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Hong Kong’s musical scene is rapidly changing along with the evolving media landscape. The purpose of this paper is to examine the new way of Cantopop production and dissemination in the new media ecosystem. Furthermore, this study calls for a reconceptualization of the process of Cantopop listening and sharing as a form of public pedagogy within the online public space.

Based on the investigation into two of the leading local indie bands Kolor and Supper Moment, this study explores the implications that social media and participatory culture have for these indie bands. In this study, the music content and promotion strategy of the two bands, as well as the role of their online audiences are studied.

Social media leads to more democratic cultural production and distribution. The strong online audience engagement serves as the foundation for the popularity of the two Cantopop indie bands. In their music practice, the lyrics appear to be in alignment with the goals and interests of the listeners, which gives rise to greater participation by its audiences through social media. Under the context of interactive internet culture, listening and sharing Cantopop can be seen as an educational force, thus reinforcing the values and attitudes.

While many important works have examined various aspects of Cantopop, little attention has been paid to the indie bands. This paper attempts to reveal the recent development of local indie bands as a site under the interactive internet culture. It also gives insights to the significant role of Cantopop played in public pedagogy.

The key concepts to be explored in this article include the blurring boundary between “indie” and “pop”; the significance of digital media in contemporary music industry and the distinctive socio-political nature of indie music in Hong Kong. To a large extent, it discusses the social functions of music – a subject discussed by Simon Frith (2007), a leading scholar in popular music studies.

In order to expound on some observations of the connections between music cultures and socio-political development in Hong Kong, a selection of musical works by indie musicians will be looked into closely.

A focus of discussion will be given to the difference between mainstream Cantopop and indie music in a way that the latter mentions socio-political matters overtly while the former downplays sensitive political issues, particularly in the post-colonial era after the handover of Hong Kong to mainland China in 1997.

Originality of research can be evidenced by the author's textual analysis of the musical styles and lyrics produced by various local indie artists' musical works through primary sources.

The purpose of this paper is to compare music mood perceptions of people with diverse cultural backgrounds when they interact with Chinese music. It also discusses how the results can inform the design of global music digital libraries (MDL).

An online survey was designed based on the Music Information Retrieval Evaluation eXchange (MIREX) five-cluster mood model, to solicit mood perceptions of listeners in Hong Kong and the USA on a diverse set of Chinese music. Statistical analysis was applied to compare responses from the two user groups, with consideration of different music types and characteristics of listeners. Listeners’ textual responses were also analyzed with content coding.

Listeners from the two cultural groups made different mood judgments on all but one type of Chinese music. Hong Kong listeners reached higher levels of agreement on mood judgments than their US counterparts. Gender, age and familiarity with the songs were related to listeners’ mood judgment to some extent.

The MIREX five-cluster model may not be sufficient for representing the mood of Chinese music. Refinements are suggested. MDL are recommended to differentiate tags given by users from different cultural groups, and to differentiate music types when classifying or recommending Chinese music by mood.

It is the first study on cross-cultural access to Chinese music in MDL. Methods and the refined mood model can be applied to cross-cultural access to other music types and information objects.

The increasing incidence of for-profit corporations publicly expressing views on social, cultural and political issues is creating new reputational risks. This viewpoint aims to examine this problem and propose a range of practices for companies to adopt for minimizing this risk.

This paper examines a variety of recent cases of companies expressing public viewpoints to extract learnings about the range of potential stances to adopt to minimize reputation risk.

This analysis determined that there were four different paths for companies to take – radical behavior change, vocal activism, quiet engagement or strict neutrality – each with its own risks and benefits.

This paper offers practical advice to corporations about how and when they should adopt public stances on social, cultural and political issues in a way that minimizes reputation risk.

As corporations become smarter about their public stances, activists and advocates seeking their support will need to make more compelling arguments to gain their endorsement.

While individual corporate controversies about public positions have been written, the author is unaware of any previous comprehensive risk analysis of the reputation risks of public positions by corporations on social, cultural and political issues or recommendations on how to handle the risks.

Throughout history, from ballads to requiems, music has played an important social role in reflection on mortality. Not only do musicians articulate their angst and thoughts about death, but, in so doing, they enable listeners to explore their own feelings. While the relationship between music and mental health can be examined from a number of perspectives, two broad approaches can be taken: artist-centred approaches and listener-centred approaches. The first analyses the life and work of artists, focussing particularly on the ways in which they explore death and angst in their music. The second looks at the ways in which the life and work of an artist is interpreted by listeners. Within these general approaches, a complex set of questions emerge – often at the interface of both approaches. How is the music used by listeners in their reflection on mortality? How is music used to manage mental health? Does reflection on the life and work of an artist contribute to suicidal ideation? Is the reception of music altered by an artist’s suicide? Using both these approaches and drawing particularly on the work of Émile Durkheim, this discussion demonstrates the significance of popular music analysis for death studies, focussing particularly on the issues surrounding popular music’s relationship to suicidal ideation.

This writing reveals Hong Kong’s role as the center of China research. Before Reform and Opening in 1979, the British colony was the only place in the world where all international China experts stopped over and obtained the latest and the most accurate accounts of PRC.

The paper analyzes how Hong Kong serves as the intellectual mecca through examining the lives of China scholars amid building up their international profiles. What prompted them to join the China field? How were their lives like in the British crown colony? This paper also unveils the roles of the two research institutions played on Communist China studies: University Services Center (USC) and Union Research Institute (URI). In addition to relying on archival correspondences, personal interviews were also conducted in the last two years.

Despite being the mecca of PRC research, Hong Kong was not the first destination for most aspiring China scholars from the West. Most of these Western scholars did not even plan to devote their whole working lives to the study of China. Through luck, draft avoidance and generous grants from Ford and Carnegie Foundations, these young men and women became internationally iconic figures of East Asian research. To complete their Ph.D. theses and subsequent China-related projects, Hong Kong was a “must-go” destination for them. Under the full protection of the Union Jack, these scholars enjoyed the freedom to speak, write, research and publish. God blessed Hong Kong with such a unique political status amid the Cold War.

155 Argyle Street was the Art Deco compound where Red China experts produced most groundbreaking scholarships. It was not only a two-story structure where they acquired their first-hand resources but a platform where any China-related topics were discussed openly under the auspices of British colonial rule of law. Despite claiming themselves as apolitical, both USC and URI were products of US containment policy against communism. Even so, the colonial government never prohibited the two’s operations. Through this paper, readers will also discover how young men and women became inspired into a career in China studies.

While Hong Kong has exercised laissez-faire policy with regard to popular cultural industries, such broadcasting freedom may not fully accepted in countries where state control of the media is tight. This paper aims to have a review and brief discussion on music development and the phenomenon of popular music censorship under Chinese societies including China, Hong Kong and Singapore.

After a brief discussion on the popular music scene in Hong Kong, China and Singapore, this paper reviews on the possible reasons for popular music censorship issue in the Chinese societies.

It is found that Canto-pop can be freely broadcast in Hong Kong; however, such freedom is not accepted in China and Singapore due to censorship. While China is sensitive to pro-democratic content in popular music, Singapore's language policies hinder the development of Canto-pop since the 70s.

After reviewing the reasons for music censorship, in particular Cantonese popular music in the Chinese societies, the paper gives a prediction on the future development of Canto-pop.