Tencent: The Secretive, Chinese Tech Giant That Can Rival Facebook and Amazon | Fast Company | Business + Innovation

Internet users who make defamatory comments that are visited by 5,000 users or reposted more than 500 times can face up to three years in prison. The new rules have been devastating to Twitter-like microblogging sites (for which Sina had been the dominant player); users dropped by 9% last year. But this appears to have helped boost Tencent's Weixin, which is based on private conversations among closed circles of friends, and is thus seen as a safer space. But is it? Probably not. "Whatever Tencent can see, the Chinese government can see," says Rebecca MacKinnon, a Chinese Internet expert and senior research fellow at the New America Foundation. And companies like Tencent do fall in line; they have no real choice. In late 2011, the government convened a meeting of China's top 39 tech companies, which all signed a joint statement saying "Internet companies must strengthen their self-management, self-restraint, and strict self-discipline." Ma is a savvy businessman who knows he must play the political game as much as his government demands. When a reporter asked him about censorship at a tech conference in Singapore, he gave a reply that would have pleased China's most conservative of censors: "Lots of people think they can speak out and that they can be irresponsible. I think that's wrong," Ma said. "There should be order if the development of the cyberworld is to be sustainable." Last year, Ma was appointed a deputy to the National People's Congress, China's obedient parliament.