February Feature : Zhou Shuguang - Saving the World a Tweet at a Time

The Smoking Mexican speaks to zhou 'zuola' shuguang - the guerrilla blogger who sparked a revolution in Chinese citizen journalism

“4.20pm - They have forced me to get into their car. I want my family to be able to confirm what has happened today (...) I am all right, I am in their car and I have the impression that I am being kidnapped."
(Translated from Zuola's Twitter page in August 2008)

On a trip to see his mother in August of last year, Zhou 'Zuola' Shuguang realised he was being followed. An unmarked car with four men inside tailed Zuola from his hometown Meitanba in the Hunan Province of China to his mother's house in Feng Qiao. It was here that the men apprehended him, telling him that not only was he to return to his home town immediately, but that they would be escorting him. His mother looked on as he was bundled into their vehicle and escorted back to Meitanba. The reason behind his detainment was clear; he was a citizen journalist.

Central to his fame in the days following his detainment was his documentation of his arrest moment by moment; posting updates online using his BlackBerry. From the back seat of the vehicle during his abduction, Zuola kept his avid online followers on tenterhooks 'They didn't take my phone, so I recorded messages to my twitter page' he recalls. Twitter now, is completely blocked by the Chinese government.

Although Zuola was roughed up, questioned he was released - others have been less fortunate.

The Chinese government are currently imprisoning dozens of journalists, and nobody has any official numbers. The notion of free press in the most populated country in the world barely exists as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) keeps a watchful eye over every publication.

In November of 2002, the Chinese authorities heavily censored all reports of a SARS epidemic in the Chinese mainland. When news of the disease was finally announced, the official figure reported that 55 people in China were infected with SARS, in reality it was closer to 5,000. Little could be done to stop the spread of the disease resulting in 8,096 Chinese casualties and 774 deaths.

But a more recent threat to the people of China is the Chennguan, translated roughly as urban city officers; a government body set up to maintain order on the streets of China. Commonly referred to by the public as ' mad dogs', the Chennguan have a chilling history of intimidation, beatings and murder. Construction worker Wei Wenhua was beaten to death in January of 2008 while attempting to photograph the Chennguan on his mobile phone as they attacked innocent villagers during a dispute about waste disposal.

As a reaction to this injustice and many others like it, citizen journalism is emerging as a favourite response by the thick skinned Chinese people. The most famous face amongst these outspoken renegades is Zuola. Detained, roughed up and robbed of his money by the authorities on countless occasions, he has been blogging since 2004 and is no stranger to the harsh realities of being deemed a threat to the CCP.

His coverage of a homeowner fighting to stop his property being demolished by a property developer embodies one of Zuola's many victories as a citizen journalist. Documenting the dispute via his popular blog, the publicity he generated led to an agreement between the homeowner and the authorities in Chongqing allowing him to keep his home. A rare victory for the common man.

Exposing a loophole in the Chinese censorship of the Internet, former vegetable seller Zuola publishes his blog on a server hosted in the United States, preventing the Chinese authorities from shutting it down.

'In China it's one party, one dream' he tells me. 'All of the media is completely under the CCP's control and the mainstream media can't report the truth because of the censorship. So, in the digital age, every blogger can report anything he likes on his web page.'

'With citizen journalism, everybody can interact with an event. Everybody can generate content and add more details about an issue; this is new media method.'

'User generated content will change the media as we know it.'

When I ask him about the encounter with the authorities in 2008, he is reluctant to sensationalise his capture; 'Personally I think that these guys get a command from somebody high up and are told to make sure the activists are under control, particularly during the Beijing Olympic Games. I am certain that they were still watching me every day until the games were over. My family too.'

Although they cannot shut him down, the authorities have gone to great lengths to shut him up.

'On December 3 in 2007 in Shenyang City, I was arrested and detained over night for no reason. I was quizzed for 2 hours about what I was doing in Shenyang, asked to fill out long forms about my intentions as a journalist, and then sent home by plane.'

'I am just one man but they see me as a threat; in the past people from the Chinese mainland haven't been able to access my blog directly because the Chinese government block my site.'

But Zuola remains ever positive; 'Many people have changed their minds about issues after I have reported on them and now people believe they can change things in China like I have.'

Having been strictly prohibited from reporting on the Beijing Olympics and confined to Meitanba under town arrest on several occasions since, he continues to update his blog (zuola.com), respond to fan mail and give interviews but it seems his days of fearless reporting are behind him. He is reluctant to disclose what led to him giving up the guerrilla reporting, but it’s not really for us to judge. Zuola has a family, and feels he has done his fair share for the freedom of the people.

'Now I am running my own business; an online shop. But I know that more and more citizen journalists will appear, and we can hope that the news will eventually gain transparency. The world around us will get better and more democratic.'

Zuola remains ever humble about his work as a journalist, referring me to a quote as my correspondence with him comes to an end:

“A democratic society in the digital age needs people who understand both journalism and technology.” (Rich Gordon, Director of Digital Technology in Education, Illinois)

SM

A Flash of Blue on a Particularly Grey Sheffield Day.

SM

Watching as Derby Impales its Culture on Big Spikes

In the week that Sheffield is shortlisted for the UK City of Culture, news has broken that a new £36.2m road in Derby is to be named after video game/movie character Lara Croft following a public vote, I couldn't help shedding some judgement on the matter.

Living a few stops on the train from Derby myself means I am filled with a little more intrigue than if it was say, Londonderry. Derby folk chose to name the new road after the busty Tomb Raider as she was conceived in Derby by Core Design, and for some reason is seen as some sort of local hero.

Legendary football player Steve Bloomer, astronomer John Flamsteed and engineer George Sorocold were all pipped for the accolade, as Croft ran away with 89% of the 27,000 votes cast. And in the same breath, the spokesperson for Derby Transportation Council mentioned that a stretch of the new road structure will be named Mercian Way to honour local soldiers.

It reads like a story from The Onion.

Perhaps I am bias, as a person who abandoned the Tomb Raider back catalogue of games after spending the first 45 minutes forcing Croft to impale herself on spikes to hear her make sexy noises (I was fifteen at the time), and the following hour locking her butler in the walk-in freezer of her big English abode.

Keep your ears finely tuned for some copycat stories, as Garland Texas, home of the 3D Realms games developer unveils the all new Duke Nukem Crescent.

I Sold My Soul to Bryan Adams - Curse of The Student Night DJ

Aged fourteen he realised that if he was to make it in music, his basic knowledge of the four chords of Nirvana's Incesticide weren't going to carry him. His little sister thought he looked cool with a guitar over his shoulder, but his friends had begun to learn how to shred along with Dimebag Darrell - and had left him far behind. It was time he thought, to follow the alternative path. He would become a DJ.

He combined his Christmas and Birthday presents to get a Numark Battle Pack - the essential beginners DJ setup, and from that moment forth, he knew his place in the world - behind the decks.

The imaginary sell out crowd that filled his bedroom every night like job seekers in a smoking area would cheer his every move, as he chopped and changed, dipped the bass, tweaked the treble and ferociously worked the flanger. In six months time, if he kept at it, he'd be making the ones and twos his bitch.

He did stick at it, and as the years past he soon became very capable on the tables that turn. His friend's would pass him cans of Kronenberg 1664 as he rocked their birthday parties for free. He spent hours leafing through dusty vinyls in crumbling Camden record shops, and soon enough he was ready for the stage.

But this is where the glamour ends. This where the choice is made, to hit the underground scene and woo the cool like a crease in the trilby of Jam Master Jay, or to succumb to the lure of the pop club circuit like waking up naked with your face glued to a Milli Vanilli shoulder pad by your own saliva.

And in this case, he felt the mounting gas bills and the thirst for crowd pleasing made the decision for him.

The bills got paid, but the crowds that he pleased were so smashed on VK Tropical that he couldn't make out if their moronic dancing was seeping with irony and whether their yelps of enjoyment were in fact cackles of mocking laughter. 'Summer of 69' followed 'We're going to Ibiza' followed 'Mr Brightside' followed 'Since You Been Gone' like some kind of arduous Guinness advert.

But good things came to no one that night, however long they waited.

The masses gathered in a patronising circle around the dance floor holding hands as the crooning of Robbie Williams signalled the end of the night. 'Another day, another dollar' he grunted as he kicked a path through the discarded plastic cups on the dancefloor, showering his Crocs with budget branded energy drink and vodka.

The student night DJ - a misunderstood creature - seemingly cocky yet his sad eyes drown in insecurity and his hollow soul buckles with the weight of a thousand what-ifs. No DMC finals, no cries of 'one-more-tune' and no clever pseudonyms will befall this guy. He is DJ Darren, he is '...Plus Resident DJs', he is the Monday/Wednesday/Friday night CD spinner at a generic student night called something awful like Smashed!. When you die, he'll be manning the wheels of steel as you descend the proverbial escalator to hell.

But he is by no means doomed to this existence, he may have traded his pride at a record hop in the 90's for an extended edition of Aqua's 'Dr Jones' but he still has options.

If the the moronic dancing ceases when the world suddenly realises that he is the physical embodiment of a Now That's What I Call Music album from 1992, all is not lost for Darren.

There's always local radio.


SM

Tenzin Gyatso Online - The Dalai Lama Joins Twitter

This Monday the Dalai Lama launched his Twitter page - much to the amazement and excitement of the twitterverse. His holiness probably isn't rocking an iPhone 3GS (he has no pockets for a start) and tweeting himself as he goes. But the notion is quite fantastic.

Currently close to ten thousand followers (Twitter followers that is, I'm sure he has more actual followers) he follows no one himself, despite the best efforts of Geordie comic Ross Noble
'Dear @dalailama Please follow me. I know people normally follow you but go on, we wear similar shoes.'

It gives me great incentive to continue in the path of onlighntenment (you heard it here first), and perhaps some strength in those dark times when I turn to my Twitter feed for inspiration. It also strikes me as quite ironic in a roundabout way, that the Dalai Lama - banned from China, is at the forefront of a Twitter revolution, a website that is also completely forbidden by the Chinese government. Could this be provocation from the re-incarnated spiritual leader?

My Chinese friends, download a proxy server, access Twitter from a 'foreign' IP address and follow the Dalai, I personally can't imagine how liberating that five minutes could be.


SM

[Peace and love to obeythepurebreed.com for the image]

Introducing...

Hola y bienvenido blogosphere,

Sit down, grab a smoke and lets talk business. This is The Smoking Mexican - an anti social commentary addressing real issues with viscous rumour and wild speculation, allowing you to view the world around you with all you need; a powerful sense of cynicism and a 20 deck of Lucky Strike.

Based in Sheffield in the South of Yorkshire, UK you'll find The Smoking Mexican in print, online and on twitter (@smokingmexican) which I'm aware is also online, but lets not get finicky. Keep us bookmarked and do check back soon.

Hasta pronto

SM