This week in Chinese media idiocy: music trends, Liu Yifei, and online marriage

Is this the cover of the next big thing?

First, from Beijing Daily Messenger, which has its finger on the pulse of online trends:

In today’s wired world where things can change in an instant, if you are still enthralled with Dao Lang, Mice Like Rice or Two Butterflies, then you are so not IN, you know? Right now it’s the college folk song Glass 《玻璃杯》 that’s most popular online.

The article goes on to announce the dawning of a third age of acoustic folk rock, following the Taiwanese invasion of ’82-’85 and the mainland golden age of ’94-’95.

Problem is, search statistics from Baidu show Glass far beneath those other tunes. And the Beijing Daily Messenger article itself is suspiciously similar to an article that circulated in online forums last month. That article, in turn, bears a remarkable similarity to the album description for Glass: New College Folk Songs I, the single piece of evidence that there is a burgeoning folk music movement.

Is this all just a ploy to sell more records? After all, the singer of Glass is coming out with her debut album in August.

Next, we follow the Chongqing Evening News into the gutter as it reproduces online rumors that actress Liu Yifei underwent a sex change between 2001 and 2002 because her mother wanted a girl instead of a boy. The allegations come from someone claiming to be Liu Yifei’s childhood friend, so naturally the Chongqing Evening News credulously runs the story under the headline, “Liu Yifei’s childhood friend reveals…”

We last heard from Ms. Liu when she was accused, also by unidentified persons online, of faking her age. The evidence given to disprove those allegations was a class photo from her primary school days; it must’ve been a boy in that picture.

Finally, another online poll, this time collecting 900 responses from “a certain message board.” Guangzhou’s New Bulletin runs the results under the headline “35% of netizens have online lovers.”