If you could go back in time by say, 50 days, to just before the anniversaries of the Tiananmen Square crackdown and the founding of the Communist Party and looked at mainland microblog messages, you would find a totally different world to the one today.
Back then, you could see the wall around public opinion. Go to those same services today and you would not know that one even exists. Public outcry fills these domains - I haven't heard so much overt criticism of the government since 1989. It all reminded me of a phrase regularly invoked by the party's propaganda authorities: 'We must not allow public opinion to lose control!' Too late - it's already happened.
It all started after the tragic collision between two trains near Wenzhou in Zhejiang province. On July 23, one of the trains crashed into the back of the other, killing at least 39 people and injuring many more on board. According to the Ministry of Railways, the tragedy occurred after lightning damaged signalling equipment. The disaster was not the worst in terms of the death toll, given calamities such as mining disasters and earthquakes, but it ignited anger across the country overnight.
In the days before the disaster, the ministry had boasted about the safety and efficiency of its network. In the days after, its rescue operations exposed the chaos of its organisation. Without doing thorough searches, its rescue workers said there were no signs of life in the wreckage, and rushed to clear the site. Fortunately, thanks to someone's insistence, a little girl was pulled alive from a tangled carriage. The state of the rescue operations is a reminder of the ministry's highly monopolistic nature and rampant internal corruption. People from all walks of life rely on train services, and the ministry's callous misdeeds potentially affect everyone, including the urban middle and elite classes. Many people now understand for themselves the darkness of the system.
The builders of the internet's firewall have sought to keep out subversive content from overseas. In the case of the train crash, it's the flood of domestic public opinion that is flowing outwards; many Western outlets have relied simply on translations of mainland web content.
Microblogs are a major channel for disseminating information and the authorities and local companies work closely to control online discussions. But they've found the forums difficult to control; by their very nature the services attract people who care about many things and express their views. Even people who would otherwise be apathetic about what's happening around them can now find information at their fingertips through microblogs. And grass-roots people, who previously had no outlet to express their views, can now speak up and make their voices heard.
Major mainland portals run their own microblogs. Sina Weibo boasts the biggest number of bloggers and is also the most-monitored by the government. Rival Tencent Weibo has a strong user base and appeals to a younger demographic. NetEase's 163.com microblog is becoming more popular and apparently easing its limits on the scope and extent of opinions. And unlike Sina's microblog, which features interviews with showbiz figures, NetEase often invites opinion leaders and even dissidents to express their views.