It may be banned there, but Twitter estimates around 10 million active users in China

By Lulu Chang July 5, 2016

twitter users china teatime — Troy Holden/Twitter

Its government may be cracking down on social media across the country, but China still appears to have a lot of Twitter action going on within its borders. According to sources within Twitter, who spoke to TechCrunch about the latest numbers in the Asian nation, there are around 10 million active tweeters in China. And considering the platform has been blocked since 2009, that’s pretty impressive.

Bear in mind, of course, that this figure is largely conjecture, as Twitter itself isn’t 100-percent certain of just how large its user base is in the censor-prone country. The social media giant can only make estimates based on the number of users who connect to Twitter via VPN, which lets them bypass firewalls the country has in place that attempt to ban such sites. That said, not everyone who is using a VPN is using Twitter, so it’s tough to really determine what’s really going on inside the carefully guarded version of China’s web.

In any case, 10 million is small when compared to the company’s global numbers. 65 million people in the U.S. are active tweeters, and 245 million others use the service worldwide.

All the same, these numbers could be a boon not only for Twitter, but for a freer internet in China. “If there are 10 million Chinese on Twitter that is great news. Twitter is one of the last great bastions of relatively free speech. When was the last time 10 million Chinese could freely say what they feel, on any platform, without fear of reprisal?”

Charlie Smith, one of the pseudonymous founders of anti-censorship group Great Fire, told TechCrunch in an email. Smith added that he thinks “there are growing pockets of ordinary people who want to circumvent censorship so they can access whatever information they choose,” noting, “It’s fantastic that Twitter can provide us with an indication of how big this group might be.”

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Fascinated by the effects of technology on human interaction, Lulu believes that if her parents can use your new app…

Social Media

Less than 10 percent of Twitter users questioned fake news, study suggests

#womenboycotttwitter

Think your gut is good at warning you of potential fake news? Think again -- a new study from the University at Buffalo found that less than ten percent of Twitter users expressed doubt when responding to a false tweet. The study, published on May 11 in the journal Natural Hazards, examined Twitter’s response to four different rumors during two disasters -- the Boston Marathon Bombing and Hurricane Sandy -- by examining 20,000 related tweets.

Only between one to nine percent of the Twitter users that responded to the false rumors expressed doubt at the accuracy of the information. The most common response within that small percentage was to say that the original tweet wasn’t accurate. The number of users that retweeted or wrote comments to try to confirm the information was almost just as small, making up between five to nine percent of those tweets.

Computing

Windows 10’s Mail app may display an Office 365 ad for some users

A person using a laptop that displays various Microsoft Office apps.

Windows 10 devices owners are now jumping on Reddit to complain about an advertisement showing up in the platform's built-in Mail app. As shown above, it appears as a banner hovering above the Mail, Calendar, and People buttons on the menu stating "Get Office 365." The only way to remove the banner is to close the menu altogether.
We loaded up the Mail app, listed as version 17.9126.21425.0, and didn't see the Office 365 banner. Many other Reddit members jumping into the complaint thread aren't experiencing the advertisement either. But in our case, we do have an Office 365 subscription, yet many Reddit users aren't Office subscribers and still don't see the advertisement in the latest version of Mail.
That said, Microsoft could be testing the feature with random customers. The move wouldn't be surprising given that the company advertises its baked-in Microsoft Edge browser on the taskbar and notifications panel if you're using Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, or some other browser.
Advertisements on Outlook.com are understandable: It's a free online service, and Microsoft prefers you take advantage of its money-making software suite. But customers are purchasing Windows 10 along with their device, and although all first-party apps are provided free of charge, advertising on paid software degrades the experience and service. We have enough advertisements scattered all over the web.
"Windows isn't free. Either you're paying for it, or the OEM/systems integrator is paying for it," one Reddit user argues. "Why is there a need to serve ads in a product which isn't free? The money has already been made -- ads are just milking it for more."
Google's platform is different. On the internet, it's backed by an advertisement system, investments, paid services, and so on. Android and Chrome OS are free, open-source operating systems fueled by advertisements, device sales, app sales, and data collection. Advertisements on free, open-source platforms are expected, like Gmail, not on a paid copy of Windows 10.
Microsoft's push to sell Windows as a service seems to be intensifying. Just last month, the company revealed that it is testing a new Mail app feature in a preview build of Windows 10 that automatically opens links in Microsoft Edge. Forget whatever you have set in Windows 10 as your default browser: All links in Mail will be pushed to Microsoft Edge. The company says it's merely "testing" this feature.
Microsoft's in-app advertisement is an interesting turn given the company launched a campaign in 2013 targeting advertisements in Google's Gmail service. The search engine giant was accused of using an algorithm to scan Gmail messages and generate custom advertisements based on discovered keywords. Microsoft jumped on the Gmail-bashing bandwagon.
"Outlook.com believes your privacy is not for sale," Microsoft's Stefan Weitz said at the time. "We believe people should have choice and control over their private email messages, whether they are sharing banking information or pictures of their family or discussing their medical history."
That choice and control should also include locking out Microsoft's advertisements, even Microsoft Store app suggestions, on its paid operating systems.

Social Media

Twitter now estimates that 1.4M users interacted with fake Russian posts

#womenboycotttwitter

Twitter’s estimate of the number users that interacted with posts from the Internet Research Agency has now more than doubled. Users that interacted with the Internet Research Agency, or IRA, the group behind a majority of the propaganda and fake news spread by Russian accounts during the 2016 election, now number at least 1.4 million, Twitter shared on January 31.

Twitter originally said it would be emailing 677,775 people that followed one of the related accounts or interacted with one of the posts via a like or tweet. Two days later, the social media platform has now sent out notifications to around 1.4 million users who are based in the U.S. Those numbers only include users that interacted with the posts with a like or retweet, as well as users who actively followed an account. Users that only viewed a tweet from an IRA-connected account will not be notified. Users that have the email updates turned off also won’t see a notification.