GM pulled out of Russia and India, so with hindsight, those of us Down Under, with a far smaller total population, shouldn’t have thought we were particularly special. Even where GM remains, such as South Korea, there’s a broken model range, with a big gap where the Cruze used to be. It’s becoming […]
Tag: China
The standard Chinese New Year news report
Janos Perian from Pixabay Every year, I hear or read a news report along these lines here: It’s Chinese, or the lunar, New Year today, and Asian communities all over New Zealand are coming together with their families to celebrate. It’s the Year of the Rat, which means it will be a lucky and prosperous […]
It took a while: Autocade hits 4,000 models
The Chinese-market Buick Enclave became Autocade’s 4,000th model today. It wasn’t planned: in fact, I had readied a photograph of the Hyundai Tiburon (RD), expecting that would be the 4,000th. But, as happens with this site, you spot something, and you want that clarified. I haven’t been methodical about Autocade, ever—it has always been about […]
Baojun doesn’t scream ‘premium’ and ‘next-gen tech’ to me
I have to agree with Yang Jian, managing editor of Automotive News China, that Baojun’s new models ‘obviously’ failed to reverse the brand’s sales’ decline. It is obvious given that the vehicles are priced considerably above the previous ones, and despite its next-gen tech, there’s no real alignment with what Baojun stands for. […]
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First night
Forty-three years ago (September 16, 1976), we arrived in this country. As we flew from Sydney and into Wellington, my Dad pointed out the houses below to me. ‘See, those are the sorts of houses New Zealanders live in,’ he said. I thought it was odd they lived in two-storey homes and not apartment […]
An expat’s thoughts about Hong Kong
Studio Incendo/Creative Commons 2·0 As an expat, I’ve been asked a few times about what I think of the Hong Kong protests. There’s no straight answer to this. Here are a few thoughts, in no particular order. The British never gave us universal suffrage, so the notion that it was all roses before 1997 is […]
Huawei without Google: isn’t that a good thing?
I see Google’s going to stop supporting Huawei as a developer. How is this a bad thing? First, Huawei can still get the public parts of Android, since they’re open-source. Secondly, if they don’t get updates ahead of time, so what? When have western software companies rolled out bug-free updates? Based on my own […]
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The newer the Instagram, the clunkier the video
It’s been nearly one week with the new Meizu M6 Note. It’s the “international” model, which means it’s not Chinese-spec, and there was no way to turn it into a Chinese one. One observation is that the international one is far buggier than the Chinese one. Either that, or Android 7 is far […]
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Meizu’s made it harder to switch OSes and root the M6 Note—at least I managed the latter
Above: If phones were sentient beings, it probably is a bit mean to have the old phone take a photo of its successor. After a drop to the ground (and by that I mean the hard floor at the local Pak ’n’ Save) produced lines on the screen of my old Meizu M2 Note, I […]
Don’t group Chinese New Zealanders into one faceless bunch
Some visiting Australian friends have said that they are finding New Zealand politics as interesting as their own, although I don’t think this was meant as a compliment. Those of us in New Zealand had a few days of House of Cards-lite intrigue, in that it was stirred up by a conservative whip, in an […]
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