Author: Lyn Jeffery

Lyn Jeffery is a cultural anthropologist and researcher at the Institute for the Future, a nonprofit group in Palo Alto, California. She studies new experiences enabled by connective technologies.
Virtual China

Baidu bias: nationalism and CCP hatred

Posted on by Lyn Jeffery

A Web 2.0 blog, TechCrunch, posted about a week ago on the upcoming launch of Baidu Space.  The post spurred a series of comments that reveal the craziness of commitments both for and against China’s leading search engine, Baidu. There are those who hate Baidu because it’s a mainland company and is seen as participating in government oppression of certain kinds of speech; there are…

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Virtual China

different design traditions: 1957 contraceptive billboards

Posted on by Lyn Jeffery

Have been checking out the QQ.com BBS.  QQ.com is currently the 7th most popular site in the world, according to Alexa.com.

Yesterday someone posted two extraordinary photos of billboard ads for contraception from 1957. This would have just 8 years after the founding of the PRC. From these we get a reminder that the U.S.…

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Virtual China

China’s MSN Space/Live Spaces head to head with BaiduSpace 百度空间

Posted on by Lyn Jeffery

Time for me to do my homework on this.  I’ve been personally less interested in Microsoft online products and services for the past several years, preferring to explore other options.  But for understanding Virtual China, understanding MS is a must (as it would be for understanding virtual anywhere).

Did you know that globally, MSN Space had an estimated 100 million (100,000,000) unique visitors…

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Virtual China

MSN Spaces + Google = BaiduSpace 百度空间

Posted on by Lyn Jeffery

Baiduspace_1

Imagine MySpace pages MSN Spaces with the search functionality of Google and all its features, and you’ll see what Baidu is trying to create: BaiduSpace 百度空间, now in beta in China. Blogger Xiong Jiezeng has an analysis (in Chinese) of what works and what doesn’t, which should be of great help to the feature’s developers.

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Virtual China

Chinese portal rankings

Posted on by Lyn Jeffery

iResearch has compiled the Alexa data for us: Sina has the greatest reach (defined as how many Alexa users per million are using it everyday.  Alexa says that in the last 3 months of this year, Sina’s reach has grown by another 8%.

average_daily_reach_1

Virtual China

cyberChina business models may look strange on Wall Street

Posted on by Lyn Jeffery

This June 8 editorial by Chinese journalist Tang Yuankai in the Bangladesh The New Nation points out a few of the ways that Chinese internet companies are creating their own business models, and also how these new business models come into conflict with Wall Street analysts’ ideas about how to run a business.

Alibaba is devoted to…

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