The Chinese are obsessed by numbers. They are quick to buttonhole visitors and point out that Shanghai's skyline is populated by 15% of the world's construction cranes, or that Beijingers can buy a Big Mac at one of 42 McDonald's restaurants. Last week WU JICHUAN, who runs China's Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, unwrapped a whopper: the nation has 100 million phone lines, second only to the U.S. Just two years ago, officials said they hoped to hit 50 million phone lines by the year 2000. Now they're expecting to surpass the U.S.'s 160 million as the millennium rolls in. This...
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