May 11, 2018
Today we started the day off with a bus ride to 滴滴出行, or Didi. Didi is a company similar to Uber, and in fact acquired Uber's China division recently. It is the most popular ride sharing platform in China. On the bus ride to Didi, we listened to Ms. Lu, Shuang, who is a PhD candidate at Harvard, talk about her research into Didi. She provided a good overview of their impact on the Chinese transportation industry, including their competition in 2015 and 2016 with Uber. She told us about how Didi brands itself as a tech company. She said they have three main focuses; ride sharing, autonomous driving and AI research, and Big-Data usage. Didi is starting to focus more on autonomous driving, so that they can grab that share of the market. Shuang then continued to talk more about the less pretty side of Didi. We learned how many Didi drivers manipulate the platform to earn money without actually driving anybody, we learned how many drivers who joined in 2016, when compensation was quite high, are now forced to stop driving, or are stuck with a car they need to drive as compensation drops. Finally, she discussed how Didi is regulated in China. The national government puts very few restrictions on Didi, however they allow for local governments to place their own restrictions on them. This has led to a large variety of laws being put in place controlling how Didi can operate in the different provinces around China. To end her talk, she emphasized that she does not think that Didi is lying to the public, or that they are not a good or moral company, rather that they choose to present the facts that make them look the best.
Ms. Lu, Shuang's talk served very useful as we moved to the next part of the day, in which we visited Didi's office in Beijing. The presentation we received at the headquarters presented an image of Didi meant to seem perfect and almost unimaginable. The presentation started off with the tour guide using an obviously scripted "facial-recognition" screen to open a door. The next part of the tour was the only part with any substance, where they detailed the main talking points of the company. They provide background checks on drivers, they monitor the driving habits of their drivers, and they provide an intermediate platform for communicating with drivers. The tour guide made sure to emphasize that they had 30 million orders every day on the platform and seemed very proud of this. They listed some impressive technological feats, including that their algorithm takes into account more than just shortest distance, and includes calculations on gas cost, ease of travel, among other factors. They also shared their carpooling initiatives, and some of their efforts to provide Didi for the elderly, children, and those who need accessible rides, for example the pregnant or the disabled. This was the most impressive part of the presentation, however they decided to follow it up by leading us into a room that looked like it was designed to look like the inside of the Death Star. It featured a "real-time" data map showing traffic statistics. They showed off animations of how they are integrating smart traffic lights and trucks to change lanes on roads, similar to an HOV lane, in order to combat congestion. However, while these animations looked almost utopian and idealistic, in reality many of these initiatives are very limited in scope or are almost entirely ineffective. After another impressive light show that was extremely scripted, we were lead into a conference room, where we were allowed to ask questions of people who worked for Didi. While they were willing to answer some innocent questions, such as how they interact with the government, they were very unwilling to disclose any information that could be at all damaging to them. For example, in response to questions on how their platform impacts the environment, since it is adding cars to the road, they dodged the questions and just cited their statistic that they reduced carbon emissions by 260,000 tons in the last year. However, not once where this statistic was mentioned did they cite a source or share how they gathered this information. Additionally, when asked about data privacy, they merely wanted to talk about how this information was very protected and how important it was to them that it stayed that way, instead of talking about the steps they are taking to keep this information out of other companies or governments hands. By the end of this Q&A session, it was obvious that it would be difficult to gain any new information from Didi.
After our time at Didi, we headed to Tsinghua University's Schwarzman Scholar program to have a tour from a previous Dialogue student. We ate lunch and then had a quick tour around the building. The food was very good, and it was nice to get some coffee. The tour was very impressive, and made the program they have there seem very attractive. After the quick tour, we were led to the auditorium to listen to Liang Xiaoyan talk about "Left-Behind Children," those children whose parents are migrant workers, so they get left behind in these remote areas. Xiaoyan started the organization "Teach for China," which brings volunteers to these rural areas to help them prepare to take their tests. In China, students are tested when moving between schools, and their scores dictate what schools they can go to. It is estimated that there are 60 million "Left-Behind" children in China, 50% of whom drop out after middle school. These children face many issues outside of the classroom which impact their learning ability. For example, since these children often do not see their parents for up to 7 years at a time, they lack physical affection, or any affection at all. Because of this, many of the children end up dating at very early ages to compensate. Additionally, once these students become acquainted with the volunteers, it is not uncommon to see each volunteer with a child on his back and two children around his legs. Another negative effect of the environment these children are raised in is that physical, and often times very violent punishment is very common in schools. This type of discipline is not seen as wrong or in anyway cruel, and as such it is very much ingrained in these communities as the most effective way to teach. Because of this, it is extremely difficult to change these patterns, and introduce more effective methods of discipline. Xiaoyan finished up by highlighting how the rapid development of cities in China is coming at the expense of these peasants, and local governments are not at all sympathetic to these issues, in fact, they are often very opposed. Because of this, there has been much improvement in the infrastructure of these school systems, but the pedagogical approach has stayed the same. This talk was a nice follow up to our visit to Dandelion School yesterday, since the students at the school are the more fortunate children, the lives of those who are not able to go are much different, and also require much attention.
The next stop of the day was at 圆明园 (yuan ming yuan), which is the Old Summer Palace, where emperors from the Qing dynasty would live. However, in the 1860's, British and French troops burned down the palace. Because of this, most of the palace is gone, and is in ruins. The Palace was initially a very large area, with an almost water park feel. It was designed by an Italian missionary for the emperor, and it was very technologically advanced with how it managed the water displays. Because of this, after the missionary died, the palace was not really used. As we walked through the park, our guide pointed out many of the different ruins that were left, and some of the interesting notes about them. We even got to take a boat ride through the man-made lake in the center of the park.
The final stop of the day was at a Peking Duck restaurant. The food was amazing and is probably the best meal we have had so far. It was a great way to wrap up a very long but amazing day.
- Issac W.
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