The New Yorker

How E-Commerce Is Transforming Rural China

While Amazon and many of their US based competitors are seeking growth by diversifying beyond retail (movies, music, television), for their counterparts in China there is a huge amount of growth still to be had simply by spreading outside major urban centres. This piece looks at the impact on local communities, by examining the experience of Xia Canjun, a regional manager for JD.com covering the rural community he grew up in, and the CEO’s strategy back at HQ in Beijing.

The Trafficker

One from the New Yorker archives (2010), this is the story of one of the world’s leading arms dealers. Monzer al-Kassar was a man who lived up to many stereotypes of his profession – speaking many languages, piloting his own private jet, and running a fleet of Mercedes to get about town.

The Showman

A May 2016 profile of Preet Bharara, the charismatic United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who announced yesterday that he had been fired by the Trump administration after refusing to stand down.

Don’t Eat Before Reading This

The 1999 piece that helped launch Anthony Bourdain’s career as a writer and broadcaster. In it, he offered readers the inside track on the restaurant industry, warts and all. It was apparently sent in to the magazine as an unsolicited manuscript.