Micro-blogging increasing rapidly in China
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The number of micro-blog users in China has increased to over 120 million, according to the 2010 China Micro-blog Annual Report released by Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) Tuesday. The report also predicts that there will be another wave of micro-blog users in 2012 and 2013, when the market will become mature.
The report identified 2010 as the year that micro-blogging started to develop in China, and said that the number of micro-blog users in China reached 125.217 million in October, with 65 million of them regularly using micro-blogs.
Xie Gengyun, a writer of the report and also deputy dean at the Arts & Humanities Research Institute at SJTU, said that the report analyzed the phenomenon of micro-blogging from many aspects, including its influence, spreading of rumors, and its relation to traditional media and opinion leaders.
According to the report, micro-blogging has become the most popular way in which netizens disclose information. In 2010, 11 significant events – such as a home demolition in Jiangxi which led to a resident's death after he set himself on fire, and the "Li Gang is my father" event – were originally reported on micro-blogs, accounting for 22 percent of the top 50 significant events in China this year.
Xie was quoted by Chinese media as saying that micro-blogging would gradually replace online forums and blogs as it develops very fast and has a huge impact.
"Radio took 38 years to increase its audience to 50 million, television took 13 years, and the internet four years, while it took micro-blog merely 14 months to reach such a number," Xie told reporters at a press conference, according to the People's Daily.
Micro-blogging gives people the ability to disseminate messages and information, and it also creates opinion leaders, as like-minded people from all walks of life spread their views.
The report warns that micro-blogs can also generate and spread false rumors, such as the "Shanxi earthquake" and "Louis Cha's death".
Statistics cited in the report show that people in China mainly use micro-blogs to comment on various topics. A lower number of people use such services to send messages or to inform others of a particular event.
Xie told Chinese media that micro-bloggers are currently the more educated people in the country but that this will change and include those at the grassroots level, and its function will change from watching celebrities to online socializing.
He also suggested that the government should focus on developing its information channels by using micro-blogs to prevent negative effects of false rumors, and that netizens should adapt to the new pattern of communication and the "fragmental" life style brought by the micro-blogging era.
