Lei Feng lives on in cyberspace

Abstract

Walk into any Internet cafe across the People's Republic of China (PRC) and most likely you will find that they predominantly consist of young people playing online games. Globally, China is the fourth largest online games market, and the third largest in Asia behind South Korea and Japan, while Taiwan is the fourth largest in the region. The United States of America has the biggest online games market in the world [1]. China's state media cited a survey in September 2007 that found the vast majority of school children stayed home during school holidays playing online games and surfing the Internet [2]. The 21st Statistical Survey Report on the Internet stated that there were 210 million Internet users and of this 59.3% play online games, and the average monthly expenditure for online games is 84 Yuan [3, 4]. An industry survey in 2007 revealed that the number of online gamers was 40.1 million [5].The industry in China was estimated to be worth 1.04 billion USD at the end of 2006 and is expected to have huge growth potential in the next three years [6]. Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG) and Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs) are the most common. These games enable thousands of people to play at the same time. The government has sought to manage this online industry and content and use the same strategies used to manage other areas of government media production. This is done via the government's promotion of the technology, direct investment, regulation and the shaping of content through the code used to construct Chinese games. There is also a heavy emphasis on maintaining Chinese nationalism via Chinese game content that transfers to the online Internet gaming sphere. This maintenance is also evident via the sentiments produced by the gamers themselves.This paper explores the ways in which the government has sought to manage this sector of the Internet in their bid to create a virtual Chinese world and the tensions that have arisen in their management of this in relation to global informational flows. In doing so it also addresses the mythic, nationalistic narratives that are created and negotiated within the virtual space of the Chinese online gaming sector.