It has been two months since I moved to China, but its digital advancement hasn’t stopped impressing me ever since. One of the major things that I cannot imagine living without anymore is mobile payment. There are two major mobile payment apps here, Alipay and WeChat Pay. Both have similar payment features, though WeChat is more like a social media. That’s why I will focus on this “super app”.

So far, I’ve been overwhelmed by how convenient life can be with WeChat. It is present in every aspect of people’s daily life, from paying water and electricity bills, meals, cinema tickets to hailing a taxi, following news, and chatting with friends. Most merchants have adopted it, from tiny local street food stalls to high - end stores. A cashier may be surprised if you do not pay with WeChat or Alipay at the grocers or in restaurants. And it seems like the entire payment industry has encouraged this shift to mobile payment, equipping payment terminals (终端) with QR code scanners to simplify payments. Mobile payments are so common here that I realize that I can perfectly survive if I forget my wallet at home one day because most days I just don’t take it out of my bag!

As mentioned earlier, WeChat is also a major social media platform with about one billion daily users, which is more than the entire population of the European Union. So I have to say Chinese technological and digital development is a real miracle.

China has recently published its first artificial intelligence (AI) textbook for high school students, following a plan by central government last year to include AI courses in primary and secondary school.

Under the joint efforts by the research center for MOOC at East Normal University and AI startup Sense Time Group, the nine-chapter textbook, named Fundamentals of Artificial Intelligence, was written by eminent scholars from well-known schools nationwide, Xinhua reported on Sunday.

It includes the history of AI and how the technology can be applied in areas such as facial recognition, auto driving and public security.

“The textbook focuses not only on basics of AI, also on practical use of AI in daily life,” said Chen Yukun, a professor at East China Normal University, who is also a contributor to the book. At present, about 40 high schools across the country have joined the first batch（批）of AI high education pilot program, by introducing the textbook in curriculum（全部课程）.

“The AI sector is facing a talent shortage globally. The publication of the book is a breakthrough as it takes AI technology out of the ‘ivory tower’ and makes it part of high school learning,” said Lin Dahua, a professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

As early as 2016, the governments had estimated that demand for AI professionals may suddenly increase to 5 million in the coming years.

“Many industries in the future will benefits from AI technology, so the aim of the related courses should be to let students learn the basic idea and methods of AI,” Lin said.

China has made significant progress in technological research and development in recent years. According to a report released by US-based venture capital（风险资本）database CB Insights in March, China has for the first time surpassed the United States in equity funding（股权融资）to AI startups.

WeChat, the Chinese social media smartphone app, saw an increase in user numbers of 41 percent year on year to 500 million at the end of last year, in a sign that parent company Tencent is extending its reach for the mobile Internet. As one of the largest Internet integrated service providers in China and one of the most Internet users in China, Tencent’s profit grew 24 percent to RMB 20.98 billion per year, slightly higher than forecasts, driven mainly by online gaming profits. It is unclear how much WeChat contributed to Tencent’s profits but the app’s growth is a strong indicator of the company’s long-term health as it tries to adjust its business to be more suitable for mobile devices.

“We extended our leadership in games and online media, and made breakthroughs in emerging platforms such as online security and mobile payments.” Ma Huateng, Tencent chairman, said in a statement. WeChat is the second highest ranked social app in China, behind QQ, Tencent’s another chatting app, which claimed to have 815 million registered monthly users at the end of 2014.

Tencent has been unwilling to earn money through WeChat by flooding it with advertising, which could influence the users’ experience. But this is expected to change. Some analysts anticipated(预期) that advertising would be introduced on a large scale later this year. Early attempts to test ads on the service have not always gone smoothly. After a BMW ad was introduced on some users’ feedbacks in January, many users who were not targeted by the brand’s marketing complained of “discrimination” by Tencent’s data mining algorithm(数据挖掘算法). They claimed it unfairly treated them as not wealthy or successful enough to view the BMW ad.