4hw.org: Facebook is a global general-purpose social software. People who have accounts here can send messages to each other. However, Facebook tends to avoid China. Is that because China has QQ and wechat? Let's look at the underlying reasons!
Since it has basically covered more than 80% of the world's countries, Facebook's user growth inevitably began to slow down. In the world map lit by Facebook users, the biggest black hole is in the east of Asia, that is to say, more than 600 million potential users (the latest data from CNNIC) have not yet connected to Facebook, which is also necessary for Facebook to maintain the upward curve of stock price The emerging markets that need to be conquered are no less significant than Moses and the promised land he is trying to find.
The so-called "Facebook account opened on Sina Weibo" has revealed more and more flaws. Although the account is not authenticated, the forwarding recommendation of many Sina executives has made many users believe in it. However, pingwest, a technology blog, claims that it has made contact with Facebook's team in charge of China's related affairs, and the latter explicitly states that the micro blog under the Facebook banner The blog account has nothing to do with Facebook.
At the same time, some netizens found a photo released by the microblog account through the function of "map recognition" -- in the photo, mark middleberg, the founder of Facebook, held a white paper with the words "Happy Mid Autumn Festival, Happy Mid Autumn Festival" and smiled at the camera -- in fact, after later modification, the original picture had no Chinese information.
At this point, like the elusive Luo Shengmen, there are many conspiracy theorists who have given a cold arrow to Sina Weibo: Sina Weibo is forcing real Facebook to open official Weibo to refute rumors with its good rumors, which is a big game.
Since it has basically covered more than 80% of the world's countries, Facebook's user growth inevitably began to slow down. In the world map lit by Facebook users, the biggest black hole is in the east of Asia, that is to say, more than 600 million potential users (the latest data from CNNIC) have not yet connected to Facebook, which is also necessary for Facebook to maintain the upward curve of stock price The emerging markets that need to be conquered are no less significant than Moses and the promised land he is trying to find.
However, Facebook's entry into China has been very slow, including its own hesitation and hesitation, as well as insurmountable real-world mountains.
I. Facebook's entry into China started at the end of 2010
On Christmas Eve of 2010, Mark Zuckerberg, who just won the title of time's person of the year, visited China before he married his Chinese girlfriend Priscilla Chen. Although Mark Zuckerberg told the media that this was a holiday trip, netizens also made fun of Facebook's leader, who came to visit his father-in-law later, fac The compact schedule arranged by the ebook public relations department revealed the real purpose of the long journey: Robin Li, Wang Jianzhou (then chairman of China Mobile), Cao Guowei and Ma Yun, who separately talked with Mark · and Zuckerberg, and kept silent after the media inquiries.
At that time, in addition to Wang Jianzhou's purpose of finding out about China Mobile Internet, the other three tycoons and the companies behind them were all Facebook's intention objects of seeking joint venture.
Why baidu, Alibaba and Sina
Google's exit from China has greatly touched Mark Zuckerberg, especially his close personal relationship with Sergey Brin. Zuckerberg later bought a house that brin had abandoned as a marriage house. Sergey Brin was born in the Jewish family of the Soviet Union. He was persecuted by political censorship when he was a child, and finally his family moved to the United States. Brin was rescued Finally, a leading figure against Internet censorship, he admonished Zuckerberg to be 'alert to the Chinese market'.
In 2010, Mark Zuckerberg invited Kai Fu Li, Google's former president of Greater China, to give a speech in Silicon Valley headquarters, and received Kai Fu Li's suggestions for Facebook's entry into China.
At that time, Li Kaifu was regarded as a professional manager with Western wisdom and Chinese characteristics. Even after Google lost in the game with the Chinese government, Google headquarters did not think that it was the fault and responsibility of Li Kaifu and his team. At the meeting with mark Middleton Zuckerberg, Li Kaifu put forward many skills on how to 'soft land' in the Chinese market. For example, we must take the form of joint venture to enter China, not based on the overseas perspective and thinking to slowly learn China's Internet policy, and the user demand is higher than the law -- yes, Li Kaifu believes that American technology companies attach too much importance to the domestic law The value of law is not willing to succumb to the particularity of China to find the actual needs of users -- basically, mark Middleton Zuckerberg has a high degree of compromise, and he is willing to bear the grievances in order to obtain a large number of users in China.
Finally, Mark & middot; Zuckerberg needs to find a Chinese Internet company with the same volume as Facebook as a joint venture partner, and only 'bat' is qualified, but Tencent's social business is too close to Facebook and lacks complementary space, so it is excluded. But Sina was able to make up for it, just because Sina Weibo was in a strong fashion at that time, and Li Kaifu was also one of the core advocates of sina Weibo, so Zuckerberg also went to Sina for a while, and finally found that sina Weibo was just a twitter like product, which was quite disappointing. (in the United States, Facebook doesn't watch twitter very much.).
3. 2011 is the actual year of Facebook's entry into China, but it fails in the end
In his suggestion to mark Middleton Zuckerberg, Lee mentioned that Facebook's effective window into China is only one year, and if it is missed, it will be hopeless. It turns out that Li Kaifu's industry intuition is very sharp. Just a year later, Tencent's wechat began to rise and sweep everything.
Due to the confidentiality agreement, no one has been able to confirm which company worked with Facebook in 2011 and tried to help it land in China, but Baidu is the most likely one. In 2010, baidu launched the social product Baidu Shuba, and made it clear that "it's not Weibo, it's not twitter", and implemented a strict real name system to expand users. It's also Baidu's newly established social network business unit that runs this product. Various signs show that Baidu wants to use Baidu Shuba as a social platform to shake Tencent's market position horizontally.
At the same time, Baidu said that as the shortest product in Baidu's history, which was launched in September 2010, closed in August 2011 and operated for less than a year, this cycle overlaps with the whole process of Facebook's attempt to enter China and finally repent.
That is to say, Baidu said that this product is likely to be Baidu's dowry for Facebook, which is also Baidu's sincerity.
IV. reasons for Facebook's' breaking promise '
Just keep the technology, let the shipping right, sales right and half of the brand (like FAW & middot; Audi), Mark & middot; Zuckerberg has almost agreed to such harsh conditions, but in one of his most important principles, both sides have no intention of compromise, and this different direction of insistence leads to Facebook's "gone and back" journey to China.
Mark & middot; Zuckerberg's vision for Facebook is to 'connect everyone in the world and the whole world', so it does not accept the landing mode of 'building another new station' in China (the domain name uses facebook.cn registered in 2005). However, China's regulatory policy cannot allow such a global content community to allow the free flow of information that may 'harm' Chinese users.
In the most intense stage of the quarrel, Facebook even received a most ingenious plan: on the surface, let Facebook appear to be seamlessly connected to China, but in the operation, establish a database separately for Chinese users, and store it on the local servers in China, subject to the review and legal supervision of China. In addition, the Chinese side formulates the access rights of Chinese users, and forbids them Chinese users accept sharing, private letters and information from overseas that offends certain keywords.
In the end, faceook rejected the plan. After nearly half a year of intensive planning, Mark Zuckerberg decided to focus on Japan, South Korea and South Asia to develop markets and give up the 'tough' China.
V. whether to enter China or not, Zuckerberg said it doesn't count
Ten years ago, Mark Zuckerberg, who just founded Facebook, was young and frivolous. He pretended to agree to Sequoia Capital's investment intention. Then he was late for the appointment and showed his PPT in Sequoia Capital's office in his pajamas. The theme of PPT was' ten reasons why you shouldn't invest in Facebook '.
Zuckerberg later confessed that he was' very sorry 'for the behavior at that time. Of course, Sequoia Capital did not invest in Facebook. Instead, they invested in WhatsApp, occupying nearly 40% of the equity. Finally, Facebook had to spend 19 billion dollars to buy WhatsApp, becoming the biggest winner. Sequoia Capital called the acquisition a 'spectacular milestone', apparently in response to mark Middleton Zuckerberg's speech at the bell of Facebook's IPO - "Facebook's IPO is just a milestone" - and the more later Zuckerberg respected Wall Street.
So even if Zuckerberg doesn't like China's unique rules, investors behind Facebook can't ignore the rich Chinese market. In 2013, Facebook's coo Shirley & middot; Sandberg arrived in China with a team and had a public meeting with Cai Mingzhao, director of the new China office. Sandberg offered to let Facebook help Chinese enterprises develop overseas markets and return business. There is no doubt that the Chinese government does not exclude this level of cooperation.
One reliable guess is that Facebook wants to use enterprise level cooperation to make business connections with China, so as to reduce the potential antagonism of its product form. In the American play "house of cards", there is a concept created called "drop in diplomacy", which is probably also the implementation strategy that Facebook investors hope to promote Facebook's entry into China.
And Mark Zuckerberg's ideal of 'connecting all users' is on the list of things that can be sacrificed.
Vi. the reality of overseas Internet companies entering China
If China can get rid of the world's largest Internet company, that means it won't tolerate all forms of bargaining, no matter where the request comes from.
Especially in today's China, the position of national security -- or Information Sovereignty -- is still high. If an Internet product refuses to be managed by China's current laws or evades any request from China's law enforcement authorities, then China will not open its market to it, and unlike many western enterprises, this is not a negotiation, but a one size fits all approach Overseas companies have the right to sign or not to sign contracts.
For example, line and instagram are not willing to be censored, so since July this year, they have lost a stable access network environment in China, while Evernote and LinkedIn have bowed their heads, and they use two sets of principles: users registered in China and their generated content can be censored and deleted, 'comply with relevant laws and regulations in China', while overseas users can be censored and deleted