Living, as I obviously do, in China, it’s always difficult to keep up with anything interesting with the Great Firewall in my way. Every proxy gets blocked and every VPN fails after a couple of months. Fortunately, though, there is a cure, and it’s called Google Reader. All I need is the rss feed of an inevitably blocked blog and I can read it – though leaving comments is impossible.
These, then, are the things I read when I’m not doing something else.

China

Beijing Boyce– Reviews of pubs and clubs I will probably never go to. Oh well.
The Beijinger– Surprisingly forthright & informative listings guide blog.
Beijingologist– Mainly about the development of public transport in Beijing, surprisingly one of the most interesting blogs listed here.
Chinahush– All the most interesting unusual Chinese news turns up here.
Danwei– The best China news & comment links, inevitably VERY blocked.
Imagethief– Formerly interesting Beijing-guy blog, now very rarely updated.
Jenny Zhu– AKA the Chinesepod woman, cultural stuff, fairly interesting.
Lost Laowai– Various expat bloggers in China ranging from brilliant to ok.

Friends

Brandy In China
From The Horse’s Mouth (Virginia)
Human Jukebox (Gail)
Johnny Breeze
Latent Existence (Steven)
Master Of Arts (Bea)
Next Level Lights (Ed)
Not For Resale (Duncan)
Surfing The Void (Jamie)
Wolf Disguised As A Monk (Garreth)
Your Native Son (Noah)
(I haven’t included quite a few people whose blogs seem not to be for a public audience, if you’re missing this is why.)

Music

7 Year Glitch– Decent mp3 blog.
Diskant– From back in my day. Still going, still good.
Pitchfork Features
Popular– Tom Ewing is reviewing every British number one single in order. He’s just reached 1990. (USA version)
Pusing Ahead Of The Dame– As above, but with every Bowie song.
WFMU’s Beware Of The Blog– Top digging.

Famous People

Adam & Joe + Adam
Adam Curtis– Best documentary-maker currently around.
Bad Science– Ben Goldacre
Johann Hari– Political blog. 90% brilliant, 10% a bit embarrassing.
Peter Serafinowicz– Not as good as his twitter.
Robert Popper– Used to be a favourite, now he seems to be busy with other projects.
Warming Up – Richard Herring’s blog. Sometimes very funny but I wish he’d stop publishing every single thought that he has, three separate times in separate media. One half-hour podcast a week maybe.
Why That’s Delightful!– Graham Linehan
Will Self, always worth reading, of course.

Other

Sci-Ence! Justice Leak!– Blog on various cultural & political topics, fairly readable.
Lamebook– Worst things found on Facebook, pretty entertaining.
Passive Aggressive Notes
Sergey Larenkov– Stunning combinations of WWII and modern photos.
spEak You’re bRanes– Worst reader comments from BBC News pages etc.
Ugly Tattoos– Top schadenfreude.
Webcomics: Subnormality! xkcd Red Meat The Perry Bible Fellowship (RIP)

If you can think of anything else I should be reading then let me know.