Fri 5 Feb 2010
It has been said that “imitation is the highest form of flattery”, and nothing can be more true then looking at various web services that the Chinese who have a flair for imitation have come up with for their own nation below.
Search Engines
Amidst talks of Google pulling out of China on controversy over it wanting to lift filters on it’s Chinese search engine, an imitation website called “Goojje” which sounds like big sister in Chinese. Another popular search engine based on Google in China is “Baidu”, more than just a search engine it offers many other services such as Maps, News, Video, MP3 and image searches, social networking and even an encyclopedia.
Instant Messaging
There’s only one way to instant message friends in China, and that’s using QQ!
QQ has over 300 million users with more than half of China’s population using it and is especially popular with the younger generation. Aside from instant messaging, it provides many other functions allowing users to create their own avatars, blog, play games, listen to online radio and even keep desktop pets.
It also has their own form of currency known as Q coin where users can purchase QQ related items to personalize their blogs and avatars.
Video Sharing
Aside from Youku, YouTubecn was just recently set up in mid-January this year to mimic Youtube which was banned in China from onwards of 2008 after videos of Tibetan unrest emerged. Youtubecn is also rather clean by Chinese censorship standards and has been welcomed by the Chinese online community.
The Chinese market has huge potential in terms of providing internet services being the world’s third largest economy with the highest count of Internet users. This can also be seen from the rapid growth of companies such as QQ as well as the success of Baidu.
It will be interesting to see what the Chinese will imitate or come up with next. However the key to success for the above services are having an understanding of the Chinese language, the psyche, culture and lifestyle of the Internet users as well as providing an integrated and engaging experience where users can have everything they want at their fingertips as demonstrated by the services provided above.
