In August the number of blogs in China hit 34 million which is 30 times more than only four years ago when the on-line writing craze started to sweep the country.

 

More than 17 million people in China consider themselves blog writers and offer personal insights and opinions on any topic they wish, according to a report on China's blog market which says 75 million people regularly read blogs.

 

The report also points out that nearly 70 percent of the blogs, about 23 million of them, are classified as dormant as they've remained unchanged for more than a month. "It (the dormancy) has caused great waste to blog space," the report says.

 

The rapid growth of blog sites in China also brought potential business opportunities to the advertising industry. Some blogs written by famous people attract millions of daily readers.

 

Nearly 40 percent of the writers said they'd accept advertisements on their blogs and over half of blog readers interviewed said they’d continue to read them with advertisements, according to the report. Market observers suggest experts conduct further surveys to probe the commercial value of blog advertising.

 

(Xinhua News Agency September 26, 2006)