Ice Bucket Challenge hits Chinese social media

The Ice Bucket Challenge, which has already motivated Microsoft founder Bill Gates, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Apple Inc's CEO Tim Cook has come to China with high-fliers joining the trend and causing waves on Chinese social networking sites.

Lei Jun, founder and chairman of Xiaomi Technology Co, Zhou Hongyi, Qihoo's chairman and CEO and CEO of guokr.com known for online alias G13 have uploaded videos of themselves completing the challenge. Lei also donated $100 to ALS Association for sufferers of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, often referred to as Lou Gehrig's Disease.

The Sina Weibo topic relating to Ice Bucket Challenge has generated 169,000 posts and 180 million views.

Related: Ice bucket charity heats up Internet

Ghostwritten homework causes concern

An online trade in ghostwriting homework has become popular as the summer vacation draws to a close, the Chongqing Morning Post reported. Hundreds of offers of ghostwritten homework appear on China’s largest online marketplace Taobao.com, with average prices 2 yuan ($0.3) per textbook page, 10 yuan for one composition and 50 yuan for a whole textbook. Parents and teachers are worried the service may encourage students to become lazy.

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Safe and 40,000 yuan disappear through hole

A bank adjacent to a demolished building was found to have a hole in its newly-exposed wall overnight, and a safe containing 40,000 yuan ($6,517) was stolen, the Changjiang Daily reported. A 60cm diameter hole in the wall of a postal bank in Wuhan city, Hubei province was supposedly made early Monday morning and had been blocked. Local police are investigating.

Related: Thief gets huge cash washed away

Extortionist gets 13 years for forged photos

A man surnamed Zhang, from Nanchong, Sichuan province, used the name of the Discipline Inspection Commission and a TV station to blackmail more than 50 government officials with forged sex and gambling photos. He extorted 2.1 million yuan ($341,997), among which two victims paid 200,000 yuan, the West China Metropolis Daily reported. The case was reported to police by a city mayor in Sichuan who was the first to receive an extortion letter and photo purporting to show him gambling. Police confirmed the photo digitally altered. The blackmailer was imprisoned for 13 years and fined 50,000 yuan ($8143) for extortion.

Related: Doctored sex photos of officials put man in jail