China to have 60 million bloggers by end of 2006 (Reuters)

BEIJING (Reuters) - Blogging is booming in China with thenumber of bloggers expected to hit 60 million by the end ofthis year.

China is the world's second-largest Internet market afterthe United States with more than 110 million users. A survey byChinese search engine Baidu.com put the current number of blog,or Web log, sites at 36.82 million which are kept by 16 millionpeople, the official Xinhua news agency said on Saturday.

The number of Chinese bloggers is expected to hit 60million by the end of this year, Xinhua said, quoting a reporton China's media industry by the prestigious TsinghuaUniversity.

Zhang Xiaorong, strategy development director of "Bokee,"which was set up in 2002 and claims the biggest share ofChina's blogging market, said his company adds about 100,000blogs a day.

"The expected 60 million bloggers would account for morethan half of China's 110 million netizens," Xinhua quoted Zhangas saying.

The university report forecast the number of bloggers inChina would hit 100 million by 2007. Xinhua did not elaborate.

Although the industry has invested heavily in blogs, noneof the blog service providers are making profits, the reportsaid.

A recent report by the Internet Society of China showednine percent of bloggers write every day, 29 percent write onceto three times a week, while 35 percent write four to six timesa week, Xinhua said.

The growing stable of e-scribes has attracted homegrownfirms and foreign giants like Microsoft, Google and Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq: - )

But the Communist Party's propaganda mandarins are obsessedwith control and have closed down some outspoken blogs. Chatforums and online bulletin boards are routinely monitored forcontroversial political comments and sensitive words such as"freedom" and "democracy" are censored.

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