Although china/divide is young and impressionable, it is not a person. To be more accurate, it is not just one person but several, a new forum for discussion about China’s interaction with the world.

china/divide features social and political commentary relating to modern China. We seek to go beyond knee-jerk stereotypes, nationalism, and prejudice to engage in genuine discussions of contemporary issues, both in our writing and together with our commenters. We also offer original translations framed by context and analysis to share insights into what the Chinese themselves are saying.

Indeed. The site was born (we say “went live” in the biz) today, but that doesn’t mean it’s shy. On the contrary, it seems to crave attention. It loves visitors, links, tweets, buzzes, and I suspect it would release a sex tape if it could. That might be difficult, though. This is what it looks like:

Attractive, yes, but no sex tape in the offing anytime in the near future.

If you’ve ever seen the mortal sin masquerading as the movie Three Men and A Baby, you are already familiar with how china/divide is being cared for and fed. Unlike the aforementioned film, however, the site was also conceived by three guys — icky, bad visual image — who like to call themselves “The Three Pistoleros.” Or maybe I just made that up.

Kai Pan — Still detoxing years after graduating from university, Kai is the wizard behind the curtain at CNReviews. His superpower is sleep deprivation. His major weakness is the aftermath of sleep deprivation.

Charles Custer — The HD Thoreau of our time, Charlie lives in a small thatched-roof hut in an undisclosed location in Anhui, armed only with WiFi, a Chinese-Urdu dictionary, freeze-dried youtiao, and an Urdu-English dictionary. Charlie is the mastermind behind ChinaGeeks.

So Kai and Charlie approached me 17 hours ago and said “We’re thinking a new China site would be cool. Seems like you know how to punctuate correctly, at least some of the time. Want to make a web site?”

To which I said, “Sounds like fun. And if we get sued, you already have a sharp Jewish lawyer on the team.”

To which they replied, somewhat uncomfortably, “Yeah, that was a big plus too. But really, punctuation is also very important.”

Yes it is, not everyone knows how to do shit like that: don’t you think!

So it’s been a very long 17 hours. Sixteen of those hours were devoted to coming up with a name for the site, which was a very long process. A half hour was needed to set up the site itself. I then wrote an inaugural post (took another seven minutes), and the rest has been devoted to this announcement. Busy busy.

OK, so why am I involved with china/divide?  In short, China Hearsay is not fulfilling all of my needs. The relationship remains strong, and the attraction is still there, but I do find myself with a wandering eye these days. Man just wasn’t meant to be monogamous when it comes to web sites; that’s why ICANN made so many TLDs and GoDaddy made domain name registration so cheap.

I admit it. I’m cheating on China Hearsay so I can go hang out with the guys at china/divide. And why not? Our goal is to have great commentary and opinion writing about China and its interaction with the world. As the site matures, we will be bringing on many more talented writers with perspectives on China.

So go have a look and let us know what you think. If you want to contribute, send me your thoughts (I have access to China’s nationwide pneumatic tube network, but carrier pigeon also works). If you want to complain about anything you see on china/divide, contact information for Charlie and Kai can be found on the site.

Will this have any effect on China Hearsay? Will I be spending all my time hanging out with the new kid? No, that’s not the plan. I’m just writing more and making my life more complicated. I’ve been sleeping too well lately, so some additional self-imposed deadlines will take care of that right quick.

As china/divide is a group effort, I will not be posting there every day as I (try to) do with this site. Maybe a few times a week, with announcements on this site to close the loop.