American online social media VS Chinese online social media

Does China have Facebook, Twitter or blog? Does Chinese people using online social media actively?

The answer is yes.

So, are the online social media in China same with the USA?

The answer is yes or no.

What is the difference between American online social media and Chinese online social media?

Because of the policy, chinese people cannot sign up a Facebook or twitter account. But what life would be like without online social media nowadays? Therefore, China has their own online social media. I am going to introduce two important online social media in China. Some important elements has been translated into English.

1. Facebook VS Renren

Ren means people in Chinese, so renren literally means people people. Renren was created by Tinghua University students in 2005 and it was purchased by a corporation one year after. The original name of Renren was Xiaonei Wang which means a network for school. It used to a social platform for university student. Xiaonei Wang was changed its name to Renren in 2009 in order to expand users from university students to everyone. But most of the Renren users are students in school.
Ignoring the language, Renren and Facebook are very similar with each other in general, no matter the format or the way been used. They all used to post text, pictures or videos and online chat or games were sported as well.

Facebook vs RenRen

One interesting difference that I’ve noticed is the “the past today” section in Renren. I like this section particularly because the scrolling pictures on the section are people upload the same date as today but one or few years ago. It is interesting to see how things were and what I was doing.

2. Twitter VS Weibo

Just as Twitter very popular in America, weibo has been widely using in China now. Weibo mean microblog in Chinese and it is owned by Sina, a main media corporation in China. Techniques such as hashag, at or retweet are also used frequently in Weibo. Not like Twitter, Weibo support online chat.
Compare to the neat style of twitter, Weibo looks more fancier and stylish, in another word, means Weibo may be a little overwhelming. It contains too much colors, words and pictures. Michael Hurwitz, an experience blogger who has been living in China for many years and writes on Chinese culture. In his blog, he talks about some main Chinese website and thinks one way to understand Chinese website design idea is the culture and the way people absorb information.

Weibo VS Twitter

Ton of information flows on Weibo everyday. For students like me who study in another country, Weibo is a good way to catch up with what happening in my country. My friends in China were surprised at how I know so much popular internet vocabulary though I speak English everyday. Just like Twitter, log in Weibo and browser information, post thoughts, discuss hot topics has become an important lifestyle for Chinese people.