New social-messaging tool taps Chinese dissident in expansion drive

KwikDesk, a newly launched social online messaging platform, is expanding into the mainland with the help of an unlikely resource, exiled dissident Wuer Kaixi.

"Aside from helping with translation of the product, he is also helping us reach the Chinese market," Irish-based KwikDesk founder Kevin Abosch told the South China Morning Post.

Introduced last week, KwikDesk features a spartan, Twitter-like interface from which users can anonymously send messages of up to 300 words with a hashtag - a word or phrase preceded by the hash (#) sign - to identify its specific topic.

Users must also select a date on which the message will "self-destruct" and simply vanish online, from 24 hours, 10 days to 100 days. Messages can be retrieved by searching hashtags.

Abosch yesterday said the Chinese-language version of KwikDesk, which went live this week, could potentially serve as a platform for hundreds of millions of online users.

Official figures put the mainland's internet population at about 591 million by the end of June.