Google China today apologize for stealing rival Sohu’s data for their Pinyin IME that was released a few days ago. The suspicion started when Sohu’s employees discovered that both of the input method editors share a similar thesaurus and have the same bugs.
After threatening of lawsuit, Google comply with Sohu and apologize publicly: [translated by Keith Chan]
We are willing to face up to the problem, and therefore would like to apol

It’s somewhat of a slow news day, at least when it comes to the search engines - they’re all in NYC for Search Engine Strategies. While we may hear some announcements later in the week, here are three Google items worth a quick look. Techdirt is spot on with their attack on the publishing industry’s claims that Google “stealing” their content. If publishers are so worried about this, go ahead and ban Google’s

Google Labs China today releases the first version of the Google Pinyin IME (though it is already in version 1.0.15.0).
“The intelligent Google Pinyin IME has five major features”, as listed on its home page: Auto sentence creation
Popular vocabularies
Synchronize with Google account
One click search
English hint (when type in the first characters of a word and it will show a list of words) Some other features are auto correction,

This week an intro to optimization for Baidu, the difference between Baidu Japan and the Chinese version as well as the latest on Yahoo search. And not to forget, more foreign blog services are blocked again.
Optimize your site for Baidu
What does Baidu like in a website is an important question for those targeting Chinese internet users as the search engine dominates the Chinese search market. Baidu search results are different from the leading

Baidu.com, China’s leading search engine, reported a fivefold increase in fourth quarter net income as online marketing revenue more than doubled. China’s Internet market is the second largest after the United States, with more than 123 million people …

Last week in China - An Open Letter to Google
The last week has been quiet on the Chinese Internet front. Maybe it has something to do with nearing Chinese New Year is nearing. And speaking of that, what would a new year be without some good resolutions?
Isaac Mao, a blog pioneer in China and co-founder of CN Blog, has summed up the resolutions he’d like Google to have for the year of the pig

Last week was about the latest China internet Statistics. The China Internet Network Society (CNNIC) published its half yearly report (In Chinese. The number of Chinese Internet users is increasing. There are now 137 million Internet users in China, 23.4 percent more than last year.
The report also shows that the majority, 72.1 percent of the internet users, is under 31

Google co-founder, Sergey Brin, has admitted the company’s decision to censor its search results to appease the Chinese government, damaged the public perception of the company.
Asked whether he regretted the decision, Mr Brin admitted yesterday: “On a business level, that decision to censor… was a net negative.”…Mr Brin said the company had suffered because of the damage to its reputation in the US and Europe.

Despite the negative response, Google doesn’t appear ready to back-track on its decision.
Co-founder Larry Page said: “We always consider what to do

The number of internet users is up to 137 million according to the latest report from the China Internet Networking Information Center.
A report released by the Internet Society China put the total number at 136 million. A difference of a million would be big if it was about The Netherlands. In China, with its huge population, it is less relevant.
It’s a growth of 23.4 percent compared to January last year

MSN has partnered with Chinese-based travel agency, ctrip.com. The two will market to the young and affluent Chinese market, according to a report at Adotas.com.

The Register reports Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Vodafone are among a group of tech companies looking to create a code of conduct to protect freedom of expression online.
The companies announced their “intention to seek solutions to the free expression and privacy challenges faced by technology and communications companies doing business internationally”, according to a joint statement

McAfee developed a strong base in China by partnering with China Unicom and Baidu. McAfee offers virus protection, internet security software, personal computer updates, hacker protection and anti-virus downloads. China Unicom (China United Telecommunications Corporation) which is the second …

According to the Internet Guide 2007, a recently released report from the Internet Society of China, Internet users in China spent RMB 276.76 billion ($35.5 billion) on Internet services in 2006. This represents an increase of nearly 50 percent …

Due to an earthquake in Taiwan I have experienced again what it was like before the Internet existed. It’s liberating on the one hand, as there’s no need to check my mail every so many hours or keep track of what is written in the blogosphere.
It was also slightly frustrating as I had some domain names that were about to expire and some other business that needed attention

Google and China Mobile announced a joint venture in setting up an online search technology for China Mobile, a carrier with roughly 300 million subscribers. The new services are expected to be launched early this year. The partnership …

According to Analysys International, an Internet based provider of business information, the China search engine market will see a compound annual growth of more than 30% from 2006 to 2010 based on its recently released report “China Search Engine Market …

The big news last week was about eBay China deciding to give up on their own business by selling the majority to Tom Online.
Many articles have been published about this in the last couple of days, all mentioning the need to localize/partner when you want to do business in China.
More about that later

Yahoo! China sued Qihoo back in late September of this year for unfair competition. The lawsuit claimed that Qihoo software, known as “360safe”, prompts users to de-install the Yahoo! Toolbar. The prompt made users believe that the toolbar …

US based online auction company EBay Inc. is exiting the China market. eBay said its China-based subsidiary, eBay EachNet, and TOM Online will enter into a joint venture. where eBay will take 49 percent stake and Tom Online …

It has been hanging in the air for sometime now. Back in September 2006 the rumor circus already pointed at Tom online as the likely candidate and it’s now decided.
From Reuters
EBaysaid it will fold its China business, acquired when it purchased local auction site EachNet for $180 million (91 million pounds), into a venture with Tom Online, a Beijing-based Internet portal and wireless services firm.
Under the deal, eBay will invest $40 million and have a 49 percent stake in the venture, while Tom Online will invest $20 million and have a 51 percent stake

Last week in China, a Lot of Baidu and a bit of Microsoft and Google
There hardly goes a week by that Baidu is not in the news. They are actively getting into new partnerships, boasting about their Market Share and releasing new services. Google has yet to find a way to counter this

Chinese search site Baidu.com has signed a deal with Microsoft to sell advertising for MSN in China. Baidu’s paid search ads will appear on the Chinese versions of MSN, Live Search and other Micrsoft web properties. …

Last Week in China - Myspace in China, Yahoo Faltering and Baidu Jumps the Sea of Japan
Some of the more noteworthy tidbits that happened in China last week, ok, in the last 2 weeks, as I was busy getting some sun and beach in Hainan for a couple of days.
Is MySpace really coming to China
Rupert Murdoch has his eyes set to bring the Social Networking website, MySpace to China

People’s Daily Online has reported that Baidu is launching a blog search engine.
Just under 20 million people use blogs in the Chinese language.

Google Inc. announced Vice President Johnny Chou ( Zhou Shaoning) will resign at the end of the year in order to pursue personal interests. Mr. Chou, Google’s Greater China co-president in charge of sales and business development, first joined …

Wall Street Journal is reporting that Baidu plans to enter the Japanese market by 2007.

“We carefully studied the Japanese market,” said Mr. Li, who is also Baidu’s chairman. “It’s primarily dominated by two players we are very familiar with. We …

New Way of of Circumventing the Internet Censor
December 1, an early Christmas gift will be released for those living in countries where governments have a nag to control what users can and can not see on the Internet.
At the university of Toronto a team of political scientists, software engineers and computer-hacking activists have created Psiphon, a new and possibly advanced tool in allowing Internet users to circumvent government censorship

Last Week in China - Baidu, Blogger and a China Summer Ends
Some of the more noteworthy news tidbits that happened in China last week.
Baidu wins lawsuit over MP3’s
A bit more than a week ago Chinese search engine Baidu won a MP3 copyright infringement case lawsuit, brought to court by 7 of the world’s largest music companies, among them Warner and Sony.
Baidu ‘helps’ its users to find mp3 files by a specialized mp3 search engine

I earlier posted that China blocked and unblocked Wikipedia and that it was now available in most of China. That information was wrong and none other than the founder of Wikipedia, Jimbo Wales, set me straight. I won’t …

Chen Hui, founder of China’s leading pornographic website, “Pornographic Summer” was sentenced to life and fined 100,000 yuan (about $12,500). Mr. Chen is only 28 years old. Eight other people involved with the site were sentenced to …

Wikipedia, a Web-based free content encyclopedia, has recently been blocked again in China according to the Information World Review. Despite the fact that Wikipedia is now accessible throughout most of China, there are reports that is still …

Baidu.com (BIDU), the leading Chinese language search engine, hit a new 52-week high of $108.28. Baidu’s was established in 2000 by co- founders, Robin Li and Eric Xu and the initial public offering was August 5, …

Baidu Inc. (Nasdaq: BIDU), the leading Chinese-language search engine and eBay EachNet, the Chinese arm of the online auction company Ebay, announced a multi-year agreement to cooperate in advertising, on-line payment and a co-branded toolbar.

According to the agreement, Baidu will …

At the first Internet Governance Forum in Athens, Google is expected to defend it’s presence in China saying that it does more good than harm since it gets more information to more people. Delegates from China, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, …

Sun Zhongpeng, a member of the China Anti-Hooligan Software Alliance, is suing Zhongsou.com which claims to be the world’s largest Chinese language search engine. The law suit was heard in the People’s Court in Beijing’s Haidian District on October …

Foxnews reports that an organisation known as “DotAsia Organization Ltd” has had its application to run domain names in asian languages under the top level domain ‘.asia’ approved by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers.

The domains will cover …

Baidu, China’s biggest search engine, and MTV, a division of media giant Viacom, launch a new music video and television program service in China’s fast growing media market. The new service allows Internet users to view MTV …

Google’s recent purchase of YouTube has caused quite a stir in the industry as Google moves from a search and adverstising company to a media company and that means Google’s YouTube won’t fly in China according to David Wolf at …

The popularity of blogs in China is evident by the growth of 30 times the number in the last four years. 17.5 million people fancy themselves blog writers while 55 million are regular readers. This comes from the …

Alibaba.com’s Yahoo China filed a lawsuit against Qihoo.com for unfair-competition. The lawsuit was filed in Beijing’s No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court. Beijing Sanjiwuxian Internet Technology, which operates the Qihoo.com Web portal, distributes software , “360safe”, that urges users to …

Baidu, China’s leading search engine, is defending itself in court from charges of click fraud by online advertisters in China. Analysys International, an IT research firm, conducted a survey of 2,000 online advertisers in China and found that …

China Telecom Corp. Ltd., the largest Internet service provider in China, has partnered with the Microsoft to use Microsoft’s Windows Live Technology to power China Telecom’s 114 Web search network. According to media reports Microsoft will make its …

It seems Rupert Murdoch - owner of Fox Media and MySpace - plans on launching a Chinese version of MySpace. If it is half as popular there then I think we will se MySpace as the number one visitied site …

Baidu, China’s leading search engine with more than 50% of the China search engine market share, has had informal talks with China’s stock regulator as they are considering a domestic listing. Baidu, a big hit in their Nasdaq debut last …

China’s online advertising market reached RMB 3.23 billion in 2005, ($40 millionUSD) and is expected to reach RMB 4.39 billion ($55 million USD) in 2006 according to Analysys International. Search engine advertising is fueling this growth. Baidu, Sina, Sohu, …

According to a recent survey by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) the number of Internet users in China has increased nearly 20 percent over the past year to 123 million. China currently ranks second to the U.S. in …

Baidu, China’s largest search engine and Hewlitt Packard have announced that all HP Pavilion and HP Presario series computers that are sold in China will come with Baidu already loaded. HP users will be able to use Baidu’s search engine …

According to the Chinese IT market research firm Analysys International, Baidu still holds the lead among China’s search engines. In the first quarter of 2006 Baidu had 43.9 % of the search engine market share with Yahoo! China in …

Joyo, the Chinese Amazon.com, has signed a deal with Baidu for placement of ads on the Baidu site.

Joyo, which expanded into numerous ecommerce areas, is a prominent Chinese b2b player.

Chinese auction website eBay Eachnet has launched a mobile based auction platform with Tom Online. Under the agreement Tom Online provides wireless technology for eBay Eachnet. This new platform will allow users to do their shopping through any WAP-enabled mobile …