Submission + - The Revolt of China's Twittering Classes
Ponca City writes: "After Liu Xiaobo was awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China, few voices in mainland Chinese media discussed Liu’s Nobel Prize. But Hu Yong, a media critic in Beijing, writes that China’s blogosphere and microblogs exploded after Liu was announced as the winner and a search of the hash tag “#Liuxiaobo” shows that relevant messages pop up hundreds of times per minute on Twitter. "Twitter has become a powerful tool for Chinese citizens as they increasingly play a role in reporting local news in their communities," writes Hu. "Chinese Twitter users lead the world, using it for everything from social resistance, civic investigation, and monitoring public opinion, to creating black satire, “organizing without organizations” in the Guangdong anti-incineration movement, and mailing postcards to prisoners of conscience." The Chinese Twittersphere has three prominent features writes Hu. First, as China’s rulers strengthen their censorship efforts, Twitter has become highly politicized. Second Twitter brings opinion leaders together around one virtual table, attracting a lot of “new public intellectuals” and “rights advocates,” as well as veterans of civil rights movements and exiled dissidents. Finally, Twitter has become the coordinating platform for many campaigns asserting citizens’ rights. "With the proliferation of Twitter clones in China, social movements in China are getting a long-term boost""
