Last week Lisa Hanson was in China as an invited speaker at the UN-sponsored World Summit on Internet and Multimedia in Shenyang. The conference included speakers from all over the world talking about the use of digital technologies in many industries, including games. In addition to Shenyang she made stops in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hong Kong. In Shenzhen Lisa noticed a well-positioned promotion for SPD Bank to recruit new customers. The promotion offered free gifts for opening new accounts. Small accounts get an iPod Shuffle, medium accounts get a Nintendo DS (not an iQue DS, mind you) and large accounts get a Nintendo Wii plus the game Wii Sports Resort. This is interesting, considering that consoles are banned in China and the only DS's for legal sale are branded by iQue, not Nintendo. Lisa spoke with a Chinese government official at the conference who agrees that SPD Bank probably doesn't even know that these products are illegally sold, as they are so readily available. We still await the delayed launch of the Eedoo iSec console.

Tech Rice recently published a well-written summary of China's top social networks. Kaixin001 is still on the decline and the Weibo sites continue to gain popularity as online gaming channels. China is pioneering the gaming trends for microblogging services as Lisa discussed in Shenyang, China last week during her session at the WSIM titled: "Captivating the Masses: The Rising Tide of Chinese Online Social Games."  Over the next year we should be able to see whether foreign microblogging sites such as Twitter adopt service channels such as online games for the rest of the world or whether this will remain a Chinese phenomenon. In addition Sina Weibo has introduced its own currency, the weibi, to go along with its online games, per a blog post on penn-olson.com

Best Buy will reopen its flagship Shanghai store after shuttering all China stores branded as Best Buy in February. The company has maintained ownership over Five Star, a local chain that aims to compete against Gome. Perhaps the newly reopened Best Buy in Shanghai will offer some game products once Beijing-based Eedoo launches the iSec console locally. The company may also opt to retail game controllers for gamers who play console-alternatives, which provide LAN multiplayer experiences using a PC, a console-like controller and a TV as the monitor. For more on that topic, read Niko's 2011 reports on China's games industry.