Follow @jeffnau
According to NPR, breathing quality over the past 3 weeks in China’s capital city of Beijing has been so bad that the city’s smog alert system has been raised to the highest level in the country’s history.
In addition, plane flights are officially being cancelled because visibility is too low. Health experts in the United States equate living in Beijing with living in a packed smoking lounge.
The government has officially recommended that “Everyone should avoid all physical activity outdoors; people with heart or lung disease, older adults and children should remain indoors and keep activity levels low.”
According to charts, Beijing air quality is officially just a few points lower than that of the Fairbanks, Alaska wildfire of 2004. While the worst the U.S. Embassy in China allows air quality to go to is 500, it’s already a few points past that (see chart to right — Beijing is in the red, appropriately, with the wildfire in the green).
It’s gotten so bad that now this manufacturer/philanthropist Chen Guangbiao is now selling cans of air — partly to help people breathe, and partly to bring attention to the incredibly awful quality of air. Meanwhile, the Chinese government is responding by ordering 100 polluting factories to shut down, and officially cutting auto usage by a third. Here’s a video of the denizens of Beijing enjoying their canned air after stumbling out into a poisonous cloud of death.
Jeff Nau – who has written 1264 posts on The Jace Hall Show.
Jeff Nau is a main contributor to the Jace Hall Show covering pop culture and music trends in the nerd community. He has contributed to San Diego City Beat, 944, and Ill Literature, amongst others, and spends his spare time working as an artist and photographer.

Logan Huffman wants to know who is posting comments about him online and asks Jace for help. Meanwhile Joe Flanigan is caught again flirting in the V costume. Jace heads to the set of Law and Order: SVU to catch up with Ice – T and Coco and the Starcraft II team gets “rushed” by World of Warcraft Lead Designer, Jeff Kaplan.
Jace has decided to take advantage of his co-hosting duties at the Sony Online Entertainment Fan Faire celebration, by showing his new music video to the thousands of EverQuest players in attendance, much to the dismay of the crowd. That didn’t stop one enthusiastic guest from doing something radical.