CnBloggercon 2007

By Ben | Friday, November 2, 2007 | 7 Comments

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The Third annual Chinese BloggerCon is underway and my what a sight to behold.

Don’t worry if you don’t understand Chinese. Rebecca MacKinnon, who used to be the Beijing Bureau Chief for CNN, will probably post her thoughts on it since she has in the past and John Kennedy, the Chinese language editor for Global voices, is live blogging the event.

What’s interesting about this event is that it’s much more than about blogging itself. Blogging is great, but in China where speech is censored and there are people that are trying to speak out on this, that, or another thing, this event is really about how the technology has empowered regular people the ability to move forward. Just take a look at the technology in itself. This event even showcases the talent behind China’s equivalents to our Internet fads.

For example, Fanfou is the Chinese equivalent to Twitter. Apparently many people in China actually post direct from mobiles. Baidu is the Google of China even though Google has a presence there. You could go on and on. This only barely scratches the surface from a perspective of how the Internet and technology is advancing both Chinese thought and journalistic aspects.

Funny that not only is this event getting a lot of love in China, but friends on this side of the Pacific like Robert Scoble is wishing he was there. And I totally understand the sentiment. Sometimes you just want to be at events that are changing the world, of which CnBloggercon is sure to do.

(Photo credit: Shi Zhao)

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Current EventsTechnology

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jozjozjoz

Too bad 8Asians is banned in China!
John Kennedy

@joz: 8Asians is not banned at this particular moment
@Ben: Really good point you make about blogging empowering people here, and everywhere I’d add. Countless inspiring examples seen at the BlogCon this weekend. I’d just want to add that the organizers are under a lot of pressure in attempting to organize something like this, in a precarious position, and while some things went a little haywire, they were still able to ensure that all conversations, even potentially troublesome discussions, were given the time they deserved. For that I can’t praise the organizers Isaac Mao, Shi Zhao, the Social Brain foundation and many more who go unnamed, enough. There was outstanding translation provided by Julie Z, and I’m confident that if there’s need for simultaneous translation at next year’s CnBlogCon, these guys will have no trouble in providing it.
darkmoon

John, thanks for stopping by and commenting. It’s great to see the conference go as well as it did actually considering I was watching the twittering by blognation and it was wild. I’d wake up to about 100+ twitters about the event.

I’ll also commend what they’re doing there. Isaac Mao has been instrumental in many things going on with blogging (at least what you get to read on this side of the world).

From what I’ve read of the live blog efforts, it’s been incredible. If there is a stream or someway to participate with users on this side of the world, perhaps next year we could set something up. In any case, thanks for the provision of the English translations along with everyone else that is writing about CnBlogcon for those of us that aren’t able to read the official blog.

Waiting impatiently for next year!
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