http://cmp.hku.hk/2010/09/01/7250/

China Media Project

Content » News and analysis

Tale of a murdered microblog

By David Bandurski | Posted on 2010-09-01

Since July this year there have been rumblings of change in the world of the Chinese microblog, hints that authorities are getting more active in the control of this new information medium, which allows virtual real-time sharing of information tidbits among networks of users. Last month, CMP fellow and new media expert Hu Yong (胡泳) wrote of the importance of the microblog in China. Hu’s delicate subtext was that new attempts to control the technology must not be allowed to sap it of its vitality.

The signs, it seems, are now becoming more explicit.

In a blog entry posted yesterday, Wu Danhong (吴丹红), an assistant professor at China University of Political Science and Law, who writes online under the alias “Wu Fatian” (吴法天), popped the lid on the recent death of his microblog and the censorship he endured while maintaining it over a period of five months.

Wu Danhong is perhaps best known outside legal circles in China as the man who uncovered the truth about Chinese businessman Yu Jinyong (禹晋永), who was found to have falsified his resume, and was one of a number of prominent Chinese business leaders this summer to be dragged through the muck of the Internet. Here, for example, is a recent interview (in Chinese) in which Wu Danhong talks about how he first began to suspect that Yu Jinyong had lied about his education and credentials.

For those who missed the fireworks, New Century magazine has a good run down in English of the scandals facing Yu Jinyong and others recently.

Incidentally, it was also Yu Jinyong who famously thrashed the media as the source of his troubles, saying during a press conference he called: “If I want to close the door and beat the dogs, I have to first let them into the house. So there are a lot of media with us today.”

The following is Wu Danhong’s post yesterday on the senseless murder of his microblog.

Many people already know who I am — at least since I openly exposed the frauds of Yu Jinyong. But this is only a small part of my world. I have spent fifteen years studying the law, and I have been on the Internet for twelve years already. The Internet has become an important space in which I share my ideas about rule of law.

In the past, I was quite preoccupied with my academic work, a young scholar who scarcely lifted his head to see what was happening in the real world. Every year I wrote academic papers, and only every so often did I write more casual essays. Letters from two death-row inmates ultimately shook me out of my quiet and complacent life.

Both inmates wrote to me after reading editorials I had written for the Legal Daily and the Procuratorate Daily. They described the wrongful aspects of their cases and hoped that I could offer my assistance. I was unable to help them, but their appeals did make me recognize that legal scholars had an obligation to share their knowledge and ideas with society at large, and that perhaps this is a far more important business than the writing of academic papers. Here is how I put it in the preface to Profiles in the Law:

In academia, should we or should we not turn our attention more to real and living things of concern? Indeed, the bulk of our academic work is shared within the community of legal scholarship. But commentaries and editorials can reach a much larger audience, helping more people understand the concepts of democracy and rule of law, and giving them an experience of fairness, justice and conscience.

Ever since I began practicing law part time and writing a blog in 2005, my writings have circled around one idea, or one hope — “that one day those who observe the law will not be alone and isolated, that those who break the law will live in fear, that the law enforcement process can promise fair trials and give us a society in which justice prevails.”

It was by happenstance that I registered on Sina Microblog on April 5, 2010, and began my days as a microblogger. As a Web-based information tool allowing rapid connection with groups of people through bits of information, the microblog allows great ease of communication.

But my optimism about microblogging came with underlying reservations too. Back in April I wrote on my microblog: “The rise of the microblog has revolutionary significance for freedom of speech in China. On this platform through which everyone can become a ‘journalist,’ information controls are already rendered powerless, and hundreds of millions of Internet users are pushing their way into the future through a society that has already become rotten. Perhaps in the not-too-distant future, the communication technology of the microblog will develop and replace traditional media. The biggest unknown factor is when the government will step in to muzzle the power of this wild horse surging forward.”

In fact, controls on the microblog were already evident as I expressed the above sentiment. Another professor at China University of Political Science and Law, Xiao Han (萧瀚), a colleague of mine and someone who dares to speak the truth openly, had already been “reincarnated” some thirty times — he would move his microblog to another account for a while before that one would be shut down. But for those users registering accounts in their real names, there had not yet been a precedent in which a microblog was completely shut down.

August 28 marked the one-year anniversary of the launch of Sina Microblog. To commemorate the day, I wrote a record of my experiences with my Sina Microblog being blocked and deleted. My intention was to gift Sina with a certificate of merit, or a silk banner of honor, if you will, thanking their management personnel for their arduous work in deleting posts and blocking service, for their contributions toward a harmonious society. But this pleasantry of mine ultimately unleashed the pent-up displeasure these management personnel felt towards me. Without any prior notice whatsoever, the posting function on my microblog was made subject to item-by-item review, and all subsequent posts were blocked.

But it seems this matter was not so simple as it appeared on the surface.

On August 29, after the attack on Fang Chouzi (方舟子), there was quite a stir on the Internet. Many people wondered why I had not responded to express my support for Fang. They had no idea I could no longer make posts.

On August 30, my response and comments functions were set to item-by-item review by management personnel, and I found later that my responses were not being posted at all. I was entirely unable to respond or comment.

On August 31, my personal photograph and bio were deleted by Sina Microblog management personnel, and I received no prior notice whatsoever about this. I attempted to make contact with managers, and one manager told me that this wasn’t their decision, but was “the intention up top” (上面的意思). I said my microblog had contained nothing at all that could be construed as illegal or reactionary. He said my posts had probably dealt too much with current politics (时政内容太多). I said I focused mostly on legal issues, and can you guess what he said? He said, “The law is also current politics.”

On the night of August 31, I discovered that not only were my microblog followers not growing, but they were in fact falling in number. I watched them fall from 9,958 to 9,952. When I asked my friends about this, they said I had already been marked as “forbidden” (禁止关注), so it was no longer possible for others to follow me. A few of my friends were skeptical. They un-followed me and then attempted to add me again — but this was impossible.

This is how Sina Microblog has managed to thoroughly kill me off. 9,957, 9,956, 9,955 . . . Before long, all of my Sina Microblog followers will vanish.

In the last day or so, I’ve tried many time to get the news out, but all of my posts have been deleted by Web managers. If other microblogs attempt to post my content they too are deleted. A reporter from Youth Times approached Sina Microbog on my behalf and was told that all this was because “large amounts of language attacking the government had been posted” (发表大量攻击政府的言论).

In truth, it’s difficult to find anything among my posts that attacks the government. If they said that I had attacked Tang Jun (唐骏), Yu Jinyong (禹晋永), Li Yi (李一) and Dong Siyang (董思阳) then I would have to confess. I’ve spent a great deal of energy exposing their frauds. But do they represent the government?

http://cmp.hku.hk/2010/08/06/6439/

Content » Fellows » Hu Yong

Microblogs are crucial in China

CMP Fellow Column

Hu Yong

Posted on 2010-08-06

On July 16, 2010, at 10:09am, Sohu chief executive Zhang Chaoyang (张朝阳) made a post to his Sohu microblog in which he wrote:

The explosion [in growth] of the microblog [in China] has been no easy feat, and it is a major point of progress resulting from the aggregated development of Internet products over the past decade. Discussion forums are collective and decentralized in nature. E-mail is personal, peer-to-peer and delayed. Weblogs are centered on the individual and take the collective into account, but they are not quick and timely. Instant messaging approaches real-time, but is only peer-to-peer. Personal computer products have struggled forward left and right, transforming and becoming universal, and mobile phones have become popular as information tools, in a decade-long process that has created this form of individually-centered interactive Internet product, [the microblog], that enables group relationships, approaches real-time and can be used at any time and place. This is the product of technological progress and transformation in user behavior chosen from among myriad possibilities, and it was not easy. Won’t everyone please treasure it.

This statement [of Zhang's] sounds on first hearing like an industry expert’s summation of ten years of progress in the development of Internet products. But the final five words about the need to treasure [the microblog] are deeply significant. Who exactly should cherish [this technology]? Are there perhaps people who do not share [Zhang's sentiment] that “[t]his is the product of technological progress and transformation in user behavior chosen from among myriad possibilities”?

Looking at the situation that has emerged recently at microblog websites in China, we cannot see this call [of Zhang's] as a random shot.

On July 10 visits to Sina Microblog were suddenly impossible. The service claimed to the outside world that they were in the midst of “security” measures, and only on July 12 was service finally restored. The microblog service at Netease, [another major Internet portal site], began its own “security” measures on July 13, saying that it was “resting due to high traffic volumes.”

Sina Microblog, which has the highest volume of users and has been operating for more than a year, suddenly announced itself as a “beta version” on July 12. This is not all. Aside from QQ.com and Netease, which had been advertised as “beta versions” all along, the microblog services at Sohu.com, Phoenix Online and even the party-backed People’s Daily Online Microblog all put up this “beta version” label or similar statements to that effect.

As a result of this “beta” change, some microblog services have done away with their search functions, and others have placed restrictions on links to content outside the site. The latest development is that newly registering users of the Sina and Sohu microblog services must all submit valid identification and mobile phone numbers for verification. The era of real-name registration for microblogging seems to be upon us.

This year, microblog services have taken off in China, and the density of information they have created, their frequency of dissemination and the degree of connectivity they have enabled for web users far surpass any previous form of Internet use. This is probably the reason microblogs have suddenly drawn such a high degree of attention.

One can see the influence that microblogging has in China simply by looking at recent events. During the Qinhai earthquake the short 140-character online post became the vehicle by which people shared information, conveyed their feelings and offered mutual assistance. It was a microblog writer who revealed that the former Chinese executive for a multinational company had faked his PhD, a revelation that drew the attention of web users to the problem of diploma mills, or so-called “wild chicken universities” (野鸡大学), and tested the credibility of elites.

Recently, when a newspaper reporter exposed related-party transactions by a listed company, local police authorities issued a warrant for his arrest. Tens of thousands of microblog posts were sent out about this incident. Users expressed their views and revealed the immense appetite the Chinese people have for participation in news events. The incident ended with the withdrawal of the arrest warrant by the police.

After the July 28 explosion in the city of Nanjing, web users immediately using microblogs to “report from the scene.” There was some confusion early on about the nature of the explosion, and China Central Television reported that a “gas station had exploded,” but a representative from China Petroleum and Chemical Corporation (SINOPEC) quickly clarified the cause of the incident through their microblog.

Clearly, the defining characteristics of the microblog that Zhang Chaoyang points to — individuality, instantaneity and interactivity — can be seen in abundance in these cases. What is most critical is that these characteristics are not useful to Internet users alone, but can be useful to the government and to the media.

Microblogs can work as tools to gather public opinion, and they can also serve a useful role in communicating with the public. There have already been a number of classic examples of this.

There’s no need even to point to the role microblogs played in online participation during the meetings of the National People’s Congress and Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference this year. Look at our national police network nationally and you find many notable cases.

On June 3, for example, Guangzhou police reported a shooting incident through their microblog, bravely using new media to openly share information about a major sudden-breaking incident, thereby improving the reputation of the police and simultaneously raising the expectations of web users about the possible role of microblogs in sudden-breaking incidents.

The Guangdong Provincial Public Security Department and the police offices of the province’s 21 prefectural-level cities have all launched police microblogs, and this stands as a positive example [to other areas].

Just recently in July, Beijing’s Public Security Department announced the formation of a public relations office, which plans to launch an official microblog in order to help gauge public opinion. Beijing police chief Fu Zhenghua (傅政华) put it aptly when he said at the time: “With the coming of the age of the Internet, there is a clear increase in the independence, selectivity and difference among people’s thoughts and activities. Public opinion about the police must necessarily become a hot topic for various mainstream media, so it’s extremely important for the police to carry out open and timely interaction with the public, the media and disadvantaged groups, and to increase its fair, just, timely and credible publicity efforts (宣传).”

What should especially draw attention is that when the Beijing police answered a question from a reporter who asked how the police would respond to sharp criticism from web users, and whether they would impose restrictions, they responded with an openness that might serve as an example for other government microblogs: “We respect the expressions of web users. As to the question of ordinary public attention and critical opinions, we have prepared ourselves psychologically, and we will meet the questions of citizens head on, and actively reach out to web users, regularly connecting with opinion leaders from various walks of society, seeking understanding and support.”

This is exactly the attitude the government should have toward microblogs.

First, they should recognize that the significance of microblogs far outweighs that of social networking sites, that they have, moreover, a capacity for the expression of views and for political communication, and that they can be used for the mobilization of society.

Second, governments should recognize that microblogs are a gathering place for opinion leaders, especially for the gathering of many professionals in the media, and that they have already to a definite degree become the vanguard (引领者) of other forums in China and of Chinese traditional media. Gaining the understanding and support of these opinion leaders benefits the healthy operation of the government, and helps to mend public confidence.

Third, they should recognize that the voices on microblogs are diverse, and that they can include fierce criticism, and web users are going there seeking not just rhetoric and good tidings, but also reason and facts (理性和真相).

Surveying [microblog] development over the past year, we can say that a kind of microblog politics has already emerged in China.

The microblog is an excellent supporter of sudden-breaking news, an open platform for expression, a strong tool for participation in and deliberation of state affairs, and it is a channel for so-called sunshine governance, [or open governance], that we cannot do without. Naturally, the economic significance of the microblog cannot be overlooked either.

Doing more to open up microblog services would benefit the closing of the gap in Internet technologies, products and influence that presently exists between [China] and the United States, thereby meeting the demands of China’s more than 400 million Internet users.

This is an opportune moment in China for the rise of the microblog. Now that various microblog services [in China] have been transformed into “beta versions,” we can only hope that this as a test run process — allowing for trial and error, allowing for experimentation, and allowing users to develop in an autonomous manner. When Zhang Chaoyang calls on “everyone to please treasure” [the importance of microblogging], this “everyone” includes experimenters and regulators (管理者) [in the government]. Because when it comes down to it, the Internet belongs to everyone in China.

A version of this article appeared originally in Chinese at Southern Metropolis Daily.

http://www.scmp.com/portal/site/SCMP/menuitem.2af62ecb329d3d7733492d9253a0a0a0/?vgnextoid=56d01e53c733a210VgnVCM100000360a0a0aRCRD&ss=China&s=News

Law, public support key to journalists’ safety

Priscilla Jiao
Aug 03, 2010

South  China Morning Post

Not even experts agree on what can be done about recent threats against and assaults on mainland journalists for merely doing their job.

Some think the answer lies in new legislation to protect the media. Others say the laws are in place but are not being enforced. Another group sees the issue as one of public recognition of the job journalists do in Chinese society.

The high-profile case that sparked this debate involved Economic Observer reporter Qiu Ziming, who was put on an online list of wanted criminals on July 23 by county police in Zhejiang for “alleged damage to a company’s business reputation”, following his investigative reports on alleged insider trading and wrongdoing by a powerful company in the province.

The public outcry against Qiu’s detention warrant forced higher authorities to scrap the order and apologise for it last week.

But there have been other incidents that show how difficult it is to be a mainland journalist taking on the status quo. The families of two journalists who had revealed alleged pollution and subsequent bribery attempts by Zijin Mining (SEHK: 2899) in Fujian province were involved in car accidents on Wednesday.

On Thursday, a Shenzhen journalist from the Huaxia Times was beaten up after writing an expose about the chairman of Shenzhen International (SEHK: 0152) Enterprise being reported to police by his mistress.

On Friday, staff of the Shanghai-based National Business Daily were attacked by four employees of the company that makes Bawang shampoo after the newspaper published several investigative reports that raised questions about its products.

Zhou Ze, a partner at the Beijing Wentian Law Firm who champions journalists’ rights on the mainland, says criticising companies can be dangerous because of the taxes they pay to local governments.

“It’s commonplace for local authorities to protect big businesses and taxpayers,” he said. “It’s totally against the law that local governments become a protective umbrella for companies.”

Zhan Jiang, a journalism professor at the Beijing Foreign Studies University, told Caing.com Qiu’s case reflected attempts by local interests to suppress monitoring by the media. This, he said, clearly highlighted the lack of media-related law.

Hu Xingdou , a professor at the Beijing Institute of Technology, agreed that a law to protect media rights was what journalists need most because “it can ensure media workers’ rights in the fight against local protectionism”.

But Zhou said the poor enforcement of existing law was the main reason journalists’ rights are often violated.

Other experts point out that legislation cannot transform the whole situation overnight. They argue that society’s failure to understand the role of journalists is one reason their rights are often undermined.

To many, journalists are merely tools of propaganda. And their credibility has been harmed by past cases in which fake journalists tried to blackmail companies and a TV editor fabricated sensational stories.

“Society needs to come to the realisation that protecting journalists’ rights means protecting the public,” said Hu Yong , a professor at Peking University’s School of Journalism and Communication.

Zhou agreed, saying if journalists were well respected by a society in which the law was strictly enforced, people who challenged media reports would not resort to violence.

Wang Shengzhong, the Economic Observer’s deputy editor-in-chief, said some media outlets still held that oversight of public affairs by the media was a prerequisite for an open, fair and transparent society.

“If the media can’t monitor public companies,” he said, “it can’t do its job.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/17/world/asia/17beijing.html?_r=1

China Tests New Controls on Twitter-Style Services

By JONATHAN ANSFIELD

Published: July 16, 2010

BEIJING — China’s biggest Internet companies are testing new controls on some local alternatives to Twitter to prevent them from becoming channels for the proliferation of content the authorities dislike.

The measures highlight the trouble with efforts by the government to cultivate homegrown sites akin to Twitter and Facebook, both of which it blocked last year, even as it bolsters mechanisms to police Internet traffic and curb unregulated expression online.

China’s 420 million Internet users are well accustomed to the daily handiwork of the state’s vast yet shadowy censorship apparatus, like shuttered blogs, dead links and inaccessible Web sites. Less common, though, is the widespread tinkering many have detected on new Chinese microblogging services in the past week.

Several major Internet portals, including QQ and Sina, home to China’s most popular microblog platform so far, along with the Web arm of People’s Daily, said their Twitter-style services were in “testing mode” this week. Two others, NetEase and Sohu, also suspended microblogging services, for maintenance, they said.

By Thursday, microbloggers on Sina, which claims to have amassed 20 million users since it began in August, found that they could not post working links to any foreign-based Web sites. One media editor who has 22,000 followers on his microblog wrote that users could not even search his name.

The rival site Sohu appeared to be particularly affected. After going down for maintenance from Friday of last week to Monday, its microblog service offered no search function at all. Users were also unable to publish links to any sites outside of Sohu. Links to other sites, when posted, failed to materialize.

Influential liberal intellectuals and public interest lawyers also saw their blogs and microblogs on Sohu, and to a lesser extent on Sina, unplugged on Wednesday and Thursday. One of them, Yao Xiaoyuan, posted a list of 61 names of blogs shut on Sohu to another blog of his, on Sina, calling the event the July 14 massacre. Sina later erased that post.

An activist lawyer, Liu Xiaoyuan, grumbled that his first post to his latest Sohu blog was purged within five minutes.

“Sohu, since when did you become so timid?” he wrote on Twitter, which some Chinese continue to use, relying on proxy services to evade China’s fire walls. Other bloggers reasoned that Sohu was acting to appease officials.

In telephone interviews, people speaking for several of the affected sites denied tightening controls. They said their services had undergone constant testing ever since they began operating. But they had no clear explanation for why they had not noted so previously.

“This isn’t really news; it’s a daily event,” said one person in charge of microblogging service at Sina, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Employees at two other portals, however, said the latest tweaking was in response to direct pressure from Chinese Internet authorities to bolster their systems for monitoring content.

“I cannot give you any details, but you understand the situation in China,” said one, a ranking editor at Sohu, who declined to be named for fear of reprisal. “These products are still new to China. So when problems occur that affect their stability and dependability, we have to make adjustments to improve the stability of the products.”

The authorities permanently blocked Twitter and suspended a private Chinese equivalent, Fanfou, in July last year, after ethnic violence rocked the northwestern region of Xinjiang. But hoping to nurture more competitive media, Beijing has allowed microblogging on trusted domestic sites, which employ swarms of technicians and monitors to enforce propaganda orders.

Officials and state media are also taking advantage of the new tools, part of a parallel drive to better react to public opinion.

But government research institutes have repeatedly warned of the threat of hostile forces in China and abroad exploiting social networking sites to fan public unrest. Chen Tong, chief editor at Sina, acknowledged at a conference last month that controlling content on microblogs was a “very big headache.”

Hu Yong, a new media specialist at Peking University, said: “All along, there have been problems netizens discuss and news they spread that the government doesn’t like. So for the government to ramp up management of microblogs is completely predictable.”

Gao Yuxin and Lim Xinhui contributed research.

A version of this article appeared in print on July 17, 2010, on page A7 of the New York edition.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/25cb6340-8f1e-11df-a4de-00144feab49a.html

China’s ‘Twitters’ targetted by internet police

By Jamil Anderlini in Beijing

Published: July 14 2010 10:00 | Last updated: July 14 2010 15:29

Chinese micro-blogging sites have become the latest target of Beijing’s internet police, which have ordered companies providing Twitter-like services to step up monitoring and purge sites of politically “sensitive” words and expressions.

In the last week, most of the largest and most popular micro-blogging websites in China have been shut down for “maintenance” or have switched to “beta” or “testing” versions.

These back-up websites are being used while the companies “strengthen their self-censorship systems” and remove all politically sensitive content under orders from Chinese internet authorities, according to employees at some of those companies.

The micro-blogging site run by the popular Chinese portal Netease was unavailable on Wednesday , replaced with a notice saying the site had been “under maintenance” since 7pm on Tuesday.

The Twitter-like service provided by leading internet portal Sohu was also closed for “maintenance” over the entire weekend but reopened on Monday morning.

Other companies that have switched to “beta” or “testing” versions of their micro-blogging sites include Sina, which claims to have 20m registered micro-bloggers, as well as Tencent, QQ and even the micro-blog site of the People’s Daily website, the official mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party.

Popular US micro-blog and social networking sites including Twitter, Facebook and Youtube have all been banned in China since last year but domestic imitators have been allowed to flourish, provided they observe the government’s stringent self-censorship requirements.

“In some places the local Public Security Bureaux have started their own official micro-blogs which shows how the government understands the importance of this new communication channel,” according to Hu Yong, associate professor of journalism and communications at Peking University. “The government is strengthening its censorship over micro-blog contents but it’s very unlikely it will close them all down.”

The power of micro-blogging in China’s tightly controlled media environment has been highlighted by a case in recent days in which a popular crusading micro-blogger raised serious questions about the integrity of one of China’s most prominent business executives.

Tang Jun, a former president of Microsoft China and reportedly the highest-paid executive in China, was forced to admit he had not received a degree from the prestigious California Institute of Technology after accusations he falsified his resume were posted by micro-blogger Fang Zhouzi, known for his online campaigns against academic plagiarism and fraud in China.

The case has stirred up a frenzy on the Chinese internet and forced Mr Tang to reveal his “doctorate” came from an unaccredited US institution.

Propaganda authorities have since clamped down on reporting of the case after some Chinese media published lists of other prominent Chinese figures who received degrees from similar institutions, including government officials, executives and judges.

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90782/90872/7033756.html

Home>>Life & Culture >> Society

Online marketing tricks rattle trust in Internet

08:12, June 22, 2010

Chinese Internet users may become more skeptical following a spate of reports exposing the profit-seeking manipulation of Internet hot topics that are designed to amuse the public, experts warned on Monday.

Many eye-catching hot topics on the Internet are not opinions of web surfers, as thought, but triumphant successes by professional Internet publicity agents taking advantage of the public’s attention to make money or seek fame for their clients, the Guangzhou-based Nan Fang Daily reported last Friday citing anonymous sources within the industry, the latest in recent extensive media stories.

The widespread wave of media criticism was led by the flagship newspaper of the Communist Party of China, the People’s Daily, which published, earlier in June, a series of investigative reports tracking down the masterminds behind Internet sensations in a bid to raise public concern over the emerging, yet disturbing, Internet marketing and publicity industry.

It has been estimated that at least thousands of small or large-sized Internet marketing companies are operating across the country, with large number of full-time or part-time employees hired to write postings that may catch the public’s attention or steer online opinions towards the interest of their clients.

According to the report by the People’s Daily, it usually follows a method of three steps to plot a case of Internet manipulation, starting from a large number of postings written by employees to trigger online debate, then causing public concern and media reports, and finally being rewarded with advertising revenues or other benefits.

“These publicity agents falsified or exaggerated so-called online hot topics and then, the sentiment and opinions of the public were ‘hijacked’,” said Wang Jun, a professor from the law school of Shanghai-based Fudan University.

A case in point is Luo Yufeng, a former supermarket cashier from Chongqing who shot to fame after posting a provocative and narcissistic advertisement for marriage on the Internet last year. Dubbed “sister phoenix” by Internet users, she became one of the top searches in China and was then frequently seen at various entertainment shows.

However, an Internet marketing company recently told media that it had engineered Luo’s becoming famous, including composing the ad and then posting it on various popular forums.

Luo had a plastic surgery in March, followed by postings and videos on the Internet that attracted millions of netizens, as well as media coverage. The drama was later exposed by the Nan Fang Daily as publicity campaign for a hospital, which paid 50,000 yuan ($7,300) for the Internet publicity and was organized by another marketing company in Guangzhou.

“Internet marketing is ultimately driven by money and benefits. The case of Luo Yufeng is a typical example,” Prof. Wang said.

Internet marketing was believed to have been born with the Internet industry. Interactive in nature and relatively less expensive, it has unique advantages compared with advertising via traditional media.

But experts said that as China has no specific laws or rules to regulate the booming industry, the cost of distributing exaggerated information online was low.

“Netizens have to deal with online information in a calm and rational way, so as not to become captives of Internet marketing,” Prof. Wang said.

China boasts 404 million Internet users, or one-third of the country’s population. An average of over 3 million postings and blogs are published on the Internet every day, according to the latest white paper on Chinese Internet usage.

Hu Yong, associate professor of journalism and communications from Peking University, urged traditional media, such as newspapers and TVs, not to blindly follow hot topics on the Internet before finding out if they have been posted by marketing agents.

“It might be a challenge for ordinary netizens to distinguish between hype and reality, but it is a necessity for journalists,” Hu said in an earlier interview with media.

Internet users interviewed by Xinhua also expressed some concerns, despite the fact that they were often amused by Internet sensations.

“It can be very misleading, especially to teenagers who might not be able to distinguish the true from the false. The industry needs to be regulated, otherwise its credbility may get impaired by those hyped-up sensations,” said a college student surnamed Gong in Beijing.

Even some insiders agreed that regulations are needed to help with the survival of the industry. Xiao Guo, co-founder of a new-born Internet marketing company, told Xinhua that the bottom line of his company was do “no evil.”

“Any kind of publicity is OK with us as long as it does not hurt others for no reason, but the market is indeed very chaotic,” Guo said.

Prof. Wang stressed that codes and principles of traditional businesses should apply equally to the Internet marketing business to safeguard the reliability of the Internet community from being impaired.

“It would be a shame if some Internet marketing agents continue to deliberately manipulate the online community. Their success is at the cost of the public trust,” Wang said.

Source: Xinhua

http://rconversation.blogs.com/rconversation/2010/06/chinas-internet-white-paper-networked-authoritarianism.html

June 15, 2010

China’s Internet White Paper: networked authoritarianism in action

The release of the Chinese government’s first-ever White Paper on the Internet in China provoked some head-scratching here in the Western world. Part Three of the six-part document is titled “Guaranteeing Citizens’ Freedom of Speech on the Internet.” I’ve heard from several journalists and policy analysts (not people based in China, for whom such cognitive dissonance is normal) who at first glance thought they were reading The Onion or some kind of parody site. How, people asked me, can a government that so blatantly censors the Internet claim with a straight face to be protecting and upholding freedom of speech on the Internet? The answer of course is that China’s netizens are free to do everything… except for the things they’re not free to do.  The list of the latter, outlined in the next section titled Protecting Internet Security is long, vague, and subject to considerable interpretation:

…The Chinese government attaches great importance to protecting the safe flow of Internet information, actively guides people to manage websites in accordance with the law and use the Internet in a wholesome and correct way. The Decision of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee on Guarding Internet Security, Regulations on Telecommunications of the People’s Republic of China and Measures on the Administration of Internet Information Services stipulate that no organization or individual may produce, duplicate, announce or disseminate information having the following contents: being against the cardinal principles set forth in the Constitution; endangering state security, divulging state secrets, subverting state power and jeopardizing national unification; damaging state honor and interests; instigating ethnic hatred or discrimination and jeopardizing ethnic unity; jeopardizing state religious policy, propagating heretical or superstitious ideas; spreading rumors, disrupting social order and stability; disseminating obscenity, pornography, gambling, violence, brutality and terror or abetting crime; humiliating or slandering others, trespassing on the lawful rights and interests of others; and other contents forbidden by laws and administrative regulations.

Other than that, people are totally free. What’s more, the use of the Internet by the people to “supervise” public officials is praised. As long as – in the process of said supervision – state power is not subverted, “state honor” is not jeopardized, nobody is humiliated or slandered, and no “rumors” are spread. The rise of Twitter-like microblogging services is even praised. (Twitter itself is blocked by the “great firewall,” though tens of thousands of Chinese Internet users are believed to access it anyway through third-party clients and circumvention tools).

As I’ve frequently pointed out in the past (see here, here and here for starters), blocking of foreign websites like Twitter is just the top layer of Chinese Internet censorship. Beneath the “great firewall of China” is a sophisticated system by which censorship is delegated to the private sector. The first company to set up a Chinese Twitter-clone was a startup called Fanfou. Last June they got shut down because they failed to police the service adequately: users apparently shared too much content that violated the above no-no list. Other micro-blog services have since emerged. One run by the People’s Daily and another by the popular web portal Sina.com. They seem to have learned from Fanfou’s troubles and have put aggressive censorship systems in place. As Chen Tong, Sina’s head editor, recently commented at a 3G Wireless Industry Summit: “controlling content in Sina microblogs is a problem which is a very big headache.” (The Shanghaiist blog reports that the Sina.com news article reporting Chen’s comments has itself been censored, but not before getting quoted and reported around the Internet.) According to the Sina.com account of his remarks, Chen went on to describe Sina’s microblog-censorship strategy in some detail: 24-7 policing; constant coordination between the editorial department and the “monitoring department” (all social networking companies in China must have one of those in order to stay in compliance with government expectations);  daily meetings; and systems through which both editors and users are constantly reporting problematic content.

Even so, Chen Tong says in his speech that microblogging has been tremendously empowering in China. He says that micro-blogs have become “people’s personal web portals” and that a lot of recent incidents that have generated widespread public concern first emerged on microblogs.

Despite all the policing and the round-the-clock censorship, Chinese Internet users still feel much more empowered to participate in public discourse and even bring issues to national attention than they ever could have imagined in the past. (See Guobin Yang’s excellent book, The Power of the Internet in China for many examples.) As I described it to one journalist, it’s as if a bird that has lived in a cage all its life (one which has been gradually upgraded, with steadily improving food and which is much cleaner than it used to be) suddenly gets released into a large atrium. The bird is likely to feel excited and empowered for quite some time and may not realize that even broader freedom is possible or even desirable: after all, without the atrium walls might she get lost and starve? Or get eaten by other birds? There are plenty of security arguments in favor of supporting the atrium’s legitimacy and necessity; there are even ethical justifications.

Thus China is pioneering what I call “networked authoritarianism.” Compared to classic authoritarianism, networked authoritarianism permits – or shall we say accepts the Internet’s inevitable consequences and adjusts – a lot more give-and-take between government and citizens than in a pre-Internet authoritarian state. While one party remains in control, a wide range of conversations about the country’s problems rage on websites and social networking services. The government follows online chatter, and sometimes people are even able to use the Internet to call attention to social problems or injustices, and even manage to have an impact on government policies. As a result, the average person with Internet or mobile access has a much greater sense of freedom – and may even feel like they have the ability to speak and be heard – in ways that weren’t possible under classic authoritarianism. It also makes most people a lot less likely to join a movement calling for radical political change. In many ways, the regime actually uses the Internet not only to extend its control but also to enhance its legitimacy.

At the same time, in the networked authoritarian state there is no guarantee of individual rights and freedoms. People go to jail when the powers-that-be decide they are too much of a threat – and there’s nothing anybody can do about it. Truly competitive, free and fair elections do not happen. The courts and the legal system are tools of the ruling party.

Connecting every citizen in China to the Internet via multiple devices might sound like something the Chinese Communist Party would want to avoid. Several people who contacted me about China’s Internet White Paper were surprised at the Chinese government’s enthusiasm for connectivity. Such enthusiasm does not jive with most American and European notions of how an authoritarian state would be run by a party that calls itself Communist. What’s important to understand is that Chinese authoritarianism in the Internet age is not the same as the crumbling, centrally-planned authoritarianism of the Eastern Bloc, disconnected from the Western capitalist world.

The CCP leadership recognizes that they can’t control everybody all the time if they’re going to be a technologically advanced global economic powerhouse. What’s more, high Internet penetration is necessary if the Chinese government wants to continue high rates of economic growth, which economists agree requires boosting domestic consumer demand as well as pushing Chinese companies to the cutting edge of technological innovation.  China catapulted itself to become the world’s second largest economy by turning itself into the world’s factory. But Chinese labor has grown expensive compared to some other markets in poorer countries. In order to stay competitive and keep growing, China needs to transition from a manufacturing-fueled economy to an economy fueled by domestic consumption at home, while being an innovator for advanced technologies and services that can compete with American and European companies.

Another component of the Chinese Communist Party’s survival strategy involves influencing the Internet’s technical evolution in ways that are most compatible with censorship and surveillance goals. China already has more Internet users than there are Americans on the planet. As the world’s biggest market for Internet technologies, it is starting to influence how these technologies evolve. The Internet is quickly morphing from something we’ve mainly used through our computers into a new, more mobile phase in which all devices, appliances and vehicles – from our phones to our cars to our refrigerators – will be connected to the network. The Chinese government is embracing this future. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao now gives speeches in which he waxes enthusiastic about the “Internet of things.” Chinese Internet and telecommunications companies receive substantial government support in hopes that they will lead the world in shaping the next generation of Internet technologies.

Beyond China, the fastest-growing markets for mobile Internet technologies are in Asia, the Middle East and Africa: exactly those parts of the world where authoritarian governments are most concentrated. Chinese telecommunications companies like Huawei and ZTE (the “Ciscos of China”) are already dominant in many African and Middle Eastern markets. They are building Internet and mobile networks in countries whose governments would prefer to have their systems built by Chinese engineers rather than by Americans.

Another thing that has puzzled some of the American journalists and analysts who contacted me is the Chinese government’s assertion of its “sovereignty” on the Internet, given that the Internet is a globally inter-connected network and derives much of its value from the fact that borders are collapsed online. Yet at the same time, it’s a physical reality that web sites have to be hosted physically on computers that are located in some jurisdiction or another; they are operated by physical human beings who reside under a government jurisdiction and can thus be physically controlled when necessary; they are operated by businesses that have to be registered in one or more jurisdiction and their physical operations are subject to government regulation; and the Internet runs on networks that physically exist within or pass through nation-states. The White Paper is a clear articulation of the Chinese government’s long-standing position that nation-states should have “sovereignty” over all aspects of the Internet – human or equipment or signal – that reside within or pass through Chinese sovereign territory. Google is challenging this notion as it pushes the U.S. government to take action against China for violating WTO rules by using censorship as a barrier to trade. (For further discussion of China and Internet sovereignty see this Interview with Columbia University’s Tim Wu conducted by The New Yorker’s Evan Osnos.)

The White Paper also re-emphasizes the Chinese government’s long-standing position that the global coordination tasks required to make the Internet function – what Internet policy wonks call “Internet governance” – are best left to governments, not private entities or companies or others.  The White Paper did not condemn ICANN, the private non-profit which coordinates the Internet’s domain name system – in fact it didn’t even mention ICANN or other non-governmental organizations that coordinate the Internet’s functions and anoint preferred global technical standards. Nor did it say anything negative about the “multi-stakeholder” governance approach currently favored by Western democracies, which includes non-governmental “civil society” organizations alongside governments and companies. But the document made clear China’s position that ” the UN should be given full scope in international Internet administration.” As Brendan Kuerbis of the Internet Governance Project puts it, China is not intending to disengage from the existing Internet governance frameworks, but can be expected to exert its influence in shaping these frameworks in its preferred direction.

The White Paper’s message is that the Chinese government is not running scared from the Internet. It is embracing the Internet head-on, intends to be a leader in its global evolution, and intends to assert its influence on how the global Internet is governed and regulated.

Note that China is not the only country seeking to assert its brand of Internet sovereignty. For an analysis of what’s happening in Russia, read this chilling overview by Gregory Aslomov at Global Voices. For more on the Russia situation as well as an alarming global overview, be sure to read “Access Controlled: The Shaping of Power, Rights, and Rule in Cyberspace” just published by the Open Net Initiative.

On a more optimistic note, the White Paper does have its domestic critics. Blogger, journalist and journalism professor Hu Yong argues (writing on a domestic blog which has not been censored) that most of the regulations governing the Chinese Internet have no clear basis in Chinese law and are arguably unconstitutional. “At a time when the Internet is raising a lot of questions that we don’t have answers to,” he writes, “the government may not have the best solutions. It’s possible that the Internet could give birth to new forms of regulation that aren’t as coercive, and which place greater trust in the strength of individual freedom and the self-governance of citizens.” While the Internet does need to be regulated, he concludes, the public needs to participate in the creation of those regulations.

But as long as all of China’s Internet companies and the few foreign Internet companies with a local presence in China continue to do whatever the government demands, no matter how little legal or constitutional legitimacy such demands might have, the government will have little incentive to accept the kind of change that Hu Yong envisions. Note that many of the big Chinese companies receive American investment dollars or are publicly traded on U.S. stock exchanges, sending a clear message that whatever U.S. elected officials might say about “Internet freedom,” many American investors are quite happy to profit from China’s status quo.

http://www2.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2010-06/17/content_9981585.htm

Tweeting’s so yesterday

By Lin Shujuan (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-06-17 08:03

Sina Weibo and other domestic microblogging services are more than a match for the United States company, Lin Shujuan reports

Huang Jianxiang, 42, was once China’s best-known sports commentators.

He came to international attention during a World Cup commentary on June 26, 2006. Five months after his passionate outburst against Australia, while describing the final goal of the match between Australia and Italy, he resigned from China Central Television. Many thought that was the end of his career as a soccer commentator.

But Huang is back in business, commenting on each team and game of the ongoing FIFA World Cup in South Africa – in any tone he likes. Quite to his delight, he is not running short of an audience.

Huang is now a star in the world of Sina Weibo, China’s equivalent of Twitter, closely followed by more than 1 million fans who forward his comments to many more within minutes.

His made this comment on Wednesday’s early morning, right after China’s socialist neighbor North Korea played against Brazil:

“I plan to go to sleep immediately. Forget about any dream related to Chinese soccer. The idea of having a dream about Chinese soccer is itself ultimately stupid. Chinese soccer and soccer are in fact two different sports.”

Despite the early hours, this post was viewed nearly 2,000 times, forwarded by 140 people and commented on by 92 followers.

Weibo (which translates as microblog) has become a phenomenon since Sina started beta testing of its microblogging service, Sina Weibo, in August.

Over the past 10 months Sina Weibo has established itself as China’s leading microblogging service, raising the country’s microblogging population from less than 1 million to an estimated 10 million.

In early March 2010, Sina’s CEO Cao Guowei revealed there were 5 million registered users of the service. Then, in mid-May, Cao added the “number of registered members has doubled over the past quarter”.

In comparison, it took Twitter nearly 30 months to attract the same number of users.

“Twitter brought the concept of the microblog to China, but it is Sina Weibo that has popularized this kind of Internet service here,” says Hu Yong, an expert on new media from the School of Journalism and Communication of Peking University.

The service is much the same as Twitter in that it allows users to post messages of 140 Chinese characters or less via the Web, SMS or MMS.

But 140 Chinese characters can say a lot more, according to tech expert and Beijing resident Kaiser Kuo.

Before Sina Weibo, a few Twitter-like services had emerged in China, such as Fanfou, Jiwai and Digu.

Like Twitter, however, they were banned in July last year after deadly ethnic unrest in Xinjiang was blamed, in part, on agitators spreading their messages on the Web through Twitter.

Ironically, this turned into an opportunity for Sina Weibo to fill the gap.

Hu says Sina, as one of the top 20 websites in the world according to the Web-traffic monitoring agency Alexa.com, had a huge advantage building the massive user base needed to create a truly Twitter-like experience.

Moreover, the company’s decade of experience in content monitoring allowed it to avoid the potential pitfalls of its predecessors.

Within months Sina Weibo had become a hit with mainstream  Chinese Internet users, thanks in part to a solid base of over 400 million netizens.

Many have attributed Sina Weibo’s success to Sina’s strong marketing, but Cao Zenghui, Sina Weibo’s project manager, doesn’t entirely agree.

He says celebrity sign-ups for the service did help drive up registrations but Sina Weibo also scored because it is easy to use.

“Weibo, unlike Twitter, is tailored to Chinese users,” Cao says. “That means Sina is able to create a more user-friendly microblogging experience for them than Twitter does.”

Cao says those who have used both services tend to agree that Sina Weibo is also more expressive, with its embedded emotions, photos, video and lyrics.

Duan Hongbin, an IT analyst at Anbound, reckons that even if Twitter was available in China, it still could not compete with Sina Weibo and other Chinese micro-blogging services.

“It’s like Baidu and Google in China. Generally, Google is better in terms of technology and branding, but most Chinese still prefer Baidu,” Duan says.

While Google’s global share is over 90 percent, its best performance in China was 31.1 percent against Baidu’s 63.9 percent of China’s Internet search market share in the third quarter of 2009, according to data from Analysys International, a leading advisor on technology, media and the telecom industry in China.

“It’s not because of nationalism, the language barrier is one reason. It is normal for Chinese users to use a Chinese-language interface. There are not many Web users in China who prefer an English interface,” Duan says.

Kaiser Kuo says that if Twitter became available again in China, it wouldn’t take Chinese netizens by storm because of the popularity of the services that have developed.

While Twitter would have Chinese users, he says, Sina Weibo and other similar services have gained too much momentum.

(China Daily 06/17/2010 page18)