Global Voices Online

In China, to publish an academic essay is extremely difficult for simply one reason: Too many people are compelled to publish essays in a miserably limited number of journals. Reluctantly, contributors have to pay certain sum of money to get their essays published. But demand still overwhelmingly exceeds supply. Therefore, a new type of brokers came into existence: they help polish, rewrite and publish essays for blind profits. Academics
debate heatedly [zh], but a high-rank official openly supports charging the contributors [zh].

Recent Links also in East Asia

Lawyer and blogger raymiyatake expresses his doubts [ja] over the election of Japanese diplomat Yukiya Amano as director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). First, he says, Amano was supported by only 23 nations out of 35. Second, he points out the difficult situation that the Agency is dealing with, at present, and the “unfairness” of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which should be applied also to the five members already recognized as possessing nuclear power. Lastly, he suggests that instead of promoting a “pacific use” of nuclear energy, this should be replaced with clean energy sources (such as the geothermal or the aeolian ones).

This year is Mobile Suit Gundam's 30th birthday.
While a giant statue of the robot stands in Odaiba's park (in the Tokyo bay area), in a theatre of northern Tokyo, blogger/actress Rie Takahashi [ja] and her crew pay tribute to the animated television series in stage play Robot.

Bernard Leong observes that Facebook is almost the dominant social networking platform in Southeast Asia. It has overtaken Friendster in Malaysia and is getting more members in other countries in the region.