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Watching China

I've been growing increasingly interested in China. Knowing a little bit about every major countries history can make history a little bit dry. China has been closed off from outside influence and only recently has knowledge of it's past started to leak out. Naturally as things begin to open up my interest has peaked. Below are a couple of my favourite articles and videos which are worth a careful read.

Tank man

Tank Man is chilling documentary on the Tiananmen Square massacre that happened in 1989 when the people of China revolted against corruption in the central government and were brutally beaten back into submission. At one point 1 in 10 people in Beijing were out demonstrating, including entire professions and parts of the navy. One of the most interesting parts occurs near the ending where young students are interviewed and have almost no recollection or knowledge of the event.

Population by Age

China's projected population by age group from 1950 to 2050. The animation provides a more analytical look at what ages will play the most significant role in the near future of China.

Choking on Growth

Pollution is a major issue everywhere these days, but no where is it more serious than in the industrial cities of China's east. The NYTimes has produced an excellent series titled "Choking on Growth". All four sections are very well done. Infact 16 of the top 25 most polluted cities in the world are in China.

Wulingyuan National Park

Wulingyuan, in central China is an up-till-now mysteriously natural place. Another vividly written story by the Times describes the fight to save this wonderful piece of the natural world. It is certainly a beautiful place - one I would love to see in person.

The Sandstone towers of Wulingyuan National Park, China

The Museum of Civilization in Gatineau, Quebec has a fairly large Chinese artifact exhibit on right now. Lots of boxes and pottery are on exhibit – many for the first time. I was at the museum last week, but pottery doesn't really interest me so I passed.

Any other good pieces out there about China? Please share.

Bump graphs denote race quality

F1 has a great little live-timing app that runs during races. Each driver is represented by a line that vertically bumps its way along as time unfolds horizontally.

An exciting European Grand Prix in Germany, 2007 The less-thrilling Hungarian Grand Prix in Hungary, 2007

The graph shows an immense amount of information in a relatively small amount of space. The pit stop strategy of each team. Unexpected retirements and crashes denoted by circular line endings. Dramatic passes made when two relatively parallel lines cross. An entire two hour race is compressed into a 500x500 pixel space quite comfortably.

Here we see the 'fight' for the lead of each race. Hungary is obviously a lot less intense than Germany was. You have to feel for Massa being passed so close to the end of such a grueling race. That is a well deserved second place.

Hamilton leads the race from start to finish Massa leads until lap 56, where he was dramatically passed by Alonso

I'm not sure what else to say, other than this is an excellent example of a bump graph in action, and that this concept should be applied to many more sets of data.