Digital Life on the Internet
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Write down as much as you can remember.
Mobile plan:
China Unicom Tencent King Card Limited Edition (》Official mobile data plans)
Current plan details:
19 RMB/month for 70 GB of general data + 40 GB of Tencent-specific data,
Add-on of 9 RMB for 40 GB of Tencent Video + Bilibili video data,
Two 10 RMB supplementary SIM cards activated to share the plan,
24 RMB voice family net enabling free calls among 19 Unicom numbers,
Optional 49 RMB broadband offset (200 Mbps)
I previously shared how to apply for this card on my blog; the original plan was 29 RMB/month, but you can cancel the 10 RMB charge package to bring it down to 19 RMB. If you're unhappy with your current plan, check out 》Official mobile plans, as carriers occasionally release new SIM offers.
That's the basic setup. For an advanced setup with email access, 》fill in your email address here when you have time.
Reminders:
Log into your Microsoft account on Apple devices (add the account under Contacts or other app settings on iPhone, or under Internet Accounts in Settings on Mac), then set it as the default account after adding it.
Birthday reminders: Fill out your contacts completely—birthdays, emails, phone numbers, etc. Once birthdays are in Contacts, they'll show up in Calendar. Place the Calendar widget on your Home Screen to see upcoming birthdays at a glance (set separate alarms for important people); sync subscription renewals with Calendar and layer in Double 11 / 618 shopping reminders via the widget for a solid system.
Reminders/Notes: Most things can be tracked in Reminders—add the widget to your Home Screen and you'll stay on top of your to-do list. Use Notes as a companion to capture more detail (you can also use Notes alongside WordPress to publish write-ups).
On Windows, logging into your Microsoft account syncs Calendar and Reminders to the Windows Calendar and To Do apps (no extra config needed; notifications make the experience nearly identical). Notes maps to Windows Sticky Notes.
File sync:
Storage: OneDrive + Tianyi Cloud Drive
Mainly use Microsoft's OneDrive as the sync drive (about 2 RMB from Xianyu). First, expand it to a permanent 15 GB space. Once OneDrive is set up, it auto-creates a synced folder; just drop files there and they'll save automatically. For deeper storage, you can grab a 10 TB Tianyi Cloud Drive account for around 180 RMB from Xianyu or Tieba, then install the client and sync the OneDrive folder to it.
Officefiles:
Pick up an Office bundle from Xianyu for a few dozen RMB (I recommend 2021 or later). Starting with Office 2021, you can set OneDrive as the default save location so everything auto-saves to the cloud. If you want extra peace of mind, shorten the auto-save interval in Options and get in the habit of hitting Save now and then.
With that in place, important files sync across all your devices through the cloud folder.
Password storage:
In China, Apple's built-in Keychain plus Microsoft Authenticator is enough. Use Edge as your browser so most web passwords save and autofill automatically.
Finance & lending:
JD Finance focuses on fund management and occasionally offers JD Plus members financial perks like zero-fee fund purchases.
Cloud QuickPass handles bank and credit cards (no fee on repayments and more payment discounts).
For shopping, I mainly use JD Plus and Yihaodian membership, usually following 》2022 JD Plus & Yihaodian membership guide.
Stocks—skip it; I lost too much to face people. I occasionally use Qie to manage loose savings.
For bookkeeping, MoneyThings works well (it covers everything I need).
Kill time:
Reading:
Mainly use RSS with NetNewsWire. That alone is usually enough. It doesn't support Chinese natively, but if a site offers RSS you just paste the URL and it'll sniff out the feed—some even fetch full articles. The experience is solid overall. (As a complement, Ego Reader can grab full text from sites NNW misses, but it's clunkier and slower to read.) Pair it with Moyu Kiki to pull Bilibili, Weibo, and WeChat Official Account content; for locked-down posts, try 》webpage monitoring. Some sites, like novel hosts, work fine with Zhiji (the author isn't maintaining it, but it still functions).
Audio & video:
Details 》Apple TV experience and resources (Apple TV guide)
APTV: live TV channels, supplemented by the CCTV Video app. (》tested live TV sources that work well)
Streaming content: mainly Infuse with paid content libraries (the ones I bought cover both domestic and international titles), plus watching select stuff from 》save money on videos
Music: Apple Music cloud library + NetEase Cloud Music (personal FM recommendations) + EverMusic Pro (cloud-drive music). Apple Music's family plan is cheap; NetEase Cloud is decent for FM recommendations; EverMusic is great for offline listening from cloud drives before upgrading to a family plan.
》Apps I use (pair with some free staples as needed)