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Julianna Wu
Reporter & graphics designer, Abacus
Julianna is a summer intern on the Post's Graphics team. She studied journalism and is interested in using visual elements to tell stories.
Even though there's no official definition, cities in China are often informally slotted into four tiers. In general, higher-tier cities are larger and wealthier compared to lower-tier ones.
It turns out that recent Chinese victories in esports tournaments has inspired fans to take on the sports themselves, in a country where 30% of esports fans are women -- far higher than the US, where just 17% of esports fans are women. Female players are so common in China that there might be a different barrier: Streaming is so lucrative that some talented players are shunning esports teams to strike it out on their own. "You earn much more and there’s less pressure," says former pro Siqi "Nara" Chen.
Tencent’s new mode brings survival elements back into battle royale
The funny thing is that smart speaker sales in China increased massively in 2018. Canalys says the market grew 100 times last year, and Alibaba, Baidu and Xiaomi trail only Amazon and Google in sales. But that might have something to do with price rather than desire: One recent sale saw Alibaba's Genius X1 speaker go for just US$15.
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The team behind Journey delivers beta version of a new game that feels very much finished
Mini programs are lightweight apps that run inside another app (like WeChat, Baidu or Alipay). They don’t need to be downloaded or upgraded through app stores. They make it possible for one app to perform the service of many apps add up.
Giving out red packets filled with money (otherwise known as hong bao or lai see) is a key part of the Lunar New Year tradition. But with all forms of payment in China going mobile, even this ancient tradition is getting a digital makeover thanks to WeChat. Julianna lays it all out in her wonderful infographic, which explains the tradition, how it shifted, and why 5.20 or 6.66 are two of the most popular amounts given as gifts.
A drink-holding helmet, instant hot pot and the ultimate lazy person armchair top Taobao’s list of lazy enablers
"I'd like to appeal to employees to maintain a state of calm, to man one's post and do one's job well." Who said it? We've broken down the year that was in five simple graphics, beginning with a list of quotes from some of the biggest names in China's tech industry.
We run through our best streams and best moments of the year!
How Chinese tourists are taking their mobile payment methods global
Looking for cheaper products and a sense of uniqueness, Chinese shoppers are beginning to target Black Friday
Of course, Xiaomi, ZTE and Royole aren't the only companies working on folding phones. Julianna and Karen ran through patents filed by major smartphone makers which shows the very different possibilities that they're exploring -- everything from clamshells to rollable scrolls and... tents. (No, really.)
November 11 is China’s Singles’ Day, a national online shopping feast. Started by Alibaba in 2009, its sales volume now is bigger than Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.
Every now and then we hear these terms thrown about by people talking about cities in China. But what actually separates a first-tier city like Shanghai from a third-tier one like Wenzhou? Julianna put together this wonderful graphical explainer to show what it all means. My favorite bit: People living in higher tier cities love buying with supermarket apps.
Every now and then we hear about a new flagship, like Huawei’s latest. But with so many new premium phones coming out throughout the year, it’s hard to keep track. To make things easier, Julianna has compiled a visual calendar of what to expect and when. Check it out to see what else is coming later this year.
Golden Week is notorious for crowds of visitors pouring into tourist attractions all across China. That's probably why millions of people went with a staycation instead, curling up at home and ordering prepackaged food online. Meanwhile, for the 7 million who spent the holiday abroad, many are increasingly paying the same way they'd pay at home: Using Alipay and WeChat Pay. Julianna breaks down all the interesting data for us in one great graphic.
Tencent Music's IPO was a good opportunity for us to dive into China's online music scene. Tencent's three streaming music services dominate, while NetEase Cloud Music has found a niche among fans of anime, comics and games. Julianna has a great graphical look at the industry, including a breakdown of what people listen to -- with traditional music still scoring highly among China's 555 million online music fans.
I'm not gonna lie, this was a story born out of frustration. Lenovo started teasing a phone with FOUR cameras -- presumably to one-up Huawei's three-camera phone, which in turn one-ups the iPhone XS's two cameras. I got tired of writing endless stories about this, so we decided to look at why everyone wants more cameras, and what those extra cameras actually do. And I may have started this in a grumpy mood, but in the end I was really happy with what Karen and Julianna came up with!
Julianna put together this wonderful graphical look at China's elderly internet users. There's more of them than the entire population of Germany, they're super good at messaging people with WeChat, and there's even a social networking app dedicated to one of their favorite activities: Square dancing.
A visual look at what’s on the list (and what isn’t)
A combination of Yelp, Seamless, Uber and more, Meituan Dianping lets users order a range of services all within one app, like food delivery, restaurant deals, movie tickets or hotel bookings.
China has as many gamers as the total population of the US and Japan combined
China loves short video apps. And now there's another one for people to play with: Yoo Video, from Tencent. But it faces a tough task to break the stranglehold of Douyin and Kuaishou. The two are very different -- and which one you use even depends on which city you live in! Julianna created this visual guide to both apps so you can see how one of China's hottest app trends works.
