Is Facebook Moving Into China? [REPORT]

According to the latest crop of rumors, Facebook is about to make a deal that will bring it into the vast Chinese market.

Though such rumors have been circulating since 2007, the information is presently coming from numerous credible industry sources.

But don’t expect to friend anyone in China. Keeping with the country’s closed nature, any new Facebook social network in China wouldn’t be linked with the rest of the site.

According to TechRice, Facebook will be partnering with Baidu, the largest search engine in China, valued at $50 billion. That’s if Hu Yanping, founder of the Beijing-based Data Center of the China Internet (DCCI), tweets the truth. He says Facebook has already signed an official contract with Baidu to create a new social network in China.

Marbridge Consulting has also heard from multiple industry sources, which say Facebook will be working with Baidu on the new China site, bolstered by rumors that Baidu visited Facebook in February.

So we have tweets on top of rumors on top of blog posts. The preponderance of evidence is that Facebook has something going on in China. But given that China wants to prevent the kind of revolutionary fervor reaching a fever pitch in the Middle East and Northern Africa lately, any version of Facebook in China will likely be tightly regulated and censored.

Could this end up being like that pale imitation of Twitter we saw sprouting up in China late last year? And will China’s penchant for censorship mean a Chinese version of Facebook is doomed to die? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Posted in: internet, social networking