Deborah Fallows, a senior research fellow at Pew Internet & American Life Project, recently published a short paper packed full of commentary and stats about the Chinese Internet: usage habits, demographics, content, trust in online media, government controls etc.
Fallows’ paper summarizes a survey funded by the New York-based Markle Foundation and directed by Mr. Guo Liang and his research team at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Below are some noteworthy excerpts from Fallows’ paper:
• “most Chinese say they approve of internet control and management, especially when it comes from their government.”
• “over 80% of respondents say they think the internet should be managed or controlled, and in 2007, almost 85% say they think the government should be responsible for doing it.”
• “79% of Chinese said internet companies should manage or control the internet, just over two-thirds, 68%, identified parents, 64% schools, and 59% internet cafes.”
• “87% of internet users would control or manage pornography; 86% violent content; 83% spam or junk mail; 66% advertisements; 64% slander against individuals.”
• “Half of respondents said online games should be controlled, and more than one in four (27%) said online chatting should be controlled.”
• “An influential and highly informed group of elite Chinese bloggers continues to test the limits and vigilance of the censors.”
• “Declining trust in reliability of online content. Over four years of tracking user reaction, trust in the reliability of online content has fallen by one-half, from 52% in 2003 to 26% now.”
• “Only about one-third of internet users (30%) said they considered online content reliable.”
• “Three-quarters of respondents deemed reliable most or all the information on government websites, compared with 46% for pages from established media, 28% for results from search engines, 11% for content on bulletin boards and in advertisements, 4% for information from individuals’ web pages, and 3% for postings in chat rooms.”
• ” 93% of internet users said they considered much of internet content to be unsuitable for children.”
• “61%, thought internet users could easily become addicted to the internet, and the same number thought users could easily be affected by online pornography.
• “43%, said the internet could lure users into making the wrong kind of friends.”
• “42% said internet use easily presented risks to personal or private information.”