Project by Alex Haechler Course "Innovation and New Technologies" - University of Camerino (teacher C. Vaccari)

1. CHINESE SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICES
VS.
AMERICAN SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICES
Alex Hächler

2. CONTENT
• Social networking services
• History
• Chinese social networking services
• Freedom of expression
• Government intervention
• Website licence
• Comparison
• Popularity, largest social networks and mobile app
activity
• Demonstration: Sina Weibo

3. HISTORY - SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICES
Name
Type
Founded
Name
Type
Founded
Qzone
Social network
2005
Skype
2003
Renren
Social network
2005
VoIP / Instant
messaging
Tudou
Video sharing
2005
Facebook
Social network
2004
Youku
Video sharing
2006
YouTube
Video sharing
2005
Sina Weibo
Microblogging &
social network
2009
Twitter
Microblogging
2006
Whatsapp
Mobile messaging
2009
Tencent
Weibo
Microblogging
2010
WeChat
Mobile messaging
2011
Jego
VoIP / Instant
messaging
2013
Sources from: http://en.wikipedia.org 2013

4. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - QZONE
• Social network
• write blogs, keep diaries,
send photos, listen to
music and watch videos
• 623.3 million registered
users (Nov 2013)
• Alexa.com (based on
qq.com!):
• Global rank: 7
• China rank: 2

5. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - RENREN
• Social network
• «Facebook of China»,
popular amongst college
students
• 160 million registered
users (Dec 2012)
• Alexa.com:
• Global rank: 608
• China rank: 100

6. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - SINA WEIBO
• Microblogging (also
available in English)
• Hybrid between Twitter
and Facebook with a limit
of 140 Chinese
characters
• 503 million registered
users (Dec 2012)
• Alexa.com:
• Global rank: 18
• China rank: 7

7. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - TUDOU, YOUKU
• Video sharing
• «YouTubes of China»
• 96 million registered users
(Jan 2012) ), Youku: 50
million (Mar 2012)
• Alexa.com (Tudou):
• Global rank: 480
• China rank: 71
• Alexa.com (Youku):
• Global rank: 84
• China rank: 17

8. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - TENCENT WEIBO
• Microblogging
(also available in English)
• Similar to Twitter with a
limit of 140 Chinese
characters
• 540 million registered
users (Dec 2012)
• Alexa.com (based on
qq.com!) :
• Global rank: 7
• China rank: 2

9. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - WECHAT
• Mobile messaging
(also available in English)
• «Whatsapp of China»
• 300 million registered
users (Jan 2013)

10. SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICE - JEGO
• VoIP / Instant messaging
(also available in English)
• «Skype of China»
• Recently launched by
China Mobile in June
2013

11. FREEDOM – GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION
• Facebook and Twitter were blocked by Beijing's firewall in mid-2009
• China has the largest recorded number of imprisoned cyber-dissidents in the
world.
Some of the reasons:
• Communicating with groups abroad
• Signing online petitions
• Calling for reform
• Calling for an end to corruption
• Government forces to employ teams of internal censors
• prevent criticism of the government and social unrest

12. FREEDOM – GOVERNMENT WEBSITE LICENCE

13. FREEDOM – EN.GREATFIRE.ORG

14. COMPARISON – LARGEST SOCIAL NETWORKS
in million
monthly active users (unless indicated otherwise)
* = total users
1400
1200 1,155
1,000
1000
712
800
500
600
350 327 300 275
400
240 236 220 184 175150 114
200
54 50 45 44 40 40 31 30 20
0
Source: adapted from http://www.businessinsider.com/a-global-social-media-census-2013-10

15. COMPARISON - POPULARITY
monthly active users
1,400
1,200
1,150
1,000
in million
1,000
800
600
500
400
200
289
350
236
54
240
220
81
0
Sources: adapted from intelligence.businessinsider.com: November 2013, * forbes.com: July 2012, **online.wsj.com: October 2013

16. COMPARISON - MOBILE SOCIAL APP ACTIVITY
Top 10 - mobile social apps amount of active users in
December 2013 in China
Qzone
Baidu Tieba
Renren
Facebook
Kakao Story
Pengyou.com
Tianya Mobile
Tianya Community Mobile
Imbang
zhihu
211.03
61.16
35.59
4.99
4.03
2.5
2
1.97
1.79
1.73
in million
Source: adapted from enfodesk, China Internet Watch 2013

17. DEMONSTRATION: SINA WEIBO

18. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION!

19. SOURCES 1/2
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
www.alexa.com (for all social networks) 15.01.2014
http://antictrl.com/chapter-7-1-impact-of-journalists-and-cyberdissidents 30.01.2014
http://blog.factbrowser.com/tag/youku 15.01.2014
http://www.chinainternetwatch.com/tag/qzone 15.01.2014
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2431861/China-lifts-ban-Facebook-people-living-working-small-area-Shanghai.html 03.02.2014
http://www.digitalelement.com/press_room/Tudou_deploys_hyperlocal_geolocatio
n_technology.html 18.01.2014
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qzone 15.01.2014
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renren 15.01.2014
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tencent_Weibo 15.01.2014
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tudou 15.01.2014
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WeChat 15.01.2014
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youku 15.01.2014

20. SOURCES 2/2
• http://www.internetfreedom.org/Background#Firewall_of_Shame 24.01.2014
• http://thenextweb.com/asia/2013/08/13/chinas-twitter-like-sina-weiboservice-now-has-over-50-million-active-users-per-day/#!tRg36 18.01.2014
• http://www.techinasia.com/tencent-weibo-registered-users-540-million/
17.01.2014
• http://techrice.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Slide11.jpg 19.01.2014
• http://www.weibo.com/u/5021904851/home?wvr=5&uut=fin&from=reg
15.01.2014

21. IMAGE SOURCES
•
http://flagpedia.net/data/flags/normal/cn.png
•
http://flagpedia.net/data/flags/normal/us.png
•
http://raitamaa.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/qzone.png
•
http://www.language-trainers.de/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/weibo-tencent.png
•
http://was-de.wascdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Wechat-logo-315x315.png
•
http://www.kjr-bgl.de/userdata/others/Facebook-Icon.png
•
http://www.brookwood.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/twitter.png
•
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2013/07/31/startups-explorer/81401f9ca5ce61eb42e47e9a6f5756338086bd21/imgs/logos/whatsapp.png
•
http://files.softicons.com/download/social-media-icons/social-bookmarks-icon-set-by-yootheme/png/128x128/social_skype_box_blue.png
•
http://www.cse.ust.hk/~bwuaa/image/renren_icon.png
•
http://www.ciefcci.org/zh/images/yootheme/menu/weibo.gif
•
http://www.digitalintheround.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/paris-hilton-sina-weibo.png
•
http://s3.amazonaws.com/crunchbase_prod_assets/assets/images/original/0001/6516/16516v1.png
•
http://ascportfolios.org/chinaandmedia/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/100217235565a51910767283b5.jpg
•
http://marketingtochina.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/like_facebook_chine.jpg
•
http://meedan.org/wp-content/uploads/tencent.weibo_.screenshot.jpg
•
http://www.oneclickroot.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/WECHAT-1.jpg
•
http://cdn3.tnwcdn.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2013/11/Jego-1.png
•
http://www.hdicon.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/youtube_icon.png
•
http://healthscopeasia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/youku_logo2.png
•
http://www.userlogos.org/files/logos/Karmody/tudou_Iphone01.png
•
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/files/2013/01/WMSN1212_1024-730x514.png