search Engine Strategies Conference in Nanjing is such a big event. It started as a small event (my perception) months ago, when I agreed to participate in the meeting as a speaker. Later, Jack Mao (head of Alibaba, and Yahoo! China), and Johnny Zhou (Head of Google, China) joined as speakers. I didn’t expect it to be a big one. The event is coming this Friday.

As every industry meeting, the fun part is always outside the meeting. So we organized the Mashup Camp China. The original plan is a 7 people BBQ in Mao’s place, but when more and more people rushing to Nanjing, we finally extended to be a “very big” event – 20. :-) It is already big compared to the 7 people event.

Here is Mao‘s page on mashup.

Here is Isaac’s.

Attendant list:

Robert Mao, blogger, Founder/CEO of UUZone

Isaac Mao, blogger, VP of UCI

Jian Shuo Wang, blogger, Head of Kijiji China

Jack Gu, blogger, Founder of podlook.com

Xiaofeng, Jin

Zheng, blogger

Xuer

Bruce

Michael

Johney

6e (luliang), blogger, CTO of bokee.com

Owen, blogger

The name was inspired by Mashup Camp, which we closely monitored in the Idea Factory China alias.

Note

Met Lucifer Chu (Zhu Xueheng), the founder of OOPS (Opensource Opencourseware Prototype System). He donated his time, and money to translate all opensource opencourseware, like the MIT’s open courseware project, into Chinese. The project is a nice one. Lucifer has a personal award for sci-fi type of novelist. This idea inspired me a lot that you can help to promote something by setting up an award. :-)

Meetup: MBA or Not, that is a Question

Afternoon, attended another group discussion: Shanghai IT Club.

Arrangement

Time: 2:00 – 4:00 PM

Venue: Old Library, Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Topic: MBA 1.0 v.s. MBA 2.0

Participants:

  • Flex
  • Kejin
  • Charles
  • Austin
  • Liangming
  • Huijian
  • Lijun
  • Laohua (host)
  • Yale
  • Run Liu
  • Li Jian
  • Jian Shuo Wang

    It is a biweekly gather that many ex-microsoft collegues gathers and exchange ideas.

    Below are some random note for the discussion.

    Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business

    MBA 1.5 year term

    Flex think very highly of Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business and rated CEIBS (China European International Business School).

    Link: MBA 2000 report from CKGSB

    Why MBA?

    Reason: Want to remove fear for unknown – want to get insight about how business runs.

    Funny Answer: “The more you know, the more fear you have.”

    Links: State of Fear.

    Reason: Many go to MBA to seek for some changes.

    Funny Answer: Uncertainty of the impact of MBA program – it is not prooved.

    Yale: What is happening around is us can be very classic MBA case study. So to treasure what we can access instead of going to MBA to check other company’s MBA.

    Shanghai Jiao Tong MBA

    Tuition: 70,000 RMB

    Duration: 2.5 year

    Time: 20 Hour per week

    Think very bad of the program – invested money and invest time but didn’t get that much from the program.

    Fengshui V.S. Financial Knowledge

  • Why not study Fengshui instead of Financial knowledge?

    On Fengshui: It seems people in Hong Kong, Taiwan trust in Fengshui more than people in mainland.

    Now I started to believe some pricinciple of Fengshui. It may be a science of usability + psychology that works very good for the land of China.

    “MBA enable me to have a common language with other business leaders” – Steven

    Street Smart v.s. Book Smart

    How useful is Knowledge:

    Daily life only requires primary school level of Chinese, and middle-school level of mathematics. Most actitivies can be handled by +-*/, not square root…

    Some argues: Management is not a science. It is an art.

    Some argues: Management can be a science.

    Simplification can be a great way to create a science. But simplication process requires a lot of conditions to be true for the process to work.

    Fudan MBA

    Students are weak groups in contrast with professors and the school.

    The school is only in charge of charging money, and the professor only looks for delivering the hours.

    MBA and EMBA now become very profitable business in China – Fudan and SJTU have very successful business. It seems to me that CKGSB (Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business) is treating MBA and EMBA programs very seriously by investing into every student. There is no profit for CKGSB…

    Disclaimer: This is just a meeting note that records the discussion and debat. I hope it does not start a controversal thread here. Take all the information as it is. No garentees of accuracy at all.

  • Meetup: Future Idea Foundry

    I am at the Future Idea Foundry at the Starbucks of Zhong Shan Park Station of Metro Line #2.

    – Sunny Sunday.

    – Starting from 10:00 AM.

    – Futurists gather to share ideas in Shanghai on regular bases.

    – Participants are limited under 7.

    Participants:

  • Isaac Mao
  • Michael Li
  • Zheng Xiaoyun
  • Jack Gu
  • Jian Shuo
  • Sun Yizhong
  • Bruce Wang
  • Sayonly

    Ideas

    3D Engine from Demo.com – based on Firefox engine.

    # it is can be a very interesting idea to install an extension to Firefox to revert the homepage of sina.com.cn and display it in a completely new way.

    On watching TV on Mobile phone – Early Adopting Geeks

    People get excited about the posibility of watching TV on mobile, but people will only enjoy watching TV when the screen is big enough, the speed is fast enough and fee is cheap enough. This is called Enjoy Doing or Being Able to Do.

    Mobile Internet – UA profile

    The current mobile instructure only allow mobile to connect to China Mobile or China Unicom gateway, and China Mobile has removed User-Agent header from the request. The result is, no SP (Service Provider) is aware of which equipment the user is using, wheather they accept WML or WAP… It is the starting point of a closed mobile internet in China. The workaround for it is to use client software to send the information back to server in other header, or directly embed it into the URL request.

    Links: Opera Mini, UCWeb, Opera Mini for Nokia 6670

    I just installed Opera Mini, but it does not work now. So I need to configure a little bit later. ERROR: You do not have a working network connection. Please visit http://help.opera.com/mini/ with your desktop browser for instructios (error: 3.0.10:80)

    FON

    http://en.fon.com/. The funniest thing is, they have two types of people: selfish type and un-selfish time. The selfish type is called Microsoftie in their community. Oh my God!

    Mobile Social Network – Dodgeball

    Location based services – location based classified that allow users to post their location via SMS (check-in), and their friends/friends and friends are nearby. They were just bought by Google.

    Links: Dodgeball, Netomat.

    Social Filtering

    Editor filtering v.s. Social Filtering.

    Isaac:

    1. User contribution

    2. Web 2.0 aim to kill middle man

    Middleman is killed, but the functions of middleman must be provided, but in a social way.

    Slashdot is a great social filtering example.

    Pandora – vertical industry search is more valuable

    Pandora – “Can you help me discover more music that I’ll like?”

    They created a engine to continously provide music and based on your own continous feedbacks, combined with other’s feedback.

    For example, Google is more focused on horizontal search, while industry based vertical search, such as source code search.

    Chinese Vertical

    Douban.com = book review.

    Book review = Douban.com

    Movie = VeryCD.com

    VeryCD.com = Movie

    More links

    The above meme was transmitted by sayonly.com

    Zillow

    Redfin.com

    Complex system -> Preferencial selection.

  • Meetups are Good

    Meetups

    Hwhua called for a small Shanghai IT circle meeting this Saturday in SJTU (Shanghai Jiaotong University) (see? I am learning from the CEIBS (China Europe International Business School) case. The meeting are mainly some friends who worked together and now is Sanda, 9 City, eBay, Wicresoft, SAP, and Microsoft…

    I heard there is another one by Keso, Liuren and Hwhua on Sunday? I didn’t get confirmation yet.

    6e’s MSN changed to “Topic of this Search Salon: Anti-spam”. It seems they have a salon on search technology in Beijing tonight.

    Isaac and I are organizing another <= 7 people gathering after the Spring Festival about the latest trends in the Internet world. I remember in Dec, 2003, the chat in Starbucks with four people: Isaac, Hengge, Mao, and I may directly speed up the process to setup the blog hosting company blogbus.com, and SNS (Social Network Services) company UUZone.com. I applause for the salon and gathering in the IT field. It is a great way to spread the thoughts and provide more leadership to the field.

    Shanghai Weblogger Meetup – Feb

    I am happy to meet K W (blog://K W in Shanghai). We talked about his first impression of Shanghai: “Not so boomed city with crazy taxi drivers.” :-)

    Michel also blogged about the event. I am so happy that some one use eloquent to describe me (when I am talking in English). :-)

    I missed Maria‘s other four cats who were sent to others. But I enjoy the drinks and the place as such as the previous meetup.

    It was a great time to chat with Tek, Vicky, Lucy and others who attended the meetup. To view the same city in a traveller’s view or expat’s view help me to be more senstive, cheerful to stay in the city.

    I LOL when Tek shared his story with Wendy – as a native speaker of English, he went to Jin Men of Hunan Province to teach English, but he really had hard time to communicate with the local English teachers. That is the reason why students studies English for 12 years but still cannot communicate with foreigners. :-D

    Blogger Meetup this Wednesday

    I will attend the Shanghai Blogger Meetup this Wednesday. This is the second time I join the meetup and I definitely enjoy my previous one. A new friend Matt is among one of the best archivements that night. The topic for this Wednesday night, as Fons put it, is:

    What makes you blog? We already covered “making money” last time, now this seems a nice follow-up. How often do you write, and how do you pick your subjects every day? Do you have an audience in mind when you blog, and who is that? What is your philosophy for using links?

    If you are a blogger and want to join, I guess it is OK to register on the website. RSVP required. I will be there around 7:00 PM.