Top Chinese Tech & Online Trends for the Year of Tiger

bambook

 

New Year, new trends…Time to have a look around what’s going on here in China. What’s disappointing and odd however is to write a post about trends and using words like “blocked” and “banned”…Anyway, let’s see what we’ve got here…

E-Books

When a major online game company moves to litterature and sets up an independant e-book unit, there is no doubt about the growth in the e-book sector for 2010. This trend, causing issues of IPR, will also bring up opportunities for technology devices and content – let’s follow the evolution of digital novels and authors. To be followed : the latest Chinese e-book Bambook (in Chinese 连环书) launched by Shanda with 3G and wifi functions.

 

Cloud Computing

New government policies encourage domestic market growth, banning foreign-funded cloud computing firms from participating in this sector in China (sigh again…). Domestic firms like Kingsoft will continue reinforcing their applications suites as cloud computing services like Salesforce and GoogleDocs are still partially blocked here.

 

Chinese Search Engines & Mobile search

With Google’s threat of pulling the plug out of China, it is no surprise local rivals positions will be be even more dominating the search market : Baidu, Sogou and other smaller search engines will move to mobile phones with mobile-ready applications for targeting China’s 223 million mobile netizens.

 

Technology Events

Financial crisis and diminished budgets caused a high percentage of canceled events in 2009. This year should see more technology-related events, conferences and training programs in China and surrounding regions. Shanghai Expo should also be a trigger for top meetings.

 

Online Video Crackdowns

2008 and 2009 were certainly years of online restrictions, not only for foreign players like Youtube and Facebook, Google’s move but also for local privately-funded companies. Online video sharing websites are certainly the most targeted, hence a possible alliance between giants like Youku, Tudou and Baidu. Foreign investment in that sector is not recommended…

 

Viral ads

More rules to the online sector will lead to a more structured market and online content providers will look for optimizing their content to strengthen their positions. Meanwhile, booming numbers of China’s netizens will draw the attention of publishers for cost-effective solutions. This is where I’d put my 2010 budget.

What do you think?

Source : ChinaTechNews

February 15, 2010 | BuzzandtheCity | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | No Comments »

The End of Google China?

 

 Google China closing

 

 

Following cyber-attacks identified as Chinese’s on private information figuring on Google.cn and 20 other major IT, media, finance and technology companies, Google has published on its official blog an official announcement :

 

“We will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.”

 

So, what are the consequences if Google was to shut down Google.cn :

 

x Business : Baidu will gain most marketshares coming from publisher’s paid search programs as well as Bing and other less significant homegrown search engines. Google owned about 36% of search engines market share in China in 2009 4th quarter.

 

x Ethics : Google would gain more credibility in the West after it was critized for “adjusting” to Chinese local market requirements, i.e. sourcing censored search results

 

But honestly, is this alleged attack the real kick for this major decision and is this a smart move ? If Google was making more bucks in China would it leave? Now that the market doesn’t look like a promised land anymore, ethics, on which Google had closed eyes before, are invoked to justify a possible departure – perhaps not to “lose face”.

I understand the commercial decision, as well as the good intentions of some people towards the censorship issue. But strategically, this looks like a big step. Backwards. What do you think?

To find out more (and see how this will affect your SEO in China) check the links from SEO company Them.Pro and the official Google blog.

To be followed…

 

 

January 13, 2010 | BuzzandtheCity | Tags: , , , , | 1 Comment »

Baidu temporary unaccessible

baidu_search_engine

 

 

 

Since today 7am, Baidu.com was not accessible, whereas Google.com and Google.cn were perfectly working, leading Google.cn to an abnormal increase of traffic.

According to an official announcement from China’s number 1 search engine, the problem occured after a registration change in USA on website register.com. Last night, a search on DNS (Domain Name Server) was leading netizens to Yahoo.com website…

A surprise for us, more used to the issue of not being able to access foreign websites from China.

Baidu is now accessible again, but I wonder how much money did it cost for today’s paid search loss…

| BuzzandtheCity | Tags: , , | 1 Comment »

Mystery Google or What did the person just before you search for?

 

Mystery-Google-Get-Somebody-Elses-Search-Result 

 

Coffee Break.

What did the person just before you search for? The magic (and the answer) is on Mystery Google. Type in what you search for as usual and get the previous searcher’s results. Randomness guaranteed : I typed “Buzz and the City” and got “eat yogurt, walk miles, you\’ll drop the weight. Not fat? post it again.”

 

Enjoy (and no, definitely not fat)

December 15, 2009 | BuzzandtheCity | Tags: , , | 3 Comments »

How to find the right domain name extension?

g

 

A very interesting article on THEM.pro shows how the domain name extension impact SEO.

 

Reminder : a domain name extension is what comes after your domain name, such as .com, .net, .org. National and international extensions are for instance .cn for China or .fr for France, .uk for UK…

 

The test ran over several websites using the same domain name but different domain name extensions. 

The rankings results on Google, Bing and Baidu showed national domain extensions have “a very strong impact on the rankings of websites in the designated country” says THEM.

 

Basically, the domain name extension weighs more when it comes to ranking on national search engines than the language used on the website or even the IP location of the hosting server.

 

So, if I wanted to be ranked better in Chinese search engines, I would have to be BuzzandtheCity.cn. Turns out, I don’t.

 

What about your website?

 

For SEO tips and full article click here

September 9, 2009 | BuzzandtheCity | Tags: , , , , | No Comments »

What Google says about you

 
bigbrother2 
 
 
I often Google myself. Not that I am a total self-obsessed person, but I like to manage my image just in case people want to get information about me. As in the “real” life, I have a “rep” to protect : mine.
And, let’s be honest for 2 seconds and face it : we all do it. Ok maybe not ALL of us. Only 47% of people google themselves, while 53% google others*. In US, 45% of recruiters use social networks, while 35% disqualified candidates after having access to their profiles. 29% of IT and services companies use Facebook, 26% LinkedIn and 21% MySpace**. That makes me think. I also Baidu-d myself and got different results..funny
 
Control the information
 
This is a basic. Yes, you want some people to find you when they Google you. But do you want anybody (random strangers, potential recruiters, clients) to know about your pet diet, your sexual orientation, your religion, who you know and see your last very flattering party pictures?
My advice would be to never, ever put such information on the net. You just don’t know who can have access to it and how they can use it. Trust me, you don’t. A friend of mine was seeing this lady who has a high position in the police. She cracked his facebook account to check if he was messaging other girls…No comment…
Depending on the level of privacy wanted, you might also change your name on your Facebook profile, refuse to appear on search results, be invisible (my favorite) or settle a dedicated email address that can prevent people from finding you with your email (a sneaky one I admit). This is true about Facebook and about any decent social network. Be sure to check privacy checkings before uploading any personal information.
 
Manage your reputation
 
So, you still can’t help to do status updates and tell about your holidays of debauchery in Thailand or your sister’s wedding (sigh..) at least manage who has access to it :
 
x Google yourself and see results
x Pick the ones you want to keep and shut down the others
x Go to all your social networks profiles account and adjust the privacy settings
x Google yourself again to check if it is effective
x Brand yourself in a positive way (the ME 2.0. article is great, check it out) 18% of the previously mentioned companies said they decided to hire a candidate after checking their profiles on different networks.
 We live in a world of first impressions and appearances. Virtual information is still “real” and it can have an impact on your “real” life. Both of them - virtual and non virtual, mesh thus matter.
 
 
(*) Pew Internet study (dec 07)
(**) Harris Interactive for Careerbuilder.com (aug 09)
 
 
August 19, 2009 | BuzzandtheCity | Tags: , , , , , , , | No Comments »