1. Blogging in China and Online Public Sphere  Chinese Blogosphere  Blogging and Online Public Sphere Ying Jiang-- University of Adelaide

2. What is a blog?  A user-generated website  Entries are made in journal style  Displayed in a reverse chronological order  Combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic

3. Chinese Blogosphere  Blog--the most popular online publishing form in China  33.36 million Chinese bloggers  Cover various issues from daily diaries to politics

4. Key features of Habermas’s theory  Participation is open to all  Any issue can be raised for rational debate  All participants are considered equal

5. Blog and Online Public Sphere  Four distinct and important issues of access : 1. Mass of the population involved 2. The formation of very small numbers of highly visible voices 3. The disproportionally low visibility for under-represented groups 4. The remaining socio-economic and cultural barriers to electronically mediated debate.

6. 1. Participation is open to all  Easy to use– You can email? You can Blog!  Open contents

7. 2. Any issue can be raised for rational debate ?  Impractical to illustrate in blogosphere  The real democratic power of blog

8. 3.All participants are considered equal?? Influential factors in the blogosphere:  The pre-existing personal networks  The real world relationship  Individual Subjectivity

9. Questions to discuss: 1. Is the blogosphere truly an online public sphere? 1. Do you think blog can improve people’s lives through better information sharing? 2. What do you think about blogging’s future in China under the Great firewall?