May 20, 2006
Stealthcon down under
Now if you are not in the Search Engine Marketing industry, the term Pubcon or Pubconference won't mean a lot to you, however if you are an SEO or SEM, then the following event is a must attend if you are in Australia ;)
Can I just add, that I feel very honoured that the organisers decided to name Stealthcon 1.0 after me, it was a wonderful day indeed...
Posted by shak at 6:34 PM | Comments (0)
April 20, 2006
Google in China , The Big Disconnect
I have just spent the last 30 minutes reading a lovely piece due to be published in this weekends New York Times Magazine.
Whilst NOT agreeing 100% with what's written, I must say it is a very well researched piece and answers many many questions regarding foreign internet companies doing business in China, and also gives you a glimse into what Chinese surfers are really doing when online.
Brin's team had one more challenge to confront: how to determine which sites to block? The Chinese government wouldn't give them a list. So Google's engineers hit on a high-tech solution. They set up a computer inside China and programmed it to try to access Web sites outside the country, one after another. If a site was blocked by the firewall, it meant the government regarded it as illicit — so it became part of Google's blacklist.
Thanks to Imagethief in Beijing for the tip.
New York Times magazine article
Posted by shak at 10:33 PM | Comments (0)
April 13, 2006
Google official Chinese Name Launch
Last night saw the official name of launch of Google in China, it will be known as Gu Ge.
It was a huge event hosted in the grand ballroom at the Beijing Hotel, a stones throw away from Forbidden City, a lot of the senior folks from Mountain View were in attendance including Eric Schmidt, Omid Kordestani and Shona Brown.
Myself and a few friends were invited, and since we were in beijing anyway climbing the Great Wall, how could we miss such an important event in China.
Posted by shak at 11:22 AM | Comments (0)
April 1, 2006
Google Romance
Looks like Google are in the April Fools mood again ;)
Posted by shak at 7:33 PM | Comments (0)
March 30, 2006
China's search engine industry faces a sharp slowdown in the coming 18 months
An interesting article by Analysis International.
"China's search engine industry will face a sharp slowdown in the coming 18 months." said Edward Yu, CEO of Analysys International, at the Search Engine Symposium held in Nanjing, China, on March 17, 2006. "The actual performance of search engines is far from people's high expectations. Poor user experience, unstable advertising effects, and some irregular channel operations make the small and midsize enterprise customers of search engines suspicious of this new kind of advertising, which will lead to a slowdown in the growth of the search engine industry." explained Yu.
Well worth a read, sums it up nicely in a few hundred words.
Posted by shak at 12:33 PM | Comments (0)
March 17, 2006
Google Dance in China
Just returned from the 1st ever Google Dance which has held as the only official party for SES Nanjing.
Must say it was very impressive, lots of Googlers and Googlettes there to answer questions, lots of people and plenty of food and good music.
It's amazing that if it weren't for the nationalities being different, Google staff all around the world are real cool people and kinda come from the same family.
Obviously it was in no way as big as the San Jose bash every year at the plex, but for a city like nanjing, job well done.
and b4 you ask, NO, I did not take the wrong bus, fall asleep and end up in the wrong city 100km's away ;)
Posted by shak at 10:42 PM | Comments (2)
Keynote Speeches and Day 1 at SES
The morning went along smoothly with 2 keynotes, 1 by Johnny Chou (president of Google China) and 1 by Jack Ma (Ceo of Alibaba and Yahoo China), these 2 guys along with Robin Li (Ceo of Baidu, and not present) are probably the 3 most powerful in Search in China in 2006.
Johnny Chou did his session in English and came across as another Googler, very passionate about the company and his 0000s of co workers around the world, he outlined Googles vision for China as part of their global strategy along with the huge opportunity offered here in an emerging search marketplace where Paid Listings is still in its infancy.
Jack Ma was a pleasure to watch (and started of by saying he was going to speak in Chinese which recieved a round of applause), he made some interesting comments, especially involving a story where he said "on my first visit to the USA, I got kidnapped", this is a new 1 for me as I had never heard of this event before, unfortunatley as is common in China, the questions being asked by Chris Sherman were not necessarily the 1s being answered here if you get my drift, a lot of the session involved mentions of Google, eBay and Baidu, and specifically Jack's view that the WEB and Search in China is NOT the same as in the West when it comes to user behaviour and expections. I must say that Jack Ma carries enormous respect amongst the Chinese people and especially the folks involved in the web industry, no wonder these guys can get stuff done here and probably why Yahoo made the move to team up with Jack last year.
Posted by shak at 10:43 AM | Comments (0)
The Journey to SES in Nanjing
Well I finally made it to Nanjing for the 1st ever SES in China.
3 hours of standing in a cabin with hard seats is certainly an experience which I had never expected on this trip, that said, the hotel is pretty cool even though it's a local Chinese place rather than a main chain like Hilton or Hyatt,
Speaking a bit of broken chinese sure makes life easier these days, requests or demands which a few months would have drawn blank faces, now are resolved in a speedy manner most of the time, and even the impossible is no longer impossible, a joke here and a cigarette there can make all the difference in China in my opinion.
a few of the usual suspects from SES have made the journey, namely Mike Grehan and Bill Hunt, along with a lot of people who I also met at Adtech Shanghai in autumn of 2005.
A nite out in Nanjing was sure fun, and we managed to make it back in 1 piece to our hotel after visiting some bars and clubs in downtown Nanjing, it sure ain't Shanghai however it's a lot more advanced then what I assumed, and this is enhanced by the fact that there are no way as many foreigners here, and you sure stand out.
So far so good, apart from the normal hiccups of any event being organised in China.
Posted by shak at 10:40 AM | Comments (0)
February 18, 2006
Jack Ma to keynote SES China
We're excited to announce that Jack Ma, Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Alibaba/Yahoo, will be one of our two keynote speakers at SES China. In 1995, Ma founded China Pages, widely regarded to be China's first internet-based company, and has been actively involved in driving the growth of the Chinese internet.
Just read this on the Search Engine Watch site, now Jack ma is 1 guy who I have been longing to meet for a long time, so maybe I better get to Nanjing and get Chris and co to get me introduced.
In fact I once started writing a long letter to jack ma offering to come work for him for free, but being as smart as he is he probably would have thought " a madman on the loose"
Who else is headed to Nanjing for this ? and dont forget there is still time to join the China Search Marketing Tour
Posted by shak at 12:55 AM | Comments (0)
January 28, 2006
Google and censorship in China - Yaaawn
On my last trip to UK everyone was asking if my cough was bad as a result of the Bird Flu, and switching on any TV station had headlines of how everyone in China was catching Bird Flu (slightly exaggerated).
So on this latest trip back to the UK has a similar slant, but this time it's by people jumping on the Google censors in China bandwagon, and these are people who never seem to have anything positive to say about China in the 1st place.
I don't wish to get political here, but can I just say "Get over it folks, the world doesn't revolve around what the West thinks is democracy", firstly half the pople commenting don't even actually understand what has taken place and combine that with their blinkered view of China as a whole and you are heading for a bashing for sure.
The guys over at Danwei as always have some great posts on the topic and I suggest you go read them instead.
and as for democracy and freedom, that I will be posting about in my next post in a few days, sharing my wonderful experience of coming back to a so a called civilised society.
Posted by shak at 4:29 AM | Comments (1)
January 26, 2006
China Search Marketing Tour 2006 - SES China (Nanjing)
Even though I said NO more specific search news, this event is a must for anyone thinking of coming to SES China in the city of Nanjing.
The China Search Marketing Tour is business-focused,
providing participants with cultural, social, economic and
political orientations in China. Various business
briefings, receptions and banquets will lay the
foundation for valuable business opportunities and
unforgettable cultural experiences for all attendees. Visit
the Great Wall, the Forbidden City and other exciting
places in China.
Seems like a great trip combining business and pleasure.
I hope to be back in China by 1st of March so may see some of you there.
Posted by shak at 12:18 PM | Comments (1)
December 12, 2005
the best China blogs of 2005
Danwei as always has a great piece on english blogs in China that are worthy of awards and mentions, a lot are my daily reads:
Thanks to Danwei for including me on the list, it's a true honour, as Danwei was 1 of the first blogs I started reading when looking at the whole "move to china" thing started going on in my head. Gracias Guys!
Posted by shak at 7:37 AM | Comments (0)
November 30, 2005
Yahoo Gives Ad Reseller Ultimatum
Word just in courtesy of the nice folks at Pacific Epoch:
Yahoo China has told online advertising reseller Splendor Technology, which was recently named a Google AdWords reseller, to choose between Google and Yahoo, reports Beijing Star Daily. Yahoo China small and medium enterprise department general manager Cao Kaijun said that Yahoo China will give Splendor some time to decide but that Yahoo China can not work with Splendor if the company does not end its cooperation with Google. Splendor has been an agent for Yahoo subsidiary 3721's real name service and Yahoo's paid ranking service in China for several years.
Posted by shak at 1:41 PM | Comments (0)
November 21, 2005
Adtech Shanghai follow up ...
Finally caught up on sleep after a hectic week where I was having to get up at 6am every morning and go to the other side of Shanghai for Adtech and associated meetings.
So what took place and what did folks and I learn at Adtech Shanghai, billed as Asia's leading digital marketing event...
I will provide some of my opinion, and also point to you to a few other places with summaries about the event:
USA companies sending "anyone" who happens to speak Chinese, or even looks Asian is NOT the way too go, I saw and spoke to at least 4 representatives from large USA companies who had no idea what they were doing in China apart from the fact that they happened to be Asian.
Time slots of sessions at 50 minues was way too short, especially as many Chinese when given a microphone and an audience suddenly think they are "President of China" and babble on about god knows what for hours, very frustrating and something no one had planned for.
Audience was quite mixed, and the Chinese wanted to learn about Western marketing tactics, and the Westerners wanted to learn about Chinese skills, unfortunately a few of the speakers ended up being sales pitches for western companies trying to tell the Chinese how good they were in a completely foreign market (NOT the way to go).
MSN party was kinda like their search engine, very nice and exclusive with bells and whistles, amazing venue and food, invites to all the wrong people (we gatecrashed anyway), but unfortunately the event had NO oooommmppphhhhhh....
Wednesday nights Baby Face party by MIxMedia was cancelled at last minute, so everyone ended up in the Grand Hyatt Piano bar courtesy of the Hyatt and Susan's qiuick thinking, however NO party was a bad bad pr move.
Neither Google, Baidu, eBay or AliBaba had booths or stands in the exhibition hall, which was very surprising, although there were staff members from all the major companies, I spent quite a bit of time talking to Google folk on the ground in China, and can say that these guys know their stuff, they are NOT laowai or ABCs just dropped in to China, but movers and shakers who know their stuff and their target audience.
I also realised that my 3 months in Asia this year have NOT been wasted, and I actually know more people in the Chinese web space than I could have imagined in such a short space of time, maybe I should change career and get into the Headhunting/HR space instead, as I made a few potential job introductions and also took a few of the boys to a good old Indian restaurant for a fine meal of Chicken Tikka Masala and Onion Bhajis, not forgetting a night out for some of the west coast boys to some of Shanghais finest bars and clubs.
Hope the above gives you some insight into what I think happened last week, and below you will see views from others, I'll add links as and when I or You find them, many of the attendees are still asleep and no doubt will publish stuff in the next few days.
To sum it up, we have a long way to go, both for the industry, the conference organisation and the attendees, hopefully next year will be better, but as a 1st time event i China, it rocked and will be remembered for a long time to come.
but please please do NOT think that just sending a fine looking Chinese girl straight out of School to represent your Nasdaq listed company complete with Business Card titled "Head of China" will help you enter this market, it won't, I guarantee you that...
Everyone’s talking about the new world in online, but few really understand what’s happening in China. This week, I thought I’d hit the big red country to look under the Chinese interactive marketing hood. There’s a lot of horsepower in China, even if the engine is going to take a year or two to really warm up.
Kevin Ryan's piece
Although there were some disappointments like the BabyFace Networking party being cancelled and the lack of energy and somewhat serious tone of the first day’s keynote (its common Chinese business protocol to have local Chinese government officials give an address and kick things off), things did liven up by Wednesday evening for the adhoc drinks at Jin Mao Tower in the Hyatt Hotel thankfully due to Susan Cendara’s spontaneous corralling!
seerosen's piece
The session was conducted in English at the beginning. COO of Sina and Director of MSN attended the panel. The language barrier was obvious. In which language a conference is presented now is an important decision. English seems to be the usual choice, but it really breaks down the communication this morning. It presents the same problem if the session is completely in Chinese. It is especially hard if English is not the native language for the panelists. I don’t know what about native English speakers; at least I tried very hard to understand.
Wang Jian Shuo's piece
I am not sure what I expected out of ad:tech Shanghai. But one thing for sure, just being here is mind boggling. Urban legend has it that over 70 percent of the building cranes in the world are in Shanghai. That may be close to true. Whatever the number is, this is a boom town. And China is definitely on the fast track to go from the third world to the first world, skipping the second. This is a very sophisticated city. All the best stores, great hotels and restaurants and easy to be in. The organizers went to the trouble to ask each person whether they were presenting in English or Mandarin. Then they rented headsets to everyone. True to form, the greeting was in Mandarin. Then the headsets went away and the translator has not had much business as the whole conference has been in English.
David Smith's piece
Later, I am greeted by the man, the myth, the internet node otherwise known as Shakil Khan. Although only a recent arrival to Shanghai just a few months prior, he’s on a mission in China to help VCs scout the China opportunity while identifying a piece for himself along the way. As the man who brought or “bought” search first in the UK back in 2000, the man seems to know everybody, developing relationships with Google, Yahoo, MSN, Commission Junction and leading internet advertising players the world around.
True to his calling as a master networker, after making me a quick introduction to the Allyes.com CEO, David Zhu, Shak is off again no doubt to connect another constellation of internet stars in China. I’m telling you that it’s only a matter of time befor his entrepreneural story adds another chapter in China, either by his connections or another self-started venture.
TR Harrington's piece (TR >>> $20 is on it's way)
Posted by shak at 1:18 PM | Comments (2)
The average Chinese net user
NEW YORK (AP) -- A typical Chinese Internet user is a young male who prefers instant messaging to e-mail, rarely makes online purchases and favors news, music and games sites, according to a new study.
Another day and another survey on the net in China, 1 of these days I hope someone takes time to cross check all the surveys, facts and figures and try and come up with a suitable balance of what's really happening over here.
Statistics, Surveys and Spin ;)
Yahoo finance article
Thanks to China Perspective for the tip
Posted by shak at 9:35 AM | Comments (0)
November 17, 2005
Google adds 5th reseller in China
Pacific Epoch have a breaking story on Google adding a 5th reseller in China.
Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) named its fifth Chinese advertising reseller on Thursday, reports Sina. The new agent will be Beijing based Splendor Technology, which has been an agent for 3721's real name service and Yahoo China's paid ranking service. Splendor will be responsible for selling Google's AdWords service in Beijing, and the license is effective for one year starting on October 1.
So here's some facts and info you may NOT know about Google and it's Chinese reseller model.
Google already has 4 resellers
Search Resellers in China typically work on anything between 20% > 45% agency/reseller comission (3721/Yahoo/Baidu have been heard to pay this much in the past)
Google resellers are regionally based if I am correct, so a reseller in Beijing can only pitch Chinese clients in their regional area, so a client in Shanghai could NOT work with a reseller in Beijing.
These resellers are typically very aggresive outbound call centres and NOT search specialists from my limited exposure.
Resellers in China like to sell CPC ads, on a CPM basis or even on a monthly tenancy model as Online advertising here is still very much NON measured and therefore similar to tradional media along the lines of fixed term placement in a magazine or portal home page.
Baidu are currently working aggresively on their Self service model such as Google's adwords to tackle global clients, whilst Google are headed down reseller route to get local clients.
Posted by shak at 4:39 PM | Comments (1)
November 14, 2005
Comparison Shopping comes to China
The launch makes Smarter.com the first US comparison-shopping search engine to be available in the world's three largest Internet markets by user numbers, Japan, China and the US, the company said in a statement.
'We believe Asia represents a huge growth opportunity for Smarter.com, and we are prepared to invest substantial resources to become market leaders in both China and Japan,' said the company's co-founder, Harry Tsao.
This is gonna be very interesting to watch indeed.
I met up for lunch with Harry Tsao 2 weeks ago and was also shown their control centre in Shanghai, pretty impressive stuff, Harry is also speaking at Adtech Shanghai tomorrow on the paid search panel which I am hosting.
Posted by shak at 4:41 PM | Comments (0)
November 9, 2005
AliBaba launch Yahoo China as a search brand
China's largest e-commerce company, announced today the re-launch of Yahoo! China, with a new home page and business model focused on search. As part of the re-launch, Yahoo! China's search brands, including Yisou.com, have been consolidated and rebranded as "Yahoo! Search".
"Yahoo! China's new direction can be summed up in one key word --
'search'," said Jack Ma, CEO of Alibaba.com, which in October acquired the China business of Yahoo! Inc. and became the exclusive licensee to the Yahoo! brand and search technology in China.
Looks like the fun in China is about to begin, Jack Ma and his team don't mess about when it to comes to the web in China, in fact Mr Jack is known as the Father of the internet in the PRC.
UPDATE:
"Yahoo has eight months to become a better search engine than Baidu or Yahoo will have a hard time surviving in China, said Alibaba CEO Jack Ma, whose company took over all of Yahoo's China-based assets in August.
"Honestly, when we took Yahoo search, it was not good, and today it's not good. This is why we are here, to make it better," said Ma. If we don't move fast, within 8-10 months, we won't have any chance."
Posted by shak at 4:29 PM
November 8, 2005
Baidu is NOT for sale !!!
Lately I have been meeting many people who are active in the Chinese web space in terms of having had a number of start-ups or holding senior positions (CEOs, CFOs) of large Internet companies here.
Naturally the topic turns to Google / Baidu and the small revenue generated by Baidu to justify their huge market cap and this being based on the predicted growth of paid search in China.
My own view up until now has been that Google should acquire Baidu, as Baidu has end user reach and Google has the advertisers, so it's a match made in heaven in my book, and so far Baidu has made NO effort to target NON Chinese speaking advertisers let alone NON chinese speaking users, and a lot of their advertisrs come from the chinese reseller route.
I am however hearing the same message over and over again in China.
Baidu is NOT for sale !
I let you work out your own reasons why this is the case, the clue is in the fact that 1 company is Chinese and 1 isn't!
Posted by shak at 11:36 AM | Comments (3)
November 5, 2005
Chinese Blogger Conference '05
It's 7.16am on a cold rainy Saturday morning in Shanghai and after having slept for just 2 hours, I am showered, shaved ready to go attend the 1st ever Chinese Blogger Conference.
Should be fun ... wll report back...
Chinese Blogger Conference '05
UPDATE:
a great conference round up and summary by Micah
Posted by shak at 7:16 AM | Comments (2)
November 4, 2005
Some data on who visits this site.
A few sites I visit every once in a while publish data from their stats package, so I thought why not copy them and see what the result for Chinawhite is:
a, 5 interesting keywords used to find this site
Alibaba IPO
Why ebay must win china
Pictures of chinese girls dancing in nightclub
Johnny Chou
Chinese housewife blog
b, 5 random countries/Ip ranges showing where visitors were
Kazakhstan
US Government
Bolivia
Cote D'Ivoire (Ivory Coast)
Seychelles
NOT quite sure what to make of this, but hey, any data is better than NO data right ?
Posted by shak at 6:32 AM | Comments (1)
November 2, 2005
China gears up for e-commerce boom
For e-commerce execs, this place looks like the mother lode, but there is just one hitch -- China has a notoriously fragmented banking system.
China's top three banks currently do not meet the recently released online payment requirements.
Posted by shak at 4:57 PM
October 28, 2005
AliBaba / Yahoo China Announce Completion of Strategic Partnership
"Together, Yahoo! and Alibaba have created one of the largest Internet companies in the fastest-growing Internet market," said Terry Semel, chairman and chief executive officer of Yahoo!. "Through this strategic partnership, we will combine the best of commerce, search, communications and online advertising capabilities in new ways for Chinese consumers and businesses, under the management of a strong local team."
Xinhuanet Article
Press Release
Posted by shak at 6:50 AM
October 27, 2005
Quote of the Day
"There are more VCs in China right now, then there are Entrepreneurs"
Posted by shak at 5:36 PM
Shanghai Webloggers Meetup
I'm off to the monthly Shanghai Bloggers Meetup, a laid back affair with some good folks chating about lots of stuff relevant to China, Shanghai, The Web, RSS etc etc.
Should be fun.
Posted by shak at 5:32 PM
Baidu Financial Results for 3rd Quarter of 2005
Highlights of Third Quarter 2005
Total revenues increased to RMB88.9 million ($11.0 million),
representing a 27.6% increase from the previous quarter and a 174.4%
increase from the corresponding period in 2004. Net income for the
quarter was RMB8.5 million ($1.1 million).
Number of active online marketing customers during the third quarter
increased to over 53,000, an increase of 28.9% from the previous quarter and a 148.2% increase from the corresponding period in 2004.
Baidu Press Release
Google news search for "Baidu"
Posted by shak at 9:34 AM
October 25, 2005
Google gears up in China
Looks like the fun is starting in China, with Google stepping up a gear.
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 25, 2005--Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG), developer of the award-winning search engine, today announced that it has hired respected business leader Johnny Chou to establish and lead Google's sales and business development operations in Greater China.
Johnny Chou will join Google as President, Sales and Business Development, Greater China. In this newly created role, Chou will be responsible for building Google's sales and channel businesses, and expanding the company's strategic partnerships in the region.
Talking to folks on the ground, Senior Chou is highly respected, and will be joining a number of other Old China Hands such as Dan Brody who seems to know just about everyone in China that I have talked to.
The business for Google or any other Search Engine in China is very different to most other places in the world, the reseller channel here is huge, and I am not referring to Ad/Media agencies, but more along the lines of Mass call centres reselling Google/Yahoo over the phone to end businesses.
Only time will tell, but I'd say this hiring is a very smart move.
Official Press Release
Interfax Article
Posted by shak at 8:58 PM
October 24, 2005
CPA = Cost Per Asia
My buddy Liz Lloyd has just written an article on Cost Per Action models in Asia.
With affiliate marketing being a top source of online customer acquisition methods in the U.S., one must wonder why this form of revenue and lead generation is not as popular in the Asian Pacific.
Personally I think the CPA model will be huge in Asia and China when the market explodes, there is a reason why I am meeting 1 person a week in the Affiliate/CPA business in China. and with Adtech Shanghai next month CJ and others will be arriving to scout whats taking place.
Posted by shak at 6:33 PM
China Blog List
A site you should bookmark in my opinion is the new China Blog List
This is the new revised version of the original which was at Sinosplice.
John and John have done a superb bit of work here, and am sure many people will be helped by this resource.
Posted by shak at 1:10 PM
"Are you sure you want to download illegal music"
Joel over at Danwei has a piece on Baidu and their new message in the form of a pop-up when users try and do a MP3 search.
Posted by shak at 12:44 PM
Search Engine Strategies to be held in China
Originally planned for Beijing and then cancelled, Search Engine Strategies aka SES have just announced their entry into the Chinese market with an event in Nanjing on 17th and 18th March 2006.
I have been attending these events around the globe (UK and USA) for the last few years and can honestly say they are a MUST for anyone with a remote interest in the Search space of today.
Let's hope they manage to throw a good party or 6 as usually happens at these events, and I promise to try and not fall asleep on the bus and end up in the wrong city 100 km away as happened at the last event in San Jose in August.
Am very interested what sort of speakers they will manage to gather, as currently I am seeing a shortage of people involved in Search in China.
BTw, don't forget Adtech Shanghai next month, which in my opinion will be the tipping point for Digital Advertising exhibitions/conferences in China.
Posted by shak at 10:16 AM | Comments (1)
October 22, 2005
Site of the day ...
Weekend reading, well worth a read, thanks to Peter at SearchEngineBlog for the link.
I just spent an hour on there and still haven't fully grasped what it's about, but hey, since this is my blog and I can blog about what I want, I thought I'd do just that ;)
That crazy site about drawings on back of business cards.
Posted by shak at 3:18 PM | Comments (0)
October 19, 2005
Financial Times - Special Report on China
The Financial Times "today" (19/10/05) has a special report on China in the Technology / Digital Business Supplement.
A number of very interesting articles indeed, along with a piece from the blogosphere called China on the net: they do things differently here written by some guy who fancies himself as a "Man on the Ground" chasing the "Chinese Dream"
I never imagined folks at FT read this blog, and would like to thank them for the opportunity given to me. Xie Xie.
Go take a read.
China on the net: they do things differently here
Making Matches but NO serious money
China's challenge changes the rule of the game
China Report
Locals enjoy many advantages in a market with special character
Role-playing in 3D starts to take off
Posted by shak at 7:48 AM | Comments (2)
October 18, 2005
Six Degrees of Separation "Chinese Style"
Sim6D is the first Six Degrees of Separation experiment in China. Data will be collected and aggregated. The results will be analzyed by a blue ribbon academic panel. The findings of the experiment will be published and particpants will receive a copy of the findings. The goal is to gather comprehensive data on social networks in China on which we can compare China and US key findings and conduct further analysis. We hope everyone can benefit from this experiment and continue to enhance your personal network
I am very excited about what these guys are going to do, considering it's nearly 40 years since Dr. Milgram conducted the experiment and concluded the Six Degrees of Separation theory.
I personally think I live in a 3 or 4 degrees of Separation world, and coming to China it has been quite helpful when trying to get connected with folks here.
In China it's all about GUANXI, so that combined with this trial should be very interesting.
I was actually invited to the trial, however I am a lazy sod at times and decided to pass and rather watch from the sidelines.
Look forward to seeing the results when they come out.
SIM6D - Small World Simulation
SIM6D - Media Coverage
(btw, if you want further information, feel free to drop me a line, I am happy to hook you up with the decision makers there)
Posted by shak at 7:07 PM | Comments (0)
October 17, 2005
Google in China
A great article by Perry Wu which talks about search, google, and baidu, and not forgetting microsoft.
The author talks a lot of sense and the article is well researched and thought out, however I am NOT sure how much of the paid search arena Perry understands, especially when it comes to where the big money in search will be in my opinion, this paragraph below is true but I would say this is NOT where the battle will be fought out, that will be the big global brands and agencies signing the $$$ cheques.
Google wants to grab the advertising dollars, and now in China the only direct way to enable a cash business like this is for Google is to build a business on Chinese turf. This being said, in China Google outsources much of their advertising-related services to intermediaries like Shanghai's Hotsales Company. So whether it actually needs to step foot in the Middle Kingdom is questionable. It needs to only have Hotsales send its converted currency checks to offshore accounts. This takes a little accounting voodoo, but it is possible.
Posted by shak at 11:36 PM | Comments (2)
October 16, 2005
Baidu V Google
Joel Martinsen from Danwei has a fine piece taken from Keso's chinese blog ...
IT blogger Keso recently posted some comments concerning an issue of Baidu's internal glossy newsletter, Simple that he was able to get his hands on. He points out a bit of revisionist history, a large amount of Google-chasing, and serious problems with Baidu's paid search-placement services.
Posted by shak at 9:39 PM
Hey Google, why your homepage look like Baidu ?
The funniest thing I heard from a friend yesterday, as said here by Chinese Internet users:
"Why Google copy Baidu homepage design"
I am sure you can understand why I find that funny.
Posted by shak at 9:35 PM
October 14, 2005
China and Korea beat US in terms of Spam
While the US retains the dubious title as the world's top spammer, its slice of the spam pie is getting thinner, says a report published on Wednesday by Sophos. Together, China and South Korea now account for more spam than the US.
According to Sophos, which scanned all the spam messages trapped by its filters and categorized them by originating county, the US was responsible for 26.4 percent of the globe's spam in the last six months, down from 41.5 percent during the same stretch last year.
Posted by shak at 5:49 PM
NO more online drug trading in China
Of pharmaceutical products traded online diet drugs and aphrodisiacs are among the most popular on C2C portals in China. A typical search for medicinal products listed on sites, such as on the Ebay China site, shows listings for various rare or wild medicinal materials such as sea horses, placentas, gin-seng, deer snails and spotted deer antlers, some of which are banned on the normal medical products market.
Posted by shak at 1:17 PM
October 11, 2005
Blogspot / Blogger accessible from China
Many folks in the west probably don't know that ANY blog on the Blogger network and under the Yourname.Blogspot.com domain name has been banned in China for a long time.
Today I had word that this is no longer the case, not sure how permanent this is, but it's a welcome sign for sure, NOT being able to read 1000s of blogs was a bit painful. I wonder whether now they will only block specific sites such as Sitename.Blogspot.com rather than anything related to that domain.
Time will tell
Google search on the original issue
UPDATE:
Looks like it was short lived, and ALL 29 million pages on the blogspot.com domain name are NOT accessible again from China.
Posted by shak at 4:14 PM
October 10, 2005
Laowai Collection
Looks like some foreigners in Shanghai have decided to make some money out of their experiences here.
If you happen to have been to any parts of China, you will agree with the wording.
Posted by shak at 11:32 PM
October 5, 2005
Web 2.0 starts today
Be interesting to see what is said about China, as I am sure that will be on the lips of many attendees and speakers. There are days I wish I lived in SF as it just seems to be THE place, but then again Shanghai may be the next SF.
It's a who's who of the Internet
Posted by shak at 11:56 PM | Comments (0)
October 1, 2005
Connectivity ...
I am noticing too often, there is a BIG problem when it comes to connectivity, and this a double sided sword:
a, Western Sites aiming at a Chinese audience hosted outside China.
b, Chinese Sites aiming at a Western audience hosted in China.
So a word of advice for anyone looking either of the above ...
NO point having a site which can NOT be viewed by your potential audience.
I am amazed that companies will go to all the trouble of building the site but never bother checking for speed or hosting issues ...
I see a business opportunity for clever folks to allow Chinese sites mirror their sites outside the PRC, and vice versa for Western sites targeting China.
Any views folks ?
Posted by shak at 9:39 AM | Comments (4)
September 27, 2005
Chinese firm claims rights to Gmail !
All getting very complicated with Gmail, as a UK company claimed they were the first, and now a Chinese claims it was them before Google.
Chinese internet firm ISM's webmail site www.gmail.CN looks remarkably similar to Google's Gmail.COM -- right down to the logo, however, they claim their site was there first... and it looks like it actually was.
Digg article
Gmail's long lost Chinese Cousin
Gmail.cn
Google Chinese Domain Name Problems
Polite request, who ever wins the battle, can I keep my gMail account please.
Posted by shak at 7:11 PM
Google Warns Of Search Engine Swindlers In Jiangsu
Some illegally-run companies are cheating unsuspecting advertising clients in Jiangsu Province by promising to help deliver ads on Google's search network.
Local media report that an unnamed victim had spent RMB14000 to buy seven key words from a network company who promised to put their chosen key words on the right side of Google's ad column. However, the products as well as the keywords never appeared on Google's webpage after the victim paid the money.
Staff from Google's agent in Changzhou has told the media that Google provides neither annual or monthly packages, nor ranking service to clients. The company says only those illegal companies provide these types of services in order to swindle money from users.
I wasn't aware Google had an agent in Chengzhou!
The reseller channel is very popular in China, and many ADS including Yahoo, Baidu and Google CPC (cost per click) end up being sold on a CPM (cost per 1000 impressions) or monthly model.
So basically we have two types of companies here:
a, the con artist who promises to do the work but does a runner.
b, a reseller (not necessarily approved by the engines) who buys on a CPC model and re-sells on his/her own terms.
see, ya learn something new every day
Posted by shak at 5:02 PM
September 24, 2005
Google Chinese Patent Application
A little birdie has just sent this my way, not sure whether it's already out there or not ?
Systems and methods for translating chinese pinyin to chinese characters.
United States Application 20050209844
Systems and methods to process and translate pinyin to Chinese characters and words are disclosed. A Chinese language model is trained by extracting unknown character strings from Chinese inputs, e.g., documents and/or user inputs/queries, determining valid words from the unknown character strings, and generating a transition matrix based on the Chinese inputs for predicting a word string given the context. A method for translating a pinyin input generally includes generating a set of Chinese character strings from the pinyin input using a Chinese dictionary including words derived from the Chinese inputs and a language model trained based on the Chinese inputs, each character string having a weight indicating the likelihood that the character string corresponds to the pinyin input. An ambiguous user input may be classified as non-pinyin or pinyin by identifying an ambiguous pinyin/non-pinyin ASCII word in the user input and analyzing the context to classify the user input.
Google Chinese Patent Application
Posted by shak at 5:16 PM
September 23, 2005
China's most famous blogger
As I have said before, the great thing about being in Shanghai right now is meeting so many great people.
So today I got the chance to meet ...
Mr. Jian Shuo Wang
This guy is a legend in the Blog world and it was an honour to meet him, he is also General Manager for Kijiji in Shanghai, the eBay classifieds service.
Anyway, go check the man's blog out ...
Jian Shuo Wang
Kijiji Shanghai
Posted by shak at 5:22 PM
2 very loooong days
I am so tired ...
Have had an amazing 2 days, and finally started achieving what I came out here for, the problem is that a lot of it is commercially sensitive stuff, but I'll try and give you a summary:
Wednesday 21st September:
9am = Breakfast Meeting with a New York Private Equity guy who is looking at investments and was in China for dot com part 1 as such, very interesting talking to him and getting his thoughts on what "his kind" are thinking when it comes to China. He pays for Breakfast.
11am = Meet the CEO and President of a Chinese contextual/behavioral marketing company doing some pretty funky stuff with an impressive Client and Partner list, both are EX Silicon Valley guys and speak fluent Chinese and more importantly are doing Business the Chinese way, the way it should be done here, They pay for lunch.
3pm = Meeting with the VP of a an incubator in Shanghai, tells me that he is getting cold called by at least 10 foreign VCs a week looking at pumping money in, and also trying to get local knowledge, shows me some of the stuff they are involved in and I leave suitably impressed. Seriously connected on the ground.
5pm = meeting Cancelled due to heavy rain and NO taxis.
7pm = Get picked up by an UNlicensed taxi driver in Shanghai and I have to dive out whilst he is driving at 5 mph or so, nutter wanted to charge me 10 X the going rate, must think I am a bloody Laowai "Wo Jiao Shak, Wo Shi Ying Guo Ren"
8pm = Dinner at a real nice Middle Eastern restuarant where we sit on cushions and eat like they would in Lebanon, great food followed by smoking of the peace pipe, meeting is with 3 guys who have been here for a few years chasing the dragon, sorry dream I mean. They all say the same thing "Check Please"
11pm = Get dragged to MINT nightclub as it's ladies night and and I have a meeting with someone who has a business idea and needs some advice on how to market this to the West via the Web, 1 thing leads to another and I leave at 2am.
2.30 am = Bed
---
Thursday 22nd September
5.30am = Alarm goes off and I feel like death warmed up
6.05am = In Taxi on way to Airport
8.00am = Flight to Xiamen for an all day meeting.
10am > 5.30pm = In a meeting with an SEM company with 3000 sub agents underneath them, I learn more about search and distribution of the likes of BAIDU, Yahoo, 3721 then I have read in any S1 statement, meeting includes lunch which was very interesting shall we say "1000 year old eggs" and various other things which were looking back and winking at me.
6.30pm = Flight Back
9pm = Stop off for a Pizza
10pm > Midnite = Dealing with emails ...
and you lot think all i do is hang out in Starbucks.
I am so TIRED .......
Posted by shak at 12:16 AM | Comments (4)
September 21, 2005
Google launches Chinese version of Picasa
Unconfirmed reports that the Chinese version of Picasa has just launched.
Unfortunately Google don't like to share anything about China from what I can gather, or maybe they just don't like sharing with me :( - which I find real strange as this was never the case when I was back in the West ?
Posted by shak at 6:27 PM
September 19, 2005
Sequoia to invest in China
Sequoia Capital, the well-known Silicon Valley venture capital that backed Cisco, Yahoo, Google and others, has reportedly raised a $200 million China fund -- a significant development for the firm that has long focused mainly on the U.S. and whose former leader has publicly dismissed China as being in the midst of a huge bubble.
Matt Marshall from Siliconbeat has a great piece on Sequoia and China.
and a note to Mike Moritz or his partners from Sequoia, if you are ever in Shanghai do let me buy you a drink ;)
Posted by shak at 8:50 AM
Bokee acquires Chinapages
Pacific Epoch blog post that Bokee has acquired ChinaPages
ChinaPages was founded by Alibaba's Jack Ma and He Yibing in 1995. The company develops e-commerce technology and services.
Bokee recently got $10 million in funding from BVP, as was reported here
Posted by shak at 8:06 AM
September 16, 2005
Google to acquire BAIDU ?
So for the last week or so, everyday I get an email asking me what I think of "Google buying Baidu" ?
So here's my take
The time I have spent in China in 2005 and having talked to many Business Folk, End Users, Advertisers, Taxi Drivers and Part Time Girlfriends has led me to 1 thing.
Baidu run the show!
I will try and explain it in simple terms and hope no one is offended by the example I am going to use.
Taking on Baidu or Alibaba in China for Google and Yahoo, is very similar to me wanting to sell Books to Schools in the USA when my competitor happens to be Minister of Education, basically it ain't gonna happen.
In CHINA it's all about who you know and your relationships with these people, and this (in my opinion) can not be bought with $$$s.
Yahoo have obviously realised this and hence decided the best route is getting the local guys to run their business for them whilst taking ashare of the bigger Chinese Mooncake.
Google on the other hand are a kick axx company with some very very smart people and an amazing brand, however China is 1 place where all this can mean very little or very much dependant on the mood of the people, and at the moment it's all about Baidu.
An outright buy or a much bigger partnership would make total sense, as ultimately it's about the advertising $, and this Google has lots of when you look at their advertiser base, Baidu has the user base but very little of the foreign $$$s are coming through, although their marketing activity is being ramped up since the IPO.
For a Western company trying to advertise on BAIDU is similar to me asking for "Toasted Cheese Sandwich" and being handed "Cheese, Bread and a Toaster with Chinese instructions"
As a sidenote, there may be all sorts of political and financial wall street type reasons for the above to take OR not take place, however there are many more qualified folk to share that kind of news with you.
I am just sharing it from my point of view, having been 1 of Google's earliest paid advertisers in 2001, having been involved at Webmasterworld as moderator for the Google advertising forum for 2 years, Having spent millions of $s gloablly with Google, and now sitting here in Shanghai looking at the Bigger picture and being asked questions by Advertisers on how they should spend their search $s in China.
(Comments open on this thread as a trial)
Posted by shak at 10:26 AM | Comments (4)
Note To Chinese Tech CEOs: Markets Can Do Crazy Things
Gentlemen, I agree with the three of you. I would hazard to even say many analysts and reporters know less than 5% about China's Internet universe, but when you get to these low numbers, 5% seems just as good as 15%.
Posted by shak at 10:19 AM
September 15, 2005
Google to launch two projects targeting China market
Google Inc plans to launch two projects that target the China market within three to six months of setting up its mainland research and development center, possibly focusing on wireless, e-commerce and entertainment, the South China Morning Post reported, citing court documents.
The Hong Kong-based newspaper said Google has identified improvement of its Chinese-language search results, MP3 search and mobility as key areas of development needed to close the gap with mainland rivals such as Baidu.com. The research center is scheduled to open in the fourth quarter.
Here's a piece I haven't heard covered too much even though it's like 2 days old ?
As for MP3 search, last I heard BAIDU were in talks trying to solve relations with record company executives.
And my $$$s are defo on Google/Baidu teaming up ...
Posted by shak at 6:12 PM
UTstarcom COO to join Google
Johnny Chou, chief operating officer of UTstarcom, will become Google China's next COO, the China Business News reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.
Posted by shak at 5:53 PM
Seeking beautiful Chinese single girlS !
As a follow up to VC David Cowan's post on His blog:
Reliable, inside sources who understandably wish to remain anonymous have confirmed to me that (and I kid you not) Google's recruiters have been directed to hire every attractive single woman they can.
I have decided to act as an unpaid Google employee interviewing Single Chinese women for the expansion and battle against Baidu and Alibaba.
Interviews will be held this Saturday Nite / Sunday Morning 1am > 5am @ Bar Rouge, 18 The Bund, Shanghai.
Don't bother waiting in line, and go straight to desk and inform them that you are here to see "GoogreGuy"
Posted by shak at 2:37 PM
Malaysia, APACs next China ?
"Malaysia has over 8 million users online, about 1/3 of the total population. The online population is 2x that of the entire Singapore population already. Having said that, the internet infrastructure needs to be improved in order for the online population to continue its growth and encourage greater usage of the internet."
Elizabeth Lloyd does a great piece on the growth of Malaysia.
fyi, Elizabeth will also be a speaker at Ad-tech Shanghai in November 2005, which in my opinion is a "must attend" event!
Posted by shak at 10:09 AM
Jim Sterne in Shanghai
One of the added bonuses of being in China at the moment is meeting all the interesting folks who are travelling/passing through ...
Wednesday night I had the pleasure of catching up with the legandary Jim Sterne and Jim's father Mr Sterne senior.
It was a very cool meeting on top of the Peace Hotel overlooking the Bund in Shanghai, and I hope Jim enjoyed our chat as much as I did.
Our last meeting was in a Curry house in London a few months back where I had shared my vision of moving to China, and Jim had been very encouraging and told me to go for it.
Posted by shak at 9:51 AM
September 13, 2005
Qunar.com seeking funding
There is little doubting the potential of China's online travel sector. The number of Chinese usingthe internet is expected to hit 120m by the end of this year and the online population broadly matches the people who are driving growth in airline ticket and hotel sales.
Pacific Epoch ran a piece that they are seeking funding and I have heard same from other folks here in Shanghai.
Posted by shak at 11:48 PM
Asia Pacific Affiliate Marketing Conference
News just coming in, and I think it's "Breaking News"
Looks like the movers and shakers will be heading over to Singapore in January for the first dedicated affiliate event in Asia.
Affiliate marketing is going to be huge in Asia, and the big guns such as CJ and Linshare no doubt will be attending along with some of the world's top affiliates, many of whom live in Asia.
The original choice of location from what I gather was actually Bangkok, however someone saw sense and decided on Singapore, which I must say is an amazing place.
See you there no doubt !
Asia Pacific Affiliate Marketing Conference
Posted by shak at 7:33 AM
Webmasters in the Sun 4
Let me start of by saying that this event aka WITS has nothing what so ever to do with being a Webmaster, and all to do with what I like to refer to as the "Bad Boys of Search" , the kinda folks that the search engines spend their life improving their ALGO against.
I was lucky enough to attend last years event in Puerto Banus, Spain and can say that it was 2 CRAZY days of fun, the event is strctly invite only, and if you introduce a guest, you also become responsible for them should things go wrong or certain pictures appear which are not meant to go public.
So if you want to attend the ULTIMATE SEO event of the year, I suggest you look at the "Who's invited" list and better start begging/blagging an invite pretty sharpish as there are only a few days to go.
Posted by shak at 7:31 AM
September 12, 2005
Alibaba looking at London for European HQ
Interfax are reporting that China's #1 Internet darling is looking at London for their European Headquarters, maybe Alibaba, Kelkoo, Overture and Yahoo can all play one big happy family in London.
"When a company sets up its headquarters, it must look at where its customers are," Ma said. "We have a lot customers in the U.K"
Posted by shak at 11:35 PM
The Most Popular Forum Post Ever In China
Grab a coffee and sit back to read, it's a classic!
Since then, it was been viewed more than 223,000 times, and almost 4,000 people have commented on it.
Posted by shak at 6:41 PM
September 11, 2005
Alibaba seeks Growth not IPO
HANGZHOU - Yahoo Inc.'s newly acquired Alibaba.com unit will focus on building up several key businesses, but has no near-term plans for acquisitions or a public offering, as it aims to be China's Internet leader, top company executives said on Saturday.
Not that I have met Jack Ma, but from talking to folks here, Jack and his team sure know how to make things work on the web in China.
So not only is this Alibaba/Taobao V eBay, but will also be Alibaba/Yahoo V Baidu/Google and eBay/PayPal, should be a very interesting ride for all concerned. In my opinion a team-up of Baidu and Google would make a LOT of sense when tackling the above and also the overall Chinese web space, this seems more like sleeping with the nice housewife next door rather than the enemy
Posted by shak at 10:03 PM
Clinton addresses China Internet Summit
So I never managed to get an invite, but here is a piece by Red Herring on what happened at Hangzhou
In a panel featuring founders and CEOs of four of China’s leading Internet sites, Charles Zhang, CEO and founder of Chinese Internet portal Sohu.com, and Ding Lei, founder of game-focused portal and email provider Netease.com, took the opportunity to voice doubts about the wisdom of Wall Street analysts and financiers when it comes to the Chinese Internet.
Posted by shak at 2:13 PM
China Net Investor
China Net Investor is in my top 3 blogs when it comes to information about the NET in China, the blog is read by 0000s every day including the likes of Bill Gurley from Benchmark.
Definitely one to add to your list.
And I thank Johannes from CNI for the Chinawhite recommendation.
Posted by shak at 1:41 PM
September 9, 2005
440,000 FAKE Viagra tablets seized
On August 26 this year, local police in north China's port city of Tianjin arrested three Chinese suspects selling the bogus Viagra and Cialis through the Internet, and detected they colluded with Richard Cowley, an American man, undertaking transnational counterfeit drug selling.
And before you ask, NO, I was not involved
Posted by shak at 3:02 PM
Outsourced Blogging service from China
A great read ...
I can tell you that the top 5 blogs we are currently developing are:
A blog written from the perspective of a stray cat in NYC.
A blog written from a 14 year old depressed Iowa girl.
A blog about life as a math professor in a southern community college.
A blog about being a plus sized model in Kentucky.
A blog about being a weatherman in California.
read from bottom up to get the full picture:
Blogoriented.com
Posted by shak at 2:55 PM
Allyes gets funding from Oak Investments
Allyes Information Technology Co., Ltd. is a leading Chinese digital marketing services and technology company. Allyes helps marketers acquire, retain and grow customers across all digital media. The Company is comprised of three operating units - a full-service interactive agency, a provider of digital marketing technologies and expertise, and a performance media affiliates group. Allyes has established a leading position in the ad serving market. Founded in 2000, Allyes is headquartered in Shanghai, China.
China's leading digital and affiliate marketing company has secured a US$30 million financing by IDGVC and Oak Investment Partners.
Having followed the affiliate market both in the USA then UK and then Europe, I can honestly say that China will be a HUGE market when ecommerce explodes here, in my opinion the Chinese will love CPA deals by the dozen.
I hope to meet David Zhu the CEO of Allyes over the next week or two, and he is also 1 of the speakers at Ad-Tech Shanghai in November, an event I shall be talking about a lot over the coming weeks.
Shanghai Daily Article
Allyes.com
Oak Investment
Posted by shak at 2:32 PM
September 8, 2005
AAMA CONNECT 2005 (The China Playbook) in Silicon Valley ...
AAMA CONNECT 2005 Will Be the Year's Essential Event for Silicon Valley Businesses Focused on China
'The China Playbook' Brings Together 500 Leading Executives, Entrepreneurs and to Discuss Best Practices for Operating in China. The event will take place October 4-5 at the Santa Clara Marriott.
Sure does look like the event to attend if you have an interest in China and can make it to Santa Clara, which I assume most can.
It's national holiday in China that week, I am quite tempted to pop over myself if I can get a meeting or 6 squeezed in, or alternatively find a sponsor for the trip.
Posted by shak at 9:46 PM
Skype in China
Rumors are swirling that China Telecom (CHA) is preparing a major VoIP initiative with the express desire to drive out competing services like Skype.
People's Daily newspaper reports that China Telecom has been consulting with some software and hardware suppliers on issues related to establishing VoIP services in big cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
China Tech News Article
PacificEpoch Article (Paid)
UPDATE
Word on the street has it that eBay are looking to buy Skype ...
eBay is in talks to purchase Internet-telephony company Skype Technologies SA for $2 billion to $3 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The New York Post said eBay offered roughly $5 billion for Skype, and that according to a source, "Skype has been in exclusive negotiations with eBay for some time, but the agreement expires in the next few days."
Posted by shak at 7:17 PM
September 7, 2005
Dot Com Boom 2.0
Missed the first Internet boom? Welcome back, 'cuz here we go again.
Posted by shak at 6:59 PM
Dangdang.com to Launch C2C Trading Platform
“Dangdang hopes to be capable of competing with two other online auction portals in China – Taobao.com and Ebay EachNet, by the end of next year”, said Chu Mingli, C2C Project Head of Dangdang.com.
http://www.chinaknowledge.com/news_detail.asp?cat=general&ID=990
I wonder if they have any jobs going ?
Posted by shak at 6:52 PM
September 6, 2005
$2 Billion in Internet-related Investment for China
Venture capital is all about potential, and firms are beginning to see a great deal of potential in China’s Internet.
Posted by shak at 12:01 AM
September 5, 2005
Chinese Search Engine Market to Consolidate
Based on their experience with the needs of local users, and their skills in fulfilling these needs as well as being backed by serious financial resources, Baidu will continue to hold the lead in the foreseeable future. However, after Google's comprehensive China strategy bears fruit, it will become a threat to all domestic players, by leveraging its strong lead in R&D and its continuous creativity in applying its technology to new applications. Smaller players will suffer most from this development and will seek to improve their competitive position.
Posted by shak at 11:33 PM
Baidu in Court for DDOS attack ?
8848 states in its petition that Baidu used Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attacks and attacked its server through Baidu's affiliate websites.
I'm trying to get my head round this, so this would be similar to Google doing a DDOS attack against Amazon or eBay or similar right ?
I can NOT find any further info apart from the link above to this, so have NO comment to make on the article.
Posted by shak at 12:44 PM
September 2, 2005
VCs invest $10 million in Chinese Blog Portal
Bokee earns money by serving advertisements. It also makes money from telecommunications companies that sell mobile blogging services, such as the ability to post pictures taken with a mobile phone to the web site. The company is doubling revenue each month, Ms. Lee said.
Red Herring Artilce
The VCs blog
Bokee
Posted by shak at 6:56 PM
Google launch Local Search in China
Heard a rumour yesterday that Google were launching Local Search in China, but nothing seems to have hit the press section yet (hint hint Mountain View)
However looks like it's official:
The service is available at bendi.google.com and is similar to the English version of Google map and local search services.
http://www.pacificepoch.com/newsstories?id=39401_0_5_0_M
Posted by shak at 6:16 PM
Do NOT chat online NAKED
It's 6am and I am having problems sleeping due to the body clock being somewhere in London.
So whilst surfing the web I come across this:
A Chinese researcher has warned of a new threat to public health and morality — naked Internet chatting.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-08/31/content_473771.htm
and before you ask, the answer is NO.
Posted by shak at 6:59 AM
Market Share of Chinese Search Engines
SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- A survey by a Chinese Internet research group has found that Google is losing market share to its biggest Chinese rival, Web search engine Baidu.com.
The survey, conducted by the Beijing-based China Internet Network Information Center, reported that Baidu.com Inc. boosted its market share in Beijing by 10.8 percentage points to 52 percent.
link: http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/050830/china_google.html?.v=2
The real point is that the data on usage in China is really sketchy, and, as one would expect, companies will distort it to their advantage. And investors make decisions based on this data at their own risk.
link: http://bbb.typepad.com/billsdue/2005/08/china_search_ma.html
Posted by shak at 3:06 AM
September 1, 2005
Clinton comes to China to talk Internet
The China Internet Summit at West Lake is an annual event which brings together the leading CEOs of Internet companies from China and around the world for a day of discussion and cooperation. Since its inception in 2000, the event has become the primary summit among Internet leaders in China, with CEOs from more than ten NASDAQ-listed China Internet companies serving as speakers over the years. This year, the Summit will go global, under the theme “Connecting China and the World.”
Organized by Alibaba.com, the China Internet Summit at West Lake is non-partisan in nature, with the focus on open discussion between speakers and attendees. This year, the dialogue will address the key issues facing China’s Internet industry, including globalization strategies, the future of online gaming and the development of e-commerce.
So who can blag me an invite for this event, pretty please with sugar on top.
http://www.alibaba.com/aboutalibaba/press/releases050727.html
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/050825/nyth050.html?.v=22
Posted by shak at 7:09 PM
China dissapears from Google Zeitgeist
The folks over at Danwei have an interesting piece on China and the Google Zeitgeist.
http://www.danwei.org/archives/002161.html
http://www.google.com/press/intl-zeitgeist.html
Posted by shak at 4:34 PM