Weibo rises, "bystanders are powerful" at home

If you ask what the biggest and most influential event in the internet was in 2010, it would obviously be the widespread adoption of Weibo in China. In this year, aside from Sina.com which had already seized the opportunity last year, several major domestic portal sites also launched their own microblogging products, making Weibo a "must-have" feature for websites. With its unmatched speed and breadth of dissemination compared to other online platforms, Weibo quickly won over netizens and successfully established its territory. Industry insiders called this year the "Year of Weibo Explosion."

Because of Weibo, we started getting used to expressing our thoughts within 140 characters; with Weibo, one person can be like a news agency, live broadcasting events as they happen anytime, anywhere; through Weibo, social interaction has quietly changed—originally, social networks could be constructed so rapidly and three-dimensionally...

However, the vulgar verbal battles, occasional false information, and manipulations by PR agents causing signal distortion—all these issues arose as Weibo lowered the threshold for public expression, bringing along disorder and confusion. Has the era of "citizen media" truly arrived? Where will the transformation triggered by Weibo, in terms of communication studies, lead us?

Weakness: A breeding ground for rumors

On December 6, 2010, after work, the netizen "Gulu" habitually took out his phone to browse Weibo on the Line 2 subway. Suddenly, a message forwarded by a friend made "Gulu" nearly jump up. "According to reliable sources, Jin Yong passed away at 7:07 PM on December 6, 2010, due to encephalitis at St. Mary's Hospital in Hong Kong." Looking at the source of the forward, it was a verified user with a V badge, making "Gulu" feel heavy-hearted—perhaps it was true. As a seasoned martial arts fiction enthusiast with over 3,000 followers, "Gulu" immediately forwarded the message and commented, "A master has fallen, marking the end of an era of martial arts novels." On the way home, "Gulu" was planning whether to write something on the martial arts forums he frequented to mourn the passing of the master. Along the way, "Gulu" felt complex and melancholic.

When the disheartened "Gulu" returned home and opened his computer to continue browsing Weibo, he found that the atmosphere on Weibo had drastically changed. The screen was filled with debunking posts. The most compelling evidence came from a tweet sent by famous Phoenix TV journalist Luqiulawei at 8:41 PM—"False information. Jin Yong attended the honorary doctorate award ceremony at Shue Yan University yesterday. Besides, there is no such hospital in Hong Kong. The rumor-mongers are too unprofessional." Luqiulawei had over 480,000 followers, and with the rapid spread of this highly influential tweet, the main content of Weibo that evening evolved into a counterattack against the rumors.

From the time the false information about Jin Yong's death appeared on Weibo at 7:07 PM to when users actively debunked it at 8:41 PM, the rumor only survived for 94 minutes before being swiftly dispelled. Afterwards, the culprits behind this incident—a vice editor-in-chief of a certain media outlet, a website content director, and a website editor—were all dismissed.

Debate: Separating truth from falsehood in arguments

After the false report of Jin Yong's death, the previously under-populated Weibo debunking section suddenly gained popularity. More netizens voluntarily took on the responsibility of debunking rumors, reporting and correcting any misinformation they discovered as soon as possible. The debunking section became a frequently visited area for "Gulu" and other Weibo friends.

Recently, the Leqing incident received high attention on Weibo, with various pieces of information spreading widely. Just yesterday, it was rumored on Weibo that during the press conference for the Leqing murder case, the police showed a photo of the victim Qian Yunhui holding an umbrella before the car accident. This claim was immediately refuted, stating that the photo shown by the police at the press conference was taken after the accident and did not include an umbrella. Journalists who attended the press conference also claimed that they did not see the police show any photos of Qian Yunhui holding an umbrella before the accident.

This event allowed those who had previously questioned whether Weibo might be a breeding ground for rumors to see the self-cleansing dawn of Weibo. The viral spread and speed of Weibo information, to some extent, facilitates the growth of rumors. If an opinion leader inadvertently spreads a false piece of information as fact, it could result in a geometric base mutation effect of three-dimensional dissemination.

Supervision: Can it force the truth out?

In December 2010, Weibo played a significant role in the "Fudan Mount Huang Incident." The cold-heartedness theory, power-grabbing theory, and media control theory circulating on Weibo increased attention levels, prompting media professionals to continuously dig deeper for the truth. Domestic media exposed the intervention of a "very influential Shanghai second uncle" in the rescue event, further complicating the Mount Huang rescue operation and sparking public debate, where truth and falsehood were hard to distinguish.

On December 24, the Shanghai police responded on their official website, stating that throughout the entire rescue process, there was no interference from any key or influential individuals. The next day, the Shanghai police publicly released five recordings of emergency calls made by the Fudan students involved in the Mount Huang incident. Eventually, the "very influential Shanghai second uncle" appeared on television, revealing himself to be merely someone who had worked at a construction quality testing center and resigned in 2008. This "second uncle" described himself as "ordinary, like a blade of grass or a tree."

Rumors come quickly, but they also dissipate quickly in the face of the truth. Therefore, some have said that "rumors forced the truth out." However, such rumors can cause great harm before the truth arrives. Weibo's biggest weakness cannot avoid rumors. Professor Xie Yungeng, deputy director of the Institute of Humanities and Arts at Shanghai Jiaotong University, emphasized this harmfulness. He believes that as the number of Weibo users increases, Weibo's influence on China's traditional public opinion landscape will continue to strengthen. Verified users will further enhance the credibility of information, highlight the role of opinion leaders, and thus increase the influence of Weibo content. However, in some major crisis events, Weibo rumors have a strong destructive effect, necessitating measures to curb the generation and spread of rumors at the source.

[Journalist's Notes]

Weibo governance is not "micro," another network supervision tool

A medium reaching 50 million people took 38 years for radio, 13 years for television, 4 years for the internet, and only 14 months for Sina Weibo! The latest "2010 Chinese Weibo Annual Report" released by the Public Opinion Research Laboratory of Shanghai Jiaotong University shows that as of October 2010, the scale of visiting users of China's Weibo services reached 125.217 million. In 2010, Weibo experienced explosive growth in China, spreading almost virally. This special mode of transmission increasingly demonstrated its power in public news events.

In August 2010, the unfortunate experience of candidate Li Mengmeng, who was "wrongly declared not admitted," garnered widespread attention on Sina Weibo. Through retweets and support on Weibo, her fate miraculously turned around within two days, and she was eventually admitted to Henan University of Economics and Law.

In September 2010, in the Yihuang demolition incident in Jiangxi, party member Zhong Rujiu sent a rescue plea via Weibo from the toilet, live-streaming his situation of being blocked by Yihuang government officials at the airport to netizens nationwide. The Yihuang demolition incident thus entered the public eye. Subsequently, Zhong Rujiu continuously communicated with the outside world through Weibo, updating the latest developments, ultimately pushing for the resolution of the incident.

In this series of public news events, Weibo's driving role is undeniable, leading to the birth of the "Weibo power theory" that "spectatorship generates strength." However, Professor Xie Yungeng, deputy director of the Institute of Humanities and Arts at Shanghai Jiaotong University, believes that in all Weibo public incidents, Weibo "spectatorship" indeed gathered attention, but the ultimate resolution of each incident was due to extensive follow-up by traditional media, thereby forming public opinion pressure and attracting the attention of relevant departments. "At this stage, Weibo and traditional media complement each other. Weibo content becomes an information source for traditional media, Weibo 'spectatorship' preheats news events, and traditional media grounds Weibo content, ultimately releasing the 'spectatorship' power of Weibo into reality and playing a promoting role in the development of events."

The openness of Weibo compresses the space for "black box operations" and expands channels for public awareness; the interactivity of Weibo provides more opportunities for public participation while testing local officials' ability to adapt to democratic, open, and interactive online life. Therefore, when netizens question your voice, avoiding, shirking, dodging, or pretending to be mute are both embarrassing and dangerous.

[Market Analysis]

Power has grown:

Sina propels Weibo explosion

In 2010, Weibo suddenly became wildly popular. According to research data from DCCI China Internet Center, 60% of current Weibo users in China have only been using it for half a year. However, the popularity of Weibo in China did not arise overnight—it was closely related to the gradual "fermentation" of Weibo in the Chinese market over the past three years.

In 2006, Twitter, the pioneer of microblogging, was founded, and this new medium format of publishing and sharing information with simple language quickly caught the attention of IT elites in China. In 2007, the first domestic microblogging site, Fanfou, was established, followed by other microblogging sites like Diguo and Jiwei. However, these pioneers of domestic microblogging services failed to truly open up the Chinese microblogging market due to factors such as policy, funding, and resources, but they did incubate the value of microblogging to a certain extent.

"Modern people's work and life pace is getting faster, and both time and information are showing fragmented trends. Therefore, people's need for fragmented expression is becoming stronger. The emergence of Weibo well meets this demand, allowing everyone to freely express themselves anytime, anywhere on Weibo," said Mao Taotao from the Public Relations Department of Sina.com. He believed that Weibo's expression method is quite in line with modern people's needs, so its popularity is inevitable.

As for why the domestic microblogging market was finally opened on Sina's platform, industry insiders believe this is related to Sina's powerful media resources. As a portal site, Sina.com has the most timely and comprehensive news resources, and its already successful Sina Blog service has rich celebrity resources, laying a good foundation for cultivating the microblogging market.

Profitability is a challenge:

How far can relying on celebrities go?

At the end of November, Shanghai comedian Zhou Libo threw out the "public feces theory" on Weibo. This statement immediately sparked public outrage, and verbal violence flooded Weibo. However, this was not the first instance of celebrities engaging in crude cursing on Weibo. How should the future path of Weibo, which relies on celebrity effects to create circles, proceed?

Professor Xie Yungeng, deputy director of the Institute of Humanities and Arts at Shanghai Jiaotong University, believed that in the coming years, exploring profitable models would become the focus of Weibo's development. Since the launch of the earliest domestic microblogging product, Fanfou, in 2007, Weibo's development has lasted more than three years. However, early Weibo products were hindered in their development due to problems with profit models. Currently, the most important domestic microblogging platforms, such as Sina Weibo, Tencent Weibo, and NetEase Weibo, have relatively substantial financial backing, but they still haven't found a definite profit model. For Weibo to achieve long-term development, apart from attracting more users, expanding scale, and enhancing market recognition, the key lies in the profit model.

Secondly, most domestic Weibo products currently follow a celebrity plus entertainment route. As Weibo continues to develop, it will transition from elites to the grassroots, moving from "spectatorship" of celebrities to online social interactions. The impact of Weibo on the traditional media public opinion landscape will also further strengthen.