Wired checks in on Internet use in China:
The Internet is, famously, a nonstop disruption machine — overturning every business model, cultural institution, and societal norm it touches. But even by these anarchic standards, its destabilizing impact on Chinese society has been immense. The number of Internet users in the country has skyrocketed in the past 12 years from 620,000 to 338 million, making it the world’s largest and fastest-growing online population. And while China has embraced its newfound digital prowess — the national telecom company adds more than 700,000 broadband customers each month — the authoritarian government has also attempted to control it.
It has fortified its “great firewall,” selectively blocking access to Google, YouTube, and Twitter. It has deployed a special Web police force, tens of thousands strong, to investigate and shut down online political dissent. It has hired a regiment of “secret Web commentators,” who post comments in praise of the state. And in July, it began developing the Green Dam Youth Escort, censoring software that can be preinstalled in new PCs.
But as China has become wealthier and its young people more comfortable with the tools of the digital age, the Internet has emerged as an uncontrollable force. Signs of its impact are ubiquitous: in hangar-sized, 24-hour Internet clubs, where hundreds of adolescents spend hours wired to headsets in front of massive, glowing monitors; on qq.com, the labyrinthine social networking and instant messaging platform popular in China that has more than 480 million active IM accounts alone; and in the proliferation of stealth software that helps users sneak around state firewalls. Parents have always worried about the pernicious impact of youth culture, whether from comic books, rock and roll, or videogames. But in China’s rigid, hypercompetitive society, the Internet explosion represents more than a disciplinary annoyance. It is seen as an existential threat. And that helps explain why treating kids with supposed Internet addiction has become a national obsession.
The Dish 