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Second Life Gets First Wind In China
英国天空新闻网报道HiPiHi
2007年11月27日 Peter Sharp SKY NEWS
At 31, Xu Hui was nominated as one of 10 "Internet Heroes of China" for his pioneering work on the world wide web.
| China Enters Second Life Chinese businessman Mr Xu Hui launched virtual world HiPiHi two years ago. As he prepares to launch his product commercially, he tells Sky's China correspondent Peter Sharp about how he hopes to make a profit from his new frontier in cyberspace. |
China has new internet frontiers to breach and this young, unassuming, entrepreneur is leading his nation into battle in cyberspace.
He is confronting the denizens of the virtual world like Second Life and laying the three dimensional groundwork that will be home to China's "other world".
Two years ago, Mr Xu set up HiPiHi (pronounced High-Pee-High). It's now conducting beta tests and will roll out a commercial product early next year
HiPiHi has been described as "Second Life with Censorship." It's a criticism that Mr Xu refutes.
He says: "The majority of content created in HiPiHi will not be affected by censorship. There might be no gambling and no sex but people can come into the world to socialise, explore and have fun."
But a Chinese virtual world will be filled with the same potential social and political minefields that exist in the real one.
"Right now controls on our content are about the same as for other websites on the internet," adds Mr Xu.
"But the fact is our major market is in China so we have to follow Chinese regulations."
Today, HiPiHi has a miniscule 30-40,000 users. But in a nation of 75 million internet users the awesome scope for growth has not escaped the attentions of the big players.
Mr Xu says both Intel and IBM are cooperating with his company to establish a strategic partnership.
Much like "Second Life", HiPIHi will earn income from virtual property sales and advertising.
But Mr Xu envisages a bold new virtual world standard that will allow users to move from world to world.
