China and Social Media

The great firewall of china is both an interesting and complex concept to look at.
In 1998, china implemented the golden shield project, where the idea of censoring particular information on Chinas internet was introduced. In total there are approximately 1,337 Chinese citizens with approx. 600 million of those internet users (Background check.com). The most popular way to access the internet in china is via mobile devices, where micro blogging being used by around 309 million users. The great firewall or the golden shield project involves the censorship of particular topics and sites including;

·         Politically sensitive terms

·         Embarrassing news events

·         Religious sites

·         Pornography

·         News reporting sites

·         Political activism sites

 (backgroundcheck.com)

Chinas firewall has been called the most advanced censorship system in the world and according to Amnesty International, “Chinas internet regulations may be amongst the most extensive and restrictive in the world” (background check.com).
One of the most interesting features of the firewall is the way in which its monitored. It’s estimated that around 30,000 citizens are part of Chinas internet police, or otherwise known as the 50 cent party, where they are paid 50 cents for every time they remove content from the internet that is damaging or features particular words or phrases. These people are involved in monitoring fellow citizens and each have an assigned area to work in, such as chat rooms or blogs.

Social networking pages such as Facebook, Twitter and even YouTube are all blocked. There are many ways around these firewalls, that many Chinese have been able to figure out and can have accessed banned content. However for each of these sites, China has their own equivalent, and many of these sites are have been called ‘copycats’. Webpages such as QZone (600 million active users), Kalxin (115 million active users) and Tencent Pengyou (260 million active users) are all Chinas equivalent of Facebook, with many of these pages looking a lot like the western Facebook page. The same thing has happened with Twitter with websites such as SIna Weibo (290 million users)  and Tencent Welbo (280 million users) being formatted with character limits much like twitter.

It is interesting to consider the fact that western sites are mirrored within the Chinese internet system. But questions are raised about whether this firewall was to be removed, would the Chinese quickly scramble to use Facebook and twitter? Many believe that this wouldn’t be the case, and as seen in japan, although they have open and free access to Facebook, it is not the most popular social networking site. Chiu, Lin and Silverman (2013, p 1) claim that "Social media is exploding worldwide, and China is leading the way", and I believe that this is a very valid statement. China has utilised their own technologies, and many young people are successfully shaping new types of language and ways of communicating over the internet. Just because western cultures function with particular social networks does not particularly mean that there are not different ways of going about it as seen in china.  

 

Farrell C, 2012, LSM208 lecture 11 Social Media and China; A Case Study, Learning material on blackboard, Swinburne University, 21^st of may 2013, viewed 28^th of may 2013.

Anti, M 2011, Behind the great firewall of China, TedTalks viewed 28^th of May 2013  http://www.ted.com/talks/michael_anti_behind_the_great_firewall_of_china.html

Chiu, C, Lin, D and Silverman, A 2012, China's social-media boom, McKinsey and Company, viewed  28^th ofMay 2013, http://www.mckinseychina.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/McKinsey-Chinas-Social-Media-Boom.pdf

Backgroundcheck.org, 2013, viewed 28^th of May 2013, http://www.backgroundcheck.org/

 

http://www.blupixel.it/blog/bla-bla-bla/the-great-firewall-of-china/

 

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2013/03/22/social_media_a_powerful_diplomatic_tool_canadian_diplomatic_papers_reveal.html