Origins, Growth, and Geographies of the Global Internet - Global Geographies of the Internet - page 31

internet access (Lambroschini 2011 ). Clark and Gomez ( 2011 , p.8), however,
argue that rather than fees, it is the technical skills of staff that make cybercafés
accessible to unskilled users. Throughout Central Asia, internet cafes tend to be
clustered in commercial districts frequented by tourists, particularly business
districts, hotels, and airports. Cybercafes are also major points of government
control over the internet: those in which customers attempt to access banned
websites are routinely closed, and customers who access pornography typically
face steep fines. However, as internet penetration rates climb, including more
access at home, the importance of cybercafés is likely to diminish.
2.4.5 East Asia
Chinese internet use, of course, stands in a class by itself. China's first interna-
tional internet connection began in 1987, when the country was linked to Germany
(Jing 2007 ). Today its largest ISPs are China Netcom and China Telecom. Large
numbers of Chinese rely on internet cafes, where they are subject to strict cen-
sorship ( Chap. 3 ) . Domestically-produced portals tend to be highly popular,
including Sina.com and 163.com, as well as home-grown search engines such as
Baidu. Indeed, only 6 % of Chinese computers have internet linkages outside of
the country (Crampton 2007 ). From modest beginnings, and in the context of
sustained, explosive economic growth, Chinese internet use has grown rapidly
(i.e., 20-fold between 2000 and 2011). With more than 513 million users in 2011,
China forms the largest single national pool of netizens in the world, with a
penetration rate of 38.4 %. Indeed, Chinese has become the second-most heavily
used language in cyberspace today (Table 2.2 ). The Chinese blogosphere, with 20
million blogs and counting, has become an increasingly important force in politics,
giving voice to critics of government corruption and dissident groups such as
Falun Gong.
Enormous social and spatial inequalities typify the Chinese internet (Song
2008 ; Guo and Chen 2011 ). As in many developing countries, Chinese internet
users are disproportionately male (55 %) and unmarried (58 %), and include
numerous students and those with above-average incomes. Two-thirds of China's
netizens earn 6,000 yuan or more per year, well above the national average.
Because internet access is relatively expensive in China, many low wage workers
find the internet simply unaffordable, even at internet cafes. In 2005, China had
more than 110,000 internet cafes, which employed 1 million people: of their users,
70 % were between ages 18 and 30, 90 % were male, half held a university degree,
and the most common usage was to play computer games. Users tend to be heavily
concentrated in urban areas, particularly along the prosperous eastern third of the
country. Thus, whereas 50 % of Beijing's residents log in, as do 50 % of
Guangdong, only 3.8 % of the population of rural Guizhou does so. One-fifth of
China's netizens live in either Beijing or Shanghai. Whereas 700 million Chinese
live in rural areas, they form only 27 % of the country's netizens. As elsewhere,