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Detained commentator praises crackdown on online rumors
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One of China’s best known online commentators has admitted spreading irresponsible Internet posts after China adopted tough measures to crack down on online rumors.
Detained Chinese-American venture capitalist Charles Xue, known for his controversial comments on social and political issues, told China Central Television that “freedom of speech cannot override the law.”
According to a recent judicial interpretation, people will be charged with defamation if their online rumors are clicked on more than 5,000 times or reposted more than 500 times. That could mean three years in jail.
“My irresponsibility in spreading information online was a vent of negative mood, and was a neglect of the social mainstream,” Xue said.
Under the name Xue Manzi, Xue, who has 12 million followers on Sina Weibo, was detained in August over claims he had visited prostitutes. Police are now investigating reports that Xue’s online activity may have broken the law.
His detention sent ripples through the online community as he was seen as an “online crusader for justice” by many of his followers.
From a Beijing detention center on Friday, Xue spoke about his journey from Internet obscurity to influential online voice.
He said his mass following began around 2011’s Spring Festival when he promoted a campaign to help rescue abducted children. His followers, then just a few thousand, leapt into the hundreds of thousands.
In May that year, when he announced he had been diagnosed with cancer, his followers grew to more than a million.
Later, Sina began to automatically recommend him, along with other celebrities including former Google China president Kai-fu Lee and actress Yao Chen, to new bloggers.
He also began to feature regularly on magazine covers, in television shows and at charity events.
His followers then soared to over 10 million, making Xue one of the first “big Vs with 10 million fans.” “V” is put at the end of bloggers’ names to indicate they have been verified as genuine.
Xue said he was very careful when reposting in the beginning. “I only wrote or reposted things within my professional field. I would not comment on news about which I did not have knowledge of and I would always investigate the sources of news before retweeting,” he said.
But gradually he began to comment on and forward almost anything he read.
“Every morning when I log on my Weibo account, I see thousands of messages from followers. Even a minister would not receive so many invitations from 30 provinces and cities every day,” he said.
He said that replying to or retweeting posts was like being a king looking after state affairs.
Xue said he issued about 85,000 posts, including unverified information later shown to be unsubstantiated rumors.
Xue described China’s moves to crack down on online rumors as “a good beginning.”
He said the Internet was filled with many things exceeding legal and moral bottom lines and in urgent need of being put in order.
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