chinaSMACK
A Note to Our Long-Suffering Fans
Long-time loyal readers of chinaSMACK have undoubtedly walked a tumultuous path with us over the past half year. We’ve experienced disruptions to our regular updates and, most recently, we’ve rolled out a major change to the mix and format of our content. Like all change, these have displeased and upset many.
We want to explain why these changes are happening.
Most should already be familiar with the delicate situation we have with certain advertisers that previously funded much of cS’s expenses. The loss of such advertisers has jeopardized cS’s editorial freedom and ultimately its future. Many of us working on cS, contributing our free time to this common passion in Chinese internet culture, have endeavored to be defiant, but we can’t pretend we aren’t also disheartened.
We desperately want to continue cS, and must find a way forward that carries on as much of our fundamental ideals and motivations for cS that is at the same time sustainable.
One of our ideals has been to share about modern China through what modern Chinese netizens are reading, watching, and talking about. For the most part, this will remain unchanged moving forward. cS will continue to share what’s trending on the Chinese internet, noting Chinese netizen reactions whenever they may be more interesting than what they are reacting to.
The difference is that we will now cover a wider breadth of daily hot topics through multiple Digest posts summarizing key details and notable Chinese netizen reactions. Meanwhile, our traditional long-form, in-depth, strict translations of a single story and a collection of its netizen comments will be published less frequently.
Readers who have complained about our lack of breadth may welcome this shift, while those who loved trying to figure out a story and its significance through exactly what was written by Chinese media and netizens may lament this new mix. We can identify with both.
There are multiple reasons for this change, and a key one is our collaboration with Amanda announced above and how it relates to cS not only having roots in Fauna practicing her English but also in our consistent desire to offer our translations of hot internet stories, pictures, and videos as an alternative way to learn Chinese (or English) for so many of our readers.
When Amanda approached us to work together, we were immediately impressed with the beta version of their app and how conducive it can be for casual language learning through daily content relevant to its users’ interests and daily lives in China. This overlap in both philosophy and function quickly brought us together, to build something greater than the sum of its parts.
cS’s traditional format is not suited for the small screens of mobile phones, or for mobile users on the go with limited time and attention to spare. We thus arrived at a format long enough to be sufficiently informative and short enough to be comfortably displayed and read on a mobile device. We’d still proudly provide our original Chinese internet and media sources, so anyone wishing to investigate further can do so. While we’d cover less potential depth in any particular story, we’d be able to cover a broader sample of Chinese internet news and culture.
For now, our Digest posts will appear simultaneously on the cS website and on Amanda, while our traditional long-form translation articles will exclusively be available only on our website. We encourage you to go experience Amanda. Hop on back to our site if you want to comment and discuss, but we think many of you will really enjoy Amanda’s many features for language learning that simply aren’t available on cS’s mobile site. Amanda is beautiful, clever, and not only because she has a lot of cS in her. :)
chinaSMACK has always been different things to different people. The conclusions drawn, the insights gleaned, and the purpose of visiting varies greatly between readers of different ages, interests, and familiarity with China and Chinese culture. For some, we are just salacious gossip. For others, we’re an interesting complement to their language learning. For yet others, we’re a novel way of glimpsing into an increasingly influential aspect of modern Chinese society.
Our partnership with Amanda inevitably changes our possible value to different readers. We’re sad to lose some of you but excited to have new readers join us for this next chapter in chinaSMACK’s story, one more focused on breadth of coverage and casual language learning. We hope those of you we might lose will nonetheless keep in touch, revisiting us when we publish a traditional translation post, and maybe even starring or commenting on the Digest posts with stories you’d like us to consider revisiting by doing a full translation along with Chinese netizen comments.
Let us know which stories you want more depth on and we’ll do our best to deliver.
Thank you for your continued support.
Love,
All of us at chinaSMACK (and Amanda!)
