Hao Hao ReportThe best China news and blog posts

Sarah Zhang, Producer at House Films talks about the opportunities her company has had in making an impact on the film and media scene in China and discusses the success of Quest USA, the first Chinese reality TV show filmed in the US.

With a media blackout on reporting about the "Nail House" - a piece of property that refuses to surrender to developers, and has been surrounded by a massive development pit - it's tough to know if it's still standing.

One Chinese blogger has dared to find out...

Zola, a Chinese blogger who professes himself to be an "Untypical Angry Youth" has set out from Hunan to see if what has quickly become Chongqing's most famous landmark still stands. Keep posted at Ya, I Yee.

A man refused to sell his house to project developers, and so the developers dug a deep pit around the man's house.The Chongqing Zhengsheng Real Estate Company wants to turn the area into a £40m 'Broadway' square, including apartments and a shopping mall. But the owner of the villa says he won't move out unless the company pays his price -- the equivalent of £1.3

From the Danwei article: "A group of American students of Chinese has produced a spoof kung fu film and posted it to Youtube. Apparently shot in Vermont, the film is titled House of Flying Bananas. The dialogue is in laowai-inflected Mandarin, with English subtitles."

It's a fun piece of silliness, which you can watch below or on YouTube.
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Floorplanner.com, a very handy online tool to create and share interactive floor plans for your house or office space has just released a Chinese version. It's FREE for personal use :-) Check it out at www.floorplanner.cn

Last Tuesday, the response to the local authorities failure to demolish Yu’s Nail House in the heart of Beijing sparked colossal surges in query “Nail House” (钉子户) in China. “Nail House” is a fairly common phenomenon in China. It refers to a standalone house which stands out like a nail in the middle of a demolition ground due to disagreement with compensation terms.

A Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives led by frequent China critic Nancy Pelosi will intensify scrutiny of Chinese trade and human rights practices, but will stop short of confrontation, American and Chinese experts said.

(CNN) -- Fifteen U.S. House members asked President Bush Tuesday not to attend the Olympic Games in Beijing to protest China's human rights records.

The call follows comments from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who earlier said Bush should boycott the August 8 opening ceremony.

President Bush has said he intends to meet China's president during a trip to see the Olympics. Bush didn't elaborate on what issues he might bring up, but his administration has accused China, a major U.S. trade partner, of human rights abuses.

A translation (via ESWN, of course) of a HK blogger's opinions about an Apple Daily article that reported/republished a 12-year-old girl's blog in which she violently rants about her dad abusing her. Is traditional media aware of the implications faced by taking something expecting to sit in the blogsphere and pushing it into the mainstream?