Sina Weibo

Since August 2009, an estimated 140 million users have registered with the Chinese micro-blogging site Sina Weibo (www.weibo.com - 'Sina'). One of the newest 140 word character bloggers is the Guangzhou Municipal Government.

In the meaning of Sina Weibo’s (新浪微博) name, Sina refers to 'new wave' (Xinlang), but also means 'unconstrained' - while Weibo literally means ‘micro-blog’. Forbes magazine estimates that 10% of the US internet users had accounts with micro-blogging service Twitter, while 30% of Chinese internet users are on Sina - with a lot high aggregate number of users.

In December, the first Sina post by the Guangzhou Government's Information Bureau, blogging @广州市政府新办 translates as: “A positive information bridge. Welcome everybody. Here is the Guangzhou Government Information Office micro-blog. All friends are welcome to support @广州市政府新闻办, we work diligently to post timely, authoritative and informative blog updates to establish a communication bridge. We welcome fans for the development of Guangzhou.”

Sina has over a 50% share of the Chinese micro-blog market with the substantial share of user browsing time in China. The phenomenal growth of Sina users has been stratospheric with bigger first year growth than Facebook and Twitter combined. Growth is expected to peak in 2013, however the tech wars for Chinese internet browse time is likely to be fierce from rivals Tencent Weibo.

It may be too late and difficult for circumscribed foreign net companies to break into the Chinese market; especially after the announcement that Sina will launch an English version, (the mobile app is available). There are already over an estimated 450,000 Sina users in the US.

While many mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan, as well as Western celebrities were courted to blog on Sina (or perhaps their PR agents) it has created a two-class blog. ‘Well known’ bloggers on the site are authenticated by Sina and a “V” for verification tag appears next to their user name. However, many Chinese netizens have mocked the B-grade or no-name bloggers who are verified and suspected of having ‘vampire’ friends (僵尸粉) to bloat their social network.

In December, the Beijing Municipal Internet Information Department recently required real name registration of bloggers with a policy claimed to avoid rumors and for rational debate. The Beijing based Sina is implementing the regulations and may required users IDs. However this has not seen a mass exodus to Guangdong’s Tencent Weibo, which has optional real name registration. Twenty-five percent of micro-bloggers on a Sina poll said they would quit the site if there was no anonymous blogging.

Sina has been an internet sensation, with the Red Cross Guo Mei Mei and photos of child beggar memes. Though Sina exercise a ‘civilized’ internet moderation policy, the power of Sina was instrumental in the dissemination of news about last year’s train crash in Wenzhou. With Sina giving voice to so many people for their views, it is the people’s micro-blog with an estimated 227,000 messages per minute.

// Visit the Guangzhou government's blog at www.weibo.com/guangzhouxwb

[User Interface]
Navigating Sina
Sina is a mixture of a micro-blogging and a social network akin to a Twitter-Facebook hybrid with a bundled Foursquare style service (locating other users in close proximity by mobile device). The micro-blog includes a blogroll for posts and re-posting, commenting and private messaging. Sina embraces the 140-character message limit and utilizes the '@username' and '#topic' naming conventions.
The tabs on the pull down menu (from left to right) are: Home (首页 – shouye), Square (广场 – guangchang), Micro-groups (微群 – weiqun), Applications (应用 - yingyong), Games (游戏- you xi), the search box, your user name, Mobile (手机 – shouji), Invite (找人 – zhaoren), News (新闻 - xinwen) and Settings (帐号 – zhanghao).

On the home page, there is a blogroll timeline of the recent posts of the bloggers that the user is following. There is a box to write a blogpost and the blogger can attach an emoticon, a picture, video, music or poll to be 'tweeted / shared.’ The Square page pull down menu includes the Hall of Fame (名人堂), Weibo Stars (微博达人), Billboards (风云榜), Micro Topics (微话题), Best Posts (微博精选), City Blogs (同城微博), Weibo Interviews (微访谈), Live Blogs (微直播), Streaming (大屏幕) and Hot Blogs (热门微博).

The left hand sidebar, has the user’s profile photo and below has a counter for number of blogs the user is following or has ‘attention’ (关注), fans or ‘followers’ (粉丝) and posts (微博) of the user. Below is the user’s badges, then below is the home page index (我的首页) with the user’s mentions (@提到我的), comments (我的评论), private messages (我的私信) and saved messages (我的收藏). Then below is a summary of the recent hot topics from the blogs that the users is following (热门微博) and then recommended blogs (人气用户推荐).

[Sina 'Nube']
Getting Started
Step 1 - Registering:
On the top right hand side of the Weibo home page (www.weibo.com) click the large green button (立即注册微博). You will then see this page:

First Box: Insert your E-mail address.
Second Box: Insert a password.
Third Box: Insert your name.
Clickbox: Choose your gender. Then insert the letters and numbers which you see next to the security test box.
Confirm whether your account information is correct.

Step 2 - Profiles:

Choose a profile photo to upload.

Step 3 - Blogging:
Clicking the Home button.

Then write a blogpost in the dialogue box here:

After writing a 140 words or less message, you can click here to publish your first Weibo post.

Step 4 – Friends:
Insert your friends email address in the search box to find friends:

To add friends click this:

Step 5 - Log out:

To log out, on the settings pull down menu click this:

Step 6 – Log in:
Go to Weibo and in this dialogue box enter your email address and password here:

// Download the mobile Sina Weibo software to your phone at the App Store or at 91 mobile assistant

[The Chinese Twitterverse]
Who to follow on Sina Weibo
Follow that’s PRD on Sina Weibo @thats英文杂志 and join more than 14,000 of our friends and read over 1461 posts which has received several badges including being on Sina Weibo for over two years, for more than 10,000 fans and for 'speaking the truth.' Also follow some of the PRD’s best micro-bloggers:

News
Southern Metropolitan
(@南方都市报）
Shenzhen Daily
（@深圳日报-英文）

Information
Guangzhou Security Services
（@中国广州发布）
Shenzhen Security Services
（@深圳公安）

Celebrities
News anchor Chen Yang
(@香港卫视陈扬)
NBA Basketballer Yi Jianlian
（@易建联）
Pop singer Master Dongshan（@东山少爷廖寰）who sings about Guangzhou.

that's PRD's friends
local deejay’s JCC MC (@ChAosJCC) and Urban Savant (@UrbanSavant城市大师)