communication - production - business development

 Welcome to ElliePop, a site dedicated to Chinese and American pop cultures as well as the future of work. Especially compelling are the emerging mobile lifestyles to which both hemispheres are adapting.  Which companies, philosophies, gadgets, styles, designs , movies etc. will impact us the most?  Will Apple’s iPad be the Coke that we all share in perfect harmony? Where does FoxConn end and Apple begin? What does the showdown between Google and the Chinese government mean? Can Alibaba’s hyper-realist CEO Jack Ma make us stand-up and take notice like Steve “it’s just that easy” Jobs? Will the U.S borrow itself into oblivion as China sells us more danger laced toys and baby formula? Forget about Olympic gold medals, who is going to win the sustainable energy race?

Occasionally I scan the comments on Baidu’s news forums and am alarmed by the decidedly nationalistic tone I see expressed by Chinese readers. And here in the U.S we're throwing up our hands as our flirtation empire draws to a close.

Everybody’s mad as hell and the banks are just going to take it all. The gap between rich and poor continues to widen in both China and the U.S.  Meanwhile “we the people” and “the People’s Republic” behave like the Talking Head’s song People Like Us: “We don’t want freedom, we don’t want justice. We just want someone to love.”

Hey! Hey!  Hey, Apple. Hey Apple. Which is larger, the Chinese middle-class or the entire U.S population?  Trick question (of course! haha). Answer: they are the same --roughly 300 million. I found this out while watching a promo for “Koppel on Discovery: The People’s Republic of Capitalism.” I nearly dropped the remote.

At long last, my years of language study have some relevance beyond party tricks and ordering the number 3 combo in fluent Mandarin. I have been a student of Chinese since the 1980’s. Now, finally, China has enough people, with a little extra cash, to whom we can sell stuff...maybe.

Who knows what's really going to happen next? It is my sincere hope that a pleasant surprise is in store for both you and I (and not just in bed).

Ellie

More About Ellie

Ellie and her pet rock "Pepsi" live in Los Angeles, California.

Ellie grew-up in a quiet college town in Oregon that was equally segmented between liberal and conservative thinking. It was cloudy and grey like the Morissey song "Everyday is Like Sunday." The sit-down-and-talk-about-politics-over-decent-coffee-but-do-little left a lasting impression. She prefers the lets-all-have-a-bbq-and-listen-to-music school of activism she found in Austin, Texas. Ellie is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin and majored in RTF (Radio-Television-Film) and Chinese.  Shortly before graduation, she nabbed a scholarship to study Mandarin in Taipei, Taiwan.

For five years Ellie split her time between Beijing and Taipei. She watched Taipei's first Starbucks be built -- it was on the bus route from her job doing movie and television subtitling at "TV Time" to her classes at Taiwan Normal University (Shi Da). She and a handful of other foreigners were interviewed about Taiwan by then administrative heart-throb, turned Taipei Mayor and now current President of Taiwan, Ma Ying Jeou. The Beijing she knew from 1995 had already been bull-dozed and Disneyfied by 1999.

In 2001, Ellie moved back to the U.S. and chose Los Angeles because...why not? She found work in the Chinese diaspora promoting a private utility company to communities in the San Gabriel Valley. It was a crash course in local politics as well as the dynamic and sometimes devisive nature of Los Angeles County cultural identities.

In 2005, she switched gears and began working in on-line marketing and advertising with a company in Beverly Hills, California. The work itself was interesting because of the chance to interact with clients nationally and internationally on a daily basis and because Beverly Hills itself has a Jewish, Iranian culture that is, in many ways, similar to what she encountered while living within the traditional cultures of China and Taiwan.

Now Ellie splits her time between promoting designers and the social platform Motioncore. She feels that the new century will redefine both work and education. She wants people to be less afraid and more excited about the future of work. Ellie views the increased need for better education and skills as a chance for each person to avoid the mundane, in order to live and create on his or her own terms.