Chalk up another ignominious retreat for an American Internet company that once nursed grand China dreams. The conventional wisdom in the tech salons of Beijing (and, as I must now concede, Shanghai) has for some time been that eBay's days in China are numbered. And lo, the conventional wisdom has, despite its spotty record in China, come through. eBay will be working hard to position its deal with China's Tom.com as anything but a retreat. But make no mistake: It's a retreat.Read more »

As the owner of a PowerBook I recently went through Apple's battery recall. One of my two batteries was affected. I filled out the online form and within a week a new battery was delivered with a postage-paid return envelope for the old one. Crisp, clean and efficient. Of course, Apple thinks I live in the US and sent the replacement to my father's address in San Francisco. So I got the the deluxe American treatment.

Chinese people who own Apple computers think they are getting shabbier treatment, however, and they are burning up the Internet about it.Read more »

I spent most of last week in Hong Kong at the immense ITU Telecom World expo and conference. ITU --the International Telecommunications Union-- is the global standards-setting body for the telecommunications industry, and Telecom World, its triennial conference, is one of the industry's biggest events. This was the first time ITU Telecom World has been held in Asia. China is one of the world's largest and most interesting telecommunications markets, and with China's 3G license announcements expected any day, the industry is on tenterhooks.

So why did so many people I talked to at the show think it was a disappointment?Read more »

If you think Blu-ray and HD-DVD are the only two high-definition video disc formats out there, you've missed a big part of the story. The missing chunk is EVD, or "Extended Versatile Disc", and it's China's homegrown answer to those better known formats. EVD died a quiet death a couple of years ago when it was first commercially introduced. Now it's back with a vengeance.Read more »