#FredinChina is a weekly podcast to know and understand the world's largest economy hosted by Fred Raillard. Fred fell in love with China, and lives in Shanghai since September 2012.
Thanks to Zhuomin Qin, Feng Huang, Jalila Levesque, Jules Chaffiotte, Radouane Guissi, Yi Zhang, Ying Zhang, Aliou Maro, Tina Liu, Louis Caudevilla, Dushan Karageorgevitch, Jing Qian, Jonathan Roy, Maxime Aubanel and Antoine Robin for their participation to this chronic. Find all #FredinChina podcasts on iTunes.
No more playing games: AlphaGo AI to tackle some real world challenges
The HotBrand this week is Google’s AlphaGo (the AI developed to play the Go game). This AI was launched more than one year ago, and had played and won against the previous world champion from Korea (Lee Sedol).
This year, AlphaGo dueled with the world’s top Go player Ke Jie for a second time. But, just like last year, Google’s AI proved to be a better match than humanity’s best Go player.
On social networks, people pointed out the fact that the new world champion Ke Jie, used techniques and strategies that are very close to the 'optimal option' that AlphaGo would do, which makes him the human player closest to AlphaGo.
Secondly, this was the last AlphaGo mission concerning the Go game. AlphaGo will now concentrate on nobler missions such as finding new treatments for various illnesses, as well as developing new energy techniques and materials in order to better our future.
The Chinese people were very proud of this new focus for the AlphaGo.
Exam rooms for HIV-positive students causes social media storm in China
The HotTopic this week concerns the separation of students at the Lifen Red Ribbon School during their university entrance exams. In China, the university entrance exams take place in establishments where various colleges come together.
There was a big debate this week with the Lifen Red Ribbon School, which is a rather unique school in China, since it has children with HIV/AIDS. These children are in a separate building and are cared for with special medical attention.
Now the headmaster asked that his students be allowed to take the exam separately, thereby fueling the debate. The topic generated more than 31 million media impressions and 5 thousand comments.
On the one hand, people agreed that these students should take their exams in a separate room, since they have special needs and will not be subjected to any rude remarks from the other children. On the other side, people were totally against this, arguing that one should not discriminate against these children. Moreover, one cannot be infected with the virus by being in the same classroom with people that have with HIV/AIDS.
It is an interesting debate since we can observe a change in mentalities with most people on social media believing that what the Lifen Red Ribbon School has done is a great initiative, and being thankful for their fight against discrimination.
Millennials denounce increasing generational gap with their elders
The HotPost this week is about the increasingly alarming gap between generations in China. This generation gap can be seen in this post, where we see a basketball player on a basketball court, with dozens of older women who are also dancing on the same court!
The story is that the Millennial had gone over to ask the older people (50 years old) if they could go and dance in the parks, and was then attacked.
This created a huge amount of buzz on the social networks, with tens of thousands of comments and reposts. The Millennials generally reproach the older generations (50 years and above), of not respecting them anymore. They also illustrated this generational gap by posting pictures of children trying to use public transportation (bus, subway, train), to get to school, only to find that they can’t get into the bus because some old people are blocking the door.
Millennials are asking for a more harmonious society, as well as a better perception and understanding of their generation from their elders.
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All #FredinChina podcasts on iTunes.