Dubbed the GreenOpolis, the pavilion was designed by SC M&C Strategy Development, and will cover about 21,527 square feet of space. The 5 levels will include music and cultural performance areas, plus restaurant, terrace, and office facilities.

Seriously, if the 2010 World Expo wasn't in China, I'd head over with the sole purpose of dropping acid or something. The event kicks off on May 1st next year. Oh, and next cab off the rank is South Korea. Here's the first taste at what they've got planned for World Expo 2012. [GreenOpolis via Arch Daily and China.org]

The image is actually part of National Geographic's International Photography Contest 2009—one of 25 examples collected by Boston.com. Check out the entries if you want a little eye candy to tide you over until dinner. [NatGeo via Boston]

They are not just light sources, however. These LED towers also collect rainwater and funnel sunlight to the multiple levels of the 1-kilometer long Expo Boulevard. [World Architecture News via Inhabitat]

Since my son started to drink gas, his IQ has dropped sharply and now he can't figure out simple addition and subtraction. Before that, he was a very smart boy, and he could even repair the television. But now he does not know the answer of 7 plus 17.

No kidding. The worrying thing is that it took a long time for the parents to realize that his son's habits could be bad for him. How long?

He began to drink gasoline five years ago, when we found he liked smelling lighter fuel.

Five years? FIVE FRAKING YEARS? According to the doctors at the Shanghai hospital where he's being treated "the gasoline contains a lot of lead, which can do harm to people's brains. To make thing even worse, the boy is in the physical development stage, and the lead has caused serious damage to his body." Apparently, the parents have been drinking kerosene for the longest time too.

Poor kid, seriously. I hope the parents get their ass in jail for incompetence. The only positive thing in this story: At least he wasn't tased. [Shangai Daily via slashfilm--Thanks GitEmSteveDave!]

Sounds like there was a problem with some nearby flood prevention walls at the Dianpu River, but there's no hard evidence as to why this huge building simply fell over. Anyway, here are some sweet pictures of the architectural carnage. [Cellar.org via Twitter]

Not dissing the Shanghai Expo outright, as it seems like a pretty good place to exhibit cracked-out brain melting exhibitions of the oncoming international future, and Macau is the gambling and casino capital of China (nay the world), so it makes sense that its representation is a little, how do you say, Vegas.

Regardless, the pavalion features solar panels and rain collection, and bunny's ears are inflated balloons that can bob up and down. The whole thing is designed by Macau firm Carlos Marreiros (it used to be a Portugeuse colony). So, who wants to meet me in Shanghai in 2010 with tons of acid? On second thought, Chinese jail probably isn't as nice as the Bunny Pavillion. [Carlos Marreiros via Neatorama, Picdit]

Note to Chinese tow companies: either get heavier trucks or remember to take them out of neutral. [Chinasmack]

The Shanghai Tower is organized as nine cylindrical buildings stacked one on top of the other with a double-skinned layer on the outside. The outside layer is triangular shaped and swivels as it reaches upwards. Designed by San Francisco-firm Gensler, the tower plans on accommodating offices, a luxury hotel, nine sky-gardens and various retail and cultural venues, as well as a new Shanghai Metro stop.

A lot of folks over here are saying that no matter how bad the current economic situation might get, the chances of this project losing funding is very slim. Ironically, this is probably due to the Mori Building, whose own construction was halted in its tracks by the Asian Financial Crisis—even if The Shanghai Tower turns out to be a money loser, there's no way the Chinese would've stood for having a Japanese building dominate their soil. [The Design Blog]

Basically, AMD's designed two chips targeted at the netbook market on its “Yukon” platform, due in first half of 2009. Consumers are getting “Caspian” and “Conesus,” both 45-nm dual-cores with integrated DDR-2 controllers. Caspian is designed for ultraportables and will contain 2 Mbytes of cache. Conesus, made smaller to fit into the tiny little bodies of netbooks, will only contain 1 Mbyte. But Senior VP Randy Allen hedged that the chips weren't specifically designed for netbooks, and that Yukon was focused on customers who don't want a “compromised PC experience.” Translation: AMD's saying no to Mobile Internet Devices.

It's 2009 desktop plans were less murky. High-end lines will get “Deneb”, a quadcore chip with 8Mbytes of cache and options for both DDR-2 or DDR-3. Mainstream desktops can look forward to “Propos”—also quadcore but with 2 Mbytes of cache.

It's an unfortunately foggy morning in Shanghai, but from where I am, the crappy weather only adds to the feeling of standing in the middle of clouds. I'm towering almost half a kilometer over the rest of the city, on the highest man-made observation deck in the world, the 100th floor of the Shanghai World Financial Center, which opened just two months ago. With cumulus on my right, stratus on my left and a mirrored ceiling reflecting their formations back at me—I feel myself getting dizzy. Have I developed a fear of heights, or is vertigo inevitable when you're this far up?

The Shanghai World Financial Center, also known as The Mori Building, officially opened on August 28th this year after over a decade of planning. When it was first envisioned—by a Japanese construction company, The Mori Group—it was to reach 97 floors tall, surpassing the spires of the Petronas Towers in Malaysia. But construction only got as far as the foundations during the late 1990s, sliding to a halt when the Asian financial crisis hit and the Mori Group found itself juggling a massive fund shortage.

By the time it began building again in 2003, Taiwan had already started on Taipei 101 which—at 508 meters counting its ridiculously tall spire—would soon wrestle away the title of World's Tallest Building. The Mori Group scrambled to change their plans, but since the foundations put in five years ago were only made to support 460 meters, the most they could add was four more floors, settling for second place, but with an asterisk: The building has the highest observation point in the world.

The observatory for the SWFC has its own entrance, located on the ground level and to the side of the actual skyscraper. For 150 yuan ($22), you get a ticket to see the 94th floor Sky Arena, the 97th floor Sky Walk, and Floor 100, that record-breaking vantage point. For those with a sense of frugality, or perhaps lacking a sense of adventure, eschewing the top two levels cuts 50 yuan from the entrance fee.

After paying for the ticket, I was ushered into a room labeled "Pre-Show." The several of us there that morning proceeded to stand around a tower to watch a “light show.” I raised my eyebrow as various Pokemon-like characters—flying teardrops and spinning cherries, all with Hello Kitty-esque expressionless faces—flitted across a spinning, glowing replica of the building to a soundtrack of ambient electronica in the style of Brian Eno.

My brochure told me it was designed by artist Toshio Iwai, perhaps better known in the West for his work on Electroplankton, a Nintendo DS that featured similarly plink-plonky electronic music. The revelation that Iwai had been behind the show wasn't surprising; it had reminded me of the types of multimedia exhibits I'd seen in Tokyo featuring him.

How culturally Japanese the entrance had been was especially attention-catching considering the slightly tumultuous history of the Mori Building, a Japanese building in China. The empty trapezoidal area up top, which makes the building look like a giant bottle opener, was originally supposed to be in the shape of a circle, symbolizing—at least to the architect—the Oriental myth of the square earth and circular sky.

But several prominent members of the Chinese politico including Shanghai's mayor protested that the design looked too much like the Rising Sun of the Japanese flag. In a country still sensitive over Japanese occupation during World War II (and Japan's at times unapologetic attitude towards the war), it was too much of an affront for the tallest building in China's richest city to represent anything remotely Nipponese. The building's architects dutifully redid the top, claiming that the new design saved money.

After the pre-show, we were herded towards the observatory's first elevator. A panel on one side depicted the floor we were on and the height we were at. As the doors closed, another light show played out on four screens and the ceiling, complete with yet another atmospheric ambient tune. The elevator continued upwards, and the music sped up to match our trajectory. My ears popped. It took a good minute before the lift finally slid to a halt and the doors opened to reveal the walkway to the Sky Arena.

Sky Arena? More like Sky Lounge to me

The first of the building's three observatories, the Sky Arena is less like a viewing platform and more like one of those mod mid-century airport lounges. There were high ceilings and spectacular views, but the white couches and standing-height tables were constant reminders that this was, at its heart, for tourists. A bar at one end served refreshments while a long booth area in the middle sold various Mori Building memorabilia. Ever wanted your nougats to come in a can-opener-shaped skyscraper package? You know where to get 'em now!

Dude, just put it down... it's not worth it.

I quickly bypassed the area and got on the escalator to the 97th floor, the second viewing point. This area was more plain than the first one, a long walkway painted in white. Perhaps thanks to our closer proximity to the sun, it was unbearably bright. Glancing up through glass, I could see my final destination—Skywalk 100, at 474 meters high, the world-record-holding observation deck.

It took one last elevator to bring me up those three final levels. This time, as I stepped out of the elevator and into the walkway, it was hard not to gasp.

Unlike the matted white of the lower level, the designers had decked Floor 100 out in a mirror-like finish, so that everywhere you looked, some part of the skyline was reflected back at you. From here you could see the two other Shanghai giants, the 468-meter Oriental Pearl Tower and the 421-meter Jin Mao Tower, looking like absolute dwarfs, little children reaching upwards in a futile attempt to compete with the grand daddy of vertical climbing.

The 100th floor viewing deck

On the ground were one-square-meter transparent glass panels, some offering an unobstructed view of the drop below. Standing over one and looking down, I could see the tourists down on 97, dashing from window to window. Sometimes their faces would point upwards, as they squinted into the sun and tried to make out the outlines of my feet.

It was about then that I felt my legs wobble and my knees shake. Vertigo was kind of a new experience for me. Having grown up in Asia's megacities, I'd spent virtually all my life peering out of skyscrapers. I've never had a problem standing on edges and staring down thousand-foot falls—but this was a whole new monster. Despite my rabidly anti-Luddite stance (hell, I work for a technology blog!), a part of me wondered if man was ever meant to stand this far up in the sky.

I also wondered if part of my sudden bout of lightheadedness could be attributed to the subtle vibrations of the wind whistling around the walkway. The Mori Building was allegedly designed with Japanese earthquake protections in mind, making it overspecced for an area like Shanghai that hasn't felt tremors for over a century. Wind—honking gusts of typhoon-powered wind—can still be a problem, especially at these heights.

To try and counteract swaying, the building has two mass dampers installed on the 90th floor. Each damper consists of a computer controlled, 150-ton counterweight suspended by wire rope. By rotating with and against the wind, the dampers can reduce wind effects by 40 percent and avoid oscillating even during typhoon conditions.

An LCD screen near the elevator assured me that the transparent glass I stood on was safe. Each panel could withstand the weight of three 176 pound people jumping on it at the same time, no problem. It wasn't that reassuring; I know quite a few people who weigh a little more than that. But they weren't there, and I was definitely within limits... so timidly, I tried a little hop. The person next to me screamed. It was good to know I wasn't the only one feeling nervous.

On my way back down in the elevator (complete, once again, with the light show and Eno-esque music), it was strange reflecting on how I'd just been standing at the tallest man-made point ever. It's currently impossible to get even close to that high elsewhere. Though the current tallest building, Taipei 101, may be officially 16 meters taller than the SWFC, almost 60 meters of its height is dedicated solely to the spire. Floor 101 is only 439 meters up, a good 34 meters shy of where I had just been.

Even though the SWFC tower is barely two months old, its observatory's days as the highest observation deck in the world are ticking speedily to an end. In less than a year, the Burj Dubai will open for business. Though nobody right now knows exactly where the tallest floor will be, the building is estimated to reach a whopping 818 meters once it's completed.

And even in Shanghai's own Pudong Area, the Chinese have already started the foundation on something bigger. The Shanghai Center, expected to be complete in 2013, will eclipse the Mori Building by another 140 meters. Nicknamed the "Dragon Building," its funding has been relatively untouched by the current economic downswing—some say because the last thing the Chinese government is willing to do is let a Japanese building stand as the tallest in their land.

Wallet full of cash and bags at ready, I stood, mouth agape, in front of the five-story electronics bazaar in front of me. It was one of several dozen in Shanghai, magical places where floor after floor are filled to bursting with gadget vendors begging you to stop by and see their wares. Like Circuit Cities on crack, everyone inside is desperate to make a sale and every price is negotiable. Welcome to the way the Chinese—or at least the majority who live in megacities like this one—buy their electronics.

Just minutes earlier, I had directed a taxi driver to take me to one of the bigger tech marts, the Shanghai PC Mall, located in the Pudong area of Shanghai.

“Are you sure you don't want to go to a Best Buy? We have those here now,” he said.

It's true—Best Buy opened its largest store ever in Shanghai in 2006. Since then, it's cut the red ribbon on a second outlet and recently received permission from the government to start building four more. But what would be the point of me going there?

One of the more ironic qualities of buying electronics in China is that, despite all components being made here, foreign company goods still count as imports. Suggested retail prices are pumped even higher than they would be in the U.S.... unless you know how to negotiate for a better deal. But Best Buy frowns on bargaining, even in China.

“You aren't a local. The shopkeepers will tear you apart,” the taxi driver warned, laughing, as we approached the Shanghai PC Mall.

Well, we'd see about that. I marched resolutely in, and was automatically bombarded by three sales clerks from three different booths, all hawking the latest notebooks from some of the best known corporations—Sony, Toshiba, Dell.

“Come and browse for a minute, maybe you'll see something you like,” said one.

“Go this way, we have a special today that you might be interested in,” warbled another.

“What do you need? What do you want? Tell me, I'll find you a good deal,” the third trilled.

In every cubicle-like row is a representative who'll help fix your PC problems and, if you're not careful, sell you something you don't need.

I have to admit, the intensity startled me. Coming from New York, I was used to aisles of disaffected or otherwise nonexistent employees. The last time I'd seen such fervor was when a kid in an oversized blue shirt confirmed that I was buying something expensive and insisted I needed a longer warranty. I scuttled off quickly and the three salespeople automatically turned around to beset the next person to enter.

This time around, I wasn't hunting big game. Televisions, netbooks and DSLR cameras would have to wait until I'd become more confident in my chaffering... and had more cash.

Debit cards are still pretty rare in this country, and credit cards even more so. Most transactions still rely, ridiculously, on cold hard bills. To buy a decent laptop, I'd have to stuff my pockets with over a thousand 100-yuan notes—Chinese currency's largest denomination.

Every booth sells its own unique mishmash of gadgetry, impervious to categorization or order.

On this trip, my list was more mundane, consisting mostly of accessories and doodads. I stopped at a booth with at least thirteen brands of webcams crowded around an LCD screen. Some were from established names like Logitech, others were made by local companies I'd never heard of. After waffling a bit over the specifications of each option the shopkeeper presented me, I asked how much for a simple Chinese-branded 3-megapixel number.

“180 yuan,” she said. I paused then responded that I'd actually take it for 100 yuan.

“Done!” She packed it up quickly, grinned and stretched out her hand to take my bill. Damn it. I'd done enough bargaining in my life to know that when a deal is resolved this quickly, I'd probably been suckered. Sure $15 U.S. isn't a horrible price to pay for a webcam, but who knows how cheap I could of gotten it for if I'd been a little more ambitious.

I vowed to stick to brand name goods from then on, where at least the obsessive hours I'd spent browsing Consumer Reports and Newegg.com would give me some indication of their true value.

Floor upon glorious shiny floor of stuff!

With that in mind, I next tried my hand at nabbing a wireless router. This time around I went for something I recognized: an 802.11b/g Netgear that would run about $40 in the US. The starting price this time around was 300 yuan (or about $45). I countered with 150 and was scoffed at. Employing my best “Well, if you really aren't going to sell it to me for that much, I guess I'll just be on my way” look, I got the clerk to sigh and give it to me for 200 yuan. $10 off the US price and no sales tax added on at the end of the deal. Not too shabby.

In the next hours, I haggled over everything from speakers to hard drives to extra RAM for my laptop (installed for free, with an extra discount thrown in if I left my old memory sticks with them). I came home that day, arms loaded with new stuff, satisfied with having saved a good 20 to 25% off of US street prices.

Yes, those are iPhones (and real ones, too). No, they're not supported in China yet. Don't tell anyone, okay?

And yet, I had also figured out why Best Buy, despite its inherent inability to ever compete on cost, was doing so well over here.

Negotiating for what you want is a pain. Being accosted by vendors trying to convince you that they're the ones you should buy from is a mess of stress. Worrying about whether everything will work as promised at home is downright draining. And the funny thing was, I approached the experience as an informed consumer. It must be a thousand times more frustrating for someone with less experience, who would undoubtedly realize too late that they paid way more than they should have.

What Best Buy offers in China is a haven for the emotionally fatigued. Their stock comes at a hefty premium, but with none of the uncertainties of the tech bazaars. You'll never turn around and find the next vendor selling what you just bought for 10% less. There is no “if only I were savvier” moment. Oh—and if something is wrong with your purchase, Best Buy won't yell at you for being a doofus when you return it (well, at least not over here. The Consumerist says things might be different States-side).

That kind of psychological assurance has put the company in a peculiarly powerful position. Despite initially dire predictions, Best Buy's Shanghai outlet is now one of the company's top-10 revenue generators worldwide. This is probably why three of its four new China stores will be located in this city.

But would I head there the next time I need a quick gadget fix? Heck no. Somewhere back at the Shanghai PC Mall, there's a netbook with my name on it. And it's waiting for me to win it in a bargaining battle for the ages. Paying retail? That's for sissies.

Who doesn't love bargains (and Jackie Chan)?

[Thanks to Josh Bancroft for several of the images]

To death I say! Jason, I'm ready. [Flickr via Neatorama]

On the other hand, AMD's refusal to specify when in the second half of '08 they'll launch is a bit worrying—December would basically put them a year behind Intel, and it wouldn't be the first time they've been late. Come on AMD, be awesome again, please. Update: Press release below.

AMD Demos 45nm Native Quad-Core Processors for Server, Desktop

— Customer Testing of Product Samples Underway —

HANNOVER, Germany. — March 4, 2008 —AMD (NYSE: AMD) demonstrated at the CeBit electronics exhibition its first 45nm quad-core chips running multiple operating systems and a range of processing intensive applications. The processors were produced in Dresden, Germany, in AMD's Fab 36 300mm manufacturing facility, using an advanced 45nm process co-developed with IBM.

AMD 45nm transistors are engineered to enable greater performance-per-watt capabilities in AMD processors and platforms. AMD combines new processes and materials with leading edge technologies, such as immersion lithography and AMD's fourth-generation strained silicon, for a highly-manufacturable, highly-efficient production process.

This important milestone is the first of many as AMD moves toward delivery of 45nm products later this year. The first 45nm chips demonstrated by AMD include the "Shanghai" product for server and "Deneb" for desktop platforms.

Well, aside from faster speeds and better data services, it has the potential...

to bring high definition broadcasting to your mobile. So instead of getting rear ended on the highway for talking on the phone, you'll get rear ended by someone who was watching HDTV on their phone. The trial cost Shanghai around $19 million US and Samsung has already said it could deliver 4G mobiles by the year 2010. – Louis Ramirez

Shanghai Stages 4G Telephony Rollout [Yahoo]