Paper replicas of iPads and iPhones with other gadgets for sale for the Chinese Qingming festival at a prayer supplies shop near Kuala Lumpur. Chinese people go to cemeteries during the festival to honor the dead with prayers, food, tea, wine and paper replicas of flashy cars, Louis Vuitton bags, and other bling for the ancestors to enjoy in the afterlife. Reuters/2011.
April 4 in China marks Tomb Sweeping Day (Qingming Festival), an ancient cultural tradition in which families honor their ancestors by visiting their tombs and leaving offerings of food. Not unlike Día de Los Muertos, really.
Brian Ashcraft writes at Kotaku:
Paper replicas depict items that can be used in the afterlife, such as clothing, money, and cars, are burned. Over the years, this tradition has evolved with the times as evident by a recent must-have paper replica: the iPad.
Yup. More in China Daily, Shanghai Daily (with a photo gallery), The Telegraph.
The words "iiPad" and "888 GB" are displayed on a paper replica of an Apple iPad on sale for the Chinese Qingming festival, near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The number 888 is auspicious in Chinese culture. Reuters/2011.
I’d call it a spoiler, but you already know what’s coming: “As Seen On TV” garden gadgets are not much good, however ingenious they seem to be. Household Hacker picked up a few items and subjected them to tests. None were terrible or dangerous, but the gimmicks don’t really work — a trimmer that uses […]
The Inverter is a kickstarted, sub-$500, 34mm automatic mechanical watch built around Citizen's Miyota Calibre 9000 movement, augmented with a custom module that makes the watch run backwards, so that it can be mounted so that the movement is exposed (beneath a sapphire crystal), with the back of the watch becoming its "face."
Damon Beres notes that the situation with folding displays is quickly going to hell. Enter Samsung’s Galaxy Fold, a kind of metal and glass taco that could define a new category of personal device — provided the company can get the thing to work. Several tech writers accidentally broke the gadget’s foldable display shortly after receiving review […]
Looking for a career in IT, gaming or software development? In the ever-changing world of the internet, versatility is your biggest asset. In other words, mastering Java might not cut it in an interview if you don’t know C#. However, there’s a bundle that covers the essentials in most any language. The Legendary Learn to […]
Getting a set of cookware that will outlast you is one of those signs you’ve truly grown up. It used to be easy to find durable materials that also cook well, but these days it can be hard to tell what’s quality and what brands are coasting by on a recognizable name. Well, there’s at […]
Whether you’re writing company memos or meticulously crafting a novel, everybody needs an editor – and we’re not just talking about a spell checker. Writing software has gotten pretty intuitive, to the point where programs like ProWritingAid can guard against more than just silly mistakes. They can actually improve your style. Designed as the first […]
