Even his village is now a station on the information superhighway. I can write and publish my own work and get all the news that I want. The net is enveloping China at astonishing speed. Nearly 10 million people are surfing, gaming, even trading stocks online. In a country which still bans the imports of almost all foreign books, news and information are crashing in from cyberspace.
People are paid to check for political content For dissenters, the internet is a gift.
Based safely abroad, pro-democracy activists run websites calling for an end to Communist Party rule. Falun Gong, the mystical sect that is banned in China, has even used the internet to help organise demonstrations on the streets of Beijing. The internet has already weakened the Communist Party's ability to control political debate inside China. The party has responded by issuing tough rules which govern what you can and cannot say when you go online here and those rules are designed to stifle dissent in cyberspace. China's internet entrepreneurs, people like Joseph Chen now walk a political tightrope.