Today, there is a talk in the Munk Centre at U of T called China in the Age of the Internet being presented by Guo Liang from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The use of Internet in China is huge now, with companies like Google and Yahoo setting up shop there. The largest search company so far in China before Google is Sina.com. Most Chinese researchers don't use qualitative or quantitative methods, but now the younger generation is using them. In fact, lots of people use the Internet for means of communication and getting information, which would otherwise be censored outside the Internet. The use of Internet is growing fast in China, right now there are 130 million users in China (however it is difficult to measure because people use Internet cafes). People can get access to the Internet using Internet cafes, which is about 3 RMB/hour in large cities and 1 RMB/hour in small towns which translates to about $1 CDN for 3 hours.
His methodology is based on the World Internet Project and China Internet Project. The China Internet Project is based on a door-to-door household based interview. His conceptual model looks into media use and how it influences internet use and internet access.
In the history of the Internet use in China in 2000, the early adopters were young, male, well educated, and well paid. E-mail was not heavily used, and 41.6% did not use search engines, the Internet was primarily used for games. It's interesting that 76% of Chinese users did not make purchases online. It seems that Internet is more of an entertainment highway as opposed to an information highway in the Western world. According to 2005 survey, Guo says that the #1 online activity is reading news, whereas in the UK it is reading e-mail.
So why it is that online purchasing is not so popular? Because credit cards are not prevalent in China and there isn't much content, and also lack of trust. Not many people use search engines in China.
From the 2005 survey that Guo did, he found that pornography, violence and junk messages should be controlled. One would expect that Internet control in China is political, when in fact it is social control. Another interesting thing is Internet search in China. Google started an office in China about 2 years ago in 2005 but still it is not as good or is used that much compared to Baidu. In fact, none of the US internet companies have been successful in China (Yahoo, Google, eBay, Amazon).
So why is Baidu better than Google? Because Baidu knows Chinese content and Google has not done good marketing in China. Google doesn't understand the Chinese market. Baidu apparently is a good portal and service to search for MP3s. The Chinese internet users also seem to communicate online with their friends and colleagues than face-to-face or physically with family by traditional means. As a result, it seems that building an online community would be more viable and easier than here in Western culture like the US and Canada. Chinese users also are favored to use online comments on news where people can leave comments on news articles and spur discussion. In fact, the top 2 country leaders and the Chinese president learned about SARS from the Internet. Internet can affect public opinion which can then change current regulations to become law.
Lots of people also talk about Internet censorship in China, like how some certain sites are blocked because of the type of content or the keywords used. In China, people have to register their personal ID to the police for the internet (but not all do). You can get a pre-paid Internet card to use the Internet. Even blocked sites can be accessed through proxy servers.
More information on Guo's papers and research can be found from China Internet Project.
On Technorati: China, China internet
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