Skinny on China

Baidu Logo

The fifth most visited web site in the world is www.baidu.com, a Chinese search engine that resembles Google but offers MP3 and SWF file searches in addition to everything on Google (Wikipedia) Apparently, music is free and legal to download in China (makes you want to learn Chinese, dunnit?) which is why Baidu is being sued by music companies in USA. Baidu accounts for 37% of search engine traffic and Google takes 23% (as of September, 2005) but Google owns a stake in Baidu.

Also:

Government officials have been censoring bloggers in China. The fast-growing blogging community has ran into problems when they were discussing the police incident last week which left 20 people dead.

“The domestic news blocking system is really interesting,” wrote one blogger. “I heard something happened in Shanwei and wanted to find out whether it was true or just the invention of a few people. So I started searching with Baidu, and Baidu went out of service at once. I could open their site, but couldn’t do any searches.” Baidu is one of the country’s leading search engines.

“I don’t dare to talk,” another blogger wrote. “There are sensitive words everywhere – our motherland is so sensitive. China’s body is covered with sensitive zones.”
Link

Report today from UnfoldingProphecy:

The China Aid Association condemns the arrest of 29 house church leaders in Henan Province and the confiscation of their possessions. They were gathering to discuss how to minister to AIDS victims. More

Related:

How To Blog Anonymously

Edwyn Chan, China’s Blogfather?

Images-3 interview with Matthew Bell in Shanghai

Images-3-2 interview with an early Chinese blogger

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Andrew

Andrew Jones launched his first internet space in 1997 and has been teaching on related issues for the past 20 years. He travels all the time but lives between Wellington, San Francisco and a hobbit home in Prague.

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