When the social network map was presented, there are two big pieces, which aren’t colored blue: Russia and China. Both countries have proved to be tough markets for western companies such as Google and Twitter but Facebook is determined to solve the riddle.
Facebook officially launched its Russian site in April this year and is currently ranked fifth in Russia. Despite its slow start, growth has been impressive. From January to August this year, Facebook Russia has recorded a 376 percent increase in users, to 4.5 million, according to comScore data.
The top social-network site in Russia is currently VKontakte with 28 million users, backed by Mail.Ru Group, a Russian investment fund, which also has a small stake in Facebook.
Speaking at an Oct. 17 event at Stanford University, Zuckerberg said that if Facebook succeeded in penetrating the Russian market, it might have a shot at doing the same in China. Russians’ heavy use of social network sites makes the country an ideal test case, the Businessweek reported.
So, here’s Facebook’s plan toward global dominance, Russian and then China. That explains why the Facebook chief has been touring around China this month. Prior to his visit, Mark Zuckerberg has also spent time learning the Chinese language and culture. Zuckerberg understands the need to respect each country’s values. For example, sharing Nazism content is illegal in Germany, so Facebook blocks it in Germany but not in other countries. A similar policy was implemented in Pakistan, where it’s illegal to post drawings of Muhammad. We can expect Facebook to employ the same approach towards China.
But I wonder if that is enough to convince the Chinese official to lift the Facebook ban. The ban is implemented partly because the country wants to promote its own local start-ups. Renren and Sina Weibo (China’s microblogging platform) have both enjoyed impressive growth rate without foreign competitors. China is lucrative (see statistics) but a tough one to crack. What should Facebook do?
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