New York Times starts Chinese News edition

Now The New York Times is venturing into new territory with the launch of the Chinese version of its website. It’ll be online at cn.nytimes.com, which is currently blank and inaccessible behind a login. To mark the event, the New York Times has just joined Sina Weibo, China’s hottest Twitter-esque site, with the official account pictured above.

So far, the NYT’s Weibo has posted three things, all in Chinese, and one of which is the official announcement of what’s coming:

“The New York Times Chinese Edition begins operation today, and tomorrow will begin releasing news. We welcome our new friends and followers and look forward to engaging with you”.

So far it has just over 11,000 fans after only a few hours in action. It’s not clear what cn.nytimes.com will hold.

Other major news portals have Chinese editions, such as the long-running BBC Chinese, whose website is blocked in the country. But both cn.WSJ.com and the Financial Times in Chinese remain accessible – and it seems to be a digital market that the NYT wants a part of.

via techinasia.com