60 People, 60 Stories

Unleashing the power

By Jeremy Goldkorn (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-09-30 10:43

I have been following Chinese blogs since 2003, when Muzi Mei's online sex diaries introduced the concept of blogging to millions of Chinese people. Since then, it has been a real pleasure to observe the flowering of creativity and unleashing of the powers of expression that blogging has encouraged.

Before blogging, it was very difficult to find out how ordinary Chinese people were thinking: China's traditional media organizations have quite conservative editorial policies, so real voices from young people and ordinary people were rare to see in print.

It's not only the voices of ordinary citizens that blogging has made possible to hear: Many of China's best journalists and opinion leaders in various industries write blogs where they can publish stuff that would never make it into print because of considerations of length and subject matter.

The bloggers that we have followed on my own group blog at Danwei.org give an idea of the range of subjects and opinions that blogs have brought to the Chinese Internet:

The columnist Lian Yue sometimes uses his blog to draw attention to social issues that the traditional media is reluctant to talk about, as does Tiger Temple. Youth novelist and racing driver Han Han also tackles serious issues that the mainstream media won't report on, and manages to keep them very entertaining. I may be the only person who is not a post 70s or 80s Chinese girl who enjoys the rather girly content of actress and director Xu Jinglei's blog, but it's window into the life of a successful Chinese actress and filmmaker.

But of all the Chinese bloggers that I have followed, I think Wang Xiaofeng has been the most fun and for me, the most rewarding to translate: his mix of knowing - sometime caustic - humor and satire directed at sacred cows in the media industry, China's cultural scene and at the behavior of ordinary netizens have an appeal that crosses cultural boundaries and can make laowai laugh, even when they don't totally get the joke.

Jeremy Goldkorn is a China observer who operates media portal danwei.org.