ChinAI #297: Around the Horn (18th edition)

Greetings from a world where…

heaven is two cardinals coupled for life

…As always, the searchable archive of all past issues is here. Please please subscribe here to support ChinAI under a Guardian/Wikipedia-style tipping model (everyone gets the same content but those who can pay support access for all AND compensation for awesome ChinAI contributors).

Around the Horn (18th edition)

Let’s go Around the Horn for the first time in 2025 with this week’s ChinAI issue. For those new to this, here’s how it works (see ChinAI #290 for previous edition):

• I give short previews of ten articles that caught my eye as I was scanning through sources (all published within the past week or so). The title for each preview links to the original article in Chinese.

• Readers vote on next week’s feature translation by replying to the email and/or commenting on the post with the number of your preferred article. *Votes from readers who are paid subscribers to ChinAI count a little more.

• Main premise is that any of these 10 links would have made for a great feature translation this week — like the Hunchback of Notre Dame movie soundtrack, there are no skips!

1) 2024 China Open Source Developers Annual Report

Summary: This 100+ pg. report provides a useful overview on the Chinese open source ecosystem, with a focus on large AI models. From my initial skim, it seems like there’s some really interesting data such as the adoption rate of AI-generated code by Chinese programmers.

Source: OSChina — portal that covers China’s open source community

2) AI-generated fake news, taking over my family group

Summary: How has the Chinese internet dealt with fake news stories, including those about play off the shock value of an earthquake in Tibet? This author worries about the ability of their elderly family members to discern fact from fiction.

Source: 虎嗅 (Huxiu) — well-known platform that shares user-generated content but also publishes their own pieces on China’s science and technology ecosystem.

3) 2025: What historical node are we at in AI development?

Summary: Deli Zhao, head of Alibaba DAMO Academy’s AI team, reviews the past year’s trends in AI development and looks ahead to what will define breakthroughs in 2025. He focuses on routes for AI development that are not defined by the Scaling Law.

Source: 知识分子 (The Intellectual) — a platform that covers the state of science in China, founded by Chinese and Chinese-American scientists.

4) AI is changing the world, they are changing AI

Summary: Renwu magazine named Baidu’s Duer smart assistant as its AI symbol of the year 2024. This longform piece profiles the team that developed this product, which has been having longer and longer conversations with users after incorporate large language models.

Source: 人物 (renwu) — magazine that covers human-interest stories. A previous issue translated their longform investigation of the algorithmic pressures faced by Chinese delivery drivers.

5) In the AI ​​era, don’t look at unicorns, daily consumers of 1 billion tokens

Summary: How many companies are using 1 billion in tokens per day — a critical threshold for the implementation of large models. According to this Qbit report, over 200 Chinese companies have reached this mark.

Source: 量子位 (QbitAI) — news portal that regularly covers AI issues, similar to Leiphone and xinzhiyuan. Lately, QbitAI has been publishing longer reports more frequently.

6) Real-world test — I used AI to do a year-end summary

Summary: AItechtalk reporters play around with Baidu’s new Free Canvas office productivity tool. It’s a nifty product demo that features how these reporters generated PPTs, used it for article summaries, and worked through bugs.

Source: AI科技评论(aitechtalk) — focuses on in-depth reports on developments in the AI industry and academia.

7) Data Governance Research Report

Summary: Last September, China released its Data Security Regulations, “a crucial set of national-level administrative rules to implement China's Cybersecurity Law, Data Security Law and Personal Information Protection Law.” Now that these have come into force, CAICT’s research report analyzes the implications and what needs to be revised.

Source: 中国信通院 (CAICT) — a think tank under China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

8) How to build data infrastructure that stimulates 2 billion RMB in investment in five years?

Summary: This article breaks down China’s latest guidelines on data infrastructure construction, including provisions to encourage data circulation. This piece also incorporates details on the implementation of the East-West Compute Transfer project.

Source: 财经E法 (Caijing ELaw) —portal focused on internet governance under the umbrella of Caijing Magazine, a respected business platform.

9) Many cheered for Xiaohongshu, but they misunderstood the essence of "Chinese platforms being used overseas"

Summary: Using the phenomenon of TikTok users migrating to the Chinese Xiaohongshu platform, this article looks at the broader trend of Chinese internet companies going abroad. One important phase was the “Four Little Dragons Going Overseas”: TikTok, Temu, SHEIN, and AliExpress.

Source: 文化纵横 (Wenhua Zongheng) — leading platform for contemporary political and cultural thought, which also publishes a quarterly journal.

10) I investigated the scam industry on the Thai-Myanmar border for 200 days

Summary: Based on a year of field research, Wu Qin reports on how the Thai-Myanmar border has become a center of telecom fraud and human trafficking. This is a deeply researched piece of longform journalism.

Source: 正面连接 (Positive Connections) — I came across this platform on my WeChat Moments this week. Here’s China Media Project’s description:

Positive Connections (正面连接), launched in September 2021, is a new media project and content brand with a focus on nonfiction writing (非虚构写作). The project’s goal is to “present important aspects of the complex world to which people generally turn a blind eye” and to “intervene in the rapidly changing times with newer language and more modern expressions on the basis of the truth.” Founder is Zeng Ming, former journalist for Guangzhou’s Southern Weekly.

Thank you for reading and engaging.

These are Jeff Ding's (sometimes) weekly translations of Chinese-language musings on AI and related topics. Jeff is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at George Washington University.

Check out the archive of all past issues here & please subscribe here to support ChinAI under a Guardian/Wikipedia-style tipping model (everyone gets the same content but those who can pay for a subscription will support access for all).

Also! Listen to narrations of the ChinAI Newsletter in podcast format here.