Internet Beat by Gloria Rivera

Internet users in China

With President Bush’ trip to China, it seemed interesting to mention information from a January 2002 survey of Internet users in China. I thought you might enjoy finding out statistics that seemed truly interesting.

Sixty percent of users are male, 40% are female. These are the main percentage of users and their ages: 15.3% are under 18 years old; 36.2% are 18-24 years old; 16.3% are 25-30 years old and 12.1% are between 31 and 35 years old. 43.1% are married, and 56.9% are unmarried.

Most of the users are located in the cities of Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangdong. The education attainment is as follows: Under high school, 10.2%, in high school, 30%; 2-3 years of college, 26.9%; bachelor degree, 30.4%, master degree, 2.1%; and doctor degree, 0.4 %.

The distribution according to user’s career is as follows: government officer, 8.3%,; “Engineering person”, 19.9%; clerk, 17.2%; service person, 13.2%; peasant, 1.3%; manufacturer and operator, 5.6%; “Army man,” 1.1%; student, 24.1%; “unemployed people,” 4/9%; and others, 4.4%.

The access locations are 61.3% from home, and 45.7% from the office. The information gathered most is news, 74.0%;

These are the other categories listed for information gathered:

Computer Hardware and Software 55.6%;

Entertainment Information 46.5%;

“ Life Service” information 27.8%;

“Social Culture information” 20.4%;

Electronic Books 37.4%

Science and Education Information 31.8%

Financial, estate Information 16.4%

Job Listings 22.2%

Trade and Commerce Information 9.9%

Travel Information 11.4%

Advertisement 6.4%

Medical Care Information 7.7%

Matchmaking Services 4.5%

Laws, regulations and Policies 13.7%

Others 1.6%

Other statistics mentioned include how users find websites:

Search engine 76.3%

Links on other websites 64.7%

Recommendation from friends, schoolfellows and colleagues 53.9%

Recommendation from Internet friends 30.3%

Books 17.1%

Paper and Magazines 36.5%

Broadcasting and TV programs 16.4%

Yellow Pages 4.7%

Others 0.5%

Asked if they had ever purchased Commodities or services via Internet last year, this is how users responded :

Yes 31.6%

No 68.4%

Asked if they had ever purchased commodities via auction websites last year :

Yes 6.9%

No 93.1%

As to changes from October 1997 to January 2002, the statistics show the following changes: computer hosts in China 29.9 to 1254 thousand; users connected by dial-up: 25 to 1020 thousand. The number of Internet users increased from 62 thousand, to 3.3 million. The percentage of male/female users changed as well:87.7% to 12.3% in 1997, and 60% to 40% in 2002.

Internet use in China is still changing from year to year. If interested, you can keep track of the periodic past and present survey results made available by the China Internet Network Information Center at this url: http://www.cnnic.net.cn/develst/rep200201-e.shtml. The statistics therein are the source for this article.

My interest in this topic was sparked by an article published in The Internet Computing magazine of January and February 2002, published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers IEEE, about the topic of Internet use in China. It mentions that Chinese authorities have shut down 17,000 of the country’s 94,000 Internet cafes for failing to block web sites considered subversive or pornographic.

Subversive web sites include the BBC, CNN, Washington Post, and the US. Funded Voice of America! Internet users in China have access to more than 2,000 news sites providing official news.

Can we even imagine how it is to live in such controlled environment? The Internet Computing article can be found at http://computer.org/internet/ The statistics about Internet use in China can be found at http://www.cnnic.net.cn/develst/rep200201-e.shtml.

To contribute to the Internet Beat column, contact Gloria R. Rivera at webmaster@seguin.net