Ulla, this might be relevant to your query about non-US perspectives also. Randolph Kluver School of Communication and Information Nanyang Technological University 31 Nanyang Link Singapore, 637718 (65) 6790-5770 Fax (65) 6792-4329 -----Original Message----- From: lokkie@lokman.nu [mailto:lokkie@lokman.nu] Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 7:21 PM To: chineseinternetresearch@yahoogroups.com Subject: [chineseinternetresearch] use of the internet in the chinese rave scene http://www.digitalcutuplounge.com/newsite/jvs_papers/netfxinchina.htm John von Seggern and STAFFER3. "Network Effects: Use of the Internet in the Chinese Rave Scene." 26 Feb 2002. <http://www.digitalcutuplounge.com/netfxinchina.htm>. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -------- NETWORK EFFECTS: USE OF THE INTERNET IN THE CHINESE RAVE SCENE I have spent the past two years as a graduate student at the University of Hong Kong, where my work has focused on the emerging Internet music scene. The international music world has been going through a period of extraordinary change and restructuring during this time because of the accelerating use of the Internet at every stage in the processes of musical production, distribution and reception. In this paper, I will focus on the developing electronic dance music scene in China, a particular area of interest for me, and examine some of the ways it has been affected by the advent of the Net; I also want to look at what some of the larger social implications of these phenomena might be. The significance of Net access for musicians in a country where the flow of information is heavily restricted and censored can hardly be underestimated, as I hope to show. My material here is based in part on my own experiences as a DJ and musician working in China during the period 1995-2001. I have prepared this paper in consultation with STAFFER3, a pseudonymous American techno producer who lives and works in Beijing, and his involvement has been crucial to the development of the ideas I am presenting here. BACKGROUND Since the first raves were held in Beijing in 1995, a sizable electronic dance music scene has grown up in the People.s Republic of China. Going clubbing has become a popular activity among a significant segment of the country.s growing urban middle class, and an indigenous ecology of Chinese DJs, MCs, producers and promoters has emerged. This is a phenomenon limited not only to the country.s largest cities; dance clubs playing various techno-derived musics can be found in many smaller cities as well, at least in China.s wealthier regions. I relocated to Hong Kong in 1995 to work in the city.s popular music industry and I have witnessed the rapid growth of this new Chinese club culture firsthand on my frequent trips into mainland China. I first became interested in dance music culture in 1997 as I became aware of the rapidly growing club scene in Hong Kong at that time, and events on the other side of the Chinese border seemed to be following a similar course. Large modern clubs attracting hundreds or even thousands of clubbers every weekend appeared to be springing up everywhere I went in China, perhaps filling a void for a growing middle class with increasing amounts of disposable income but relatively few entertainment options to spend it on. During this same period in the late 1990s, Internet usage has also become widespread among members of this same middle class, and according to the China Internet Network Information Center, the Internet continues to experience phenomenal growth in China. A CNNIC survey released in January 2002 reports that there are now over 33 million Internet users in China, a nearly 50% year-on-year increase. Internet use has been increasing most rapidly among the group most attracted to the dance club scene, young urban dwellers in their 20s and 30s. I became interested in possible connections between this increase in Internet and the rapid growth of the Chinese club scene as I observed a number of interesting Net-related phenomena within the dance music scene. Hearing Chinese DJs spin a variety of imported and domestic trance, techno, and house music at clubs in Beijing, Shanghai and elsewhere, I wondered where they were learning about and obtaining all the music they were using. On a February 2001 visit to Club Focus, one of the largest clubs in Guangzhou, I learned that some of the DJs there were playing MP3s downloaded from the Web and burned on recorded CDs in their live sets. This seemed to explain the uncanny musical erudition of DJ Andrew and others whom I met in Guangzhou as well -- how were they able to keep up so well with developments in the international music scene, I wondered? One of the DJs from Focus later told me that some of them used the Internet to search for information about dance music around the world. Discussing this topic with more DJs and clubbers in China, I began to see a number of distinct effects of the rapid increase in Net usage on the nascent Chinese club scene: local DJs and producers were using the Internet to obtain new tools for producing and distributing their own music; websites were springing up to inform users about new developments in the Chinese scene and provide new opportunities for participants to communicate with one another; and music makers and clubbers alike were using the Net to learn about and obtain new music from both domestic and international artists. I will now look at each of these "network effects" in more detail. THE INTERNET AS SONIC ARMS SMUGGLER Chinese DJs and dance music producers are now using many of the same software tools used by other electronic music producers around the world, and they are obtaining them from the same source: the Internet. Most Chinese producers depend completely on the Net for information about new developments in music software, either downloading new programs directly onto their computers or copying them from friends who have already done so. The online availability of such powerful software tools, as well as a wealth of information about how to use them, now makes it possible for musicians in China to keep up with new developments in electronic music production and obtain at least some of the latest technologies at the same time as their colleagues overseas. This is a very significant change when we consider that it has always been very difficult for independent musicians in China to get access to the technologies of contemporary music; import restrictions and other barriers have meant that contemporary music equipment typically costs twice as much in China as it does in the United States, when it is available at all. Computer hardware is relatively inexpensive now, however, even for some mainland Chinese, and there are powerful software tools on the Internet that can be had cheaply or for free. Increasing numbers of young Chinese are using computers to create their own dance music and upload it to the Internet, where it can be shared with a community of other producers and club music fans. YESDJ.COM As an example of how participants in the Chinese dance scene are connecting and forming communities on the Internet, I would like to look at Yesdj.com; this is one of the more extensive websites used by Chinese DJs and producers to exchange information on how to produce their favorite styles of music and where to find music software. This heavily-trafficked site also provides users with frequently updated lists of the most popular dance tracks and CDs in China, with links to downloadable MP3 samples; when I last checked, the most popular CD on the site was by well-known south China techno-rap group MP4, and tracks from the CD had been downloaded over 65,000 times according to the site statistics. Yesdj.com also provides forums for clubbers to discuss the latest developments in Chinese dance music and for DJs, MCs, producers, promoters and others actively involved in the scene to make contact with their counterparts across China. Although it is impossible to gauge the precise extent to which Internet-based communications have contributed to the rapid growth of the Chinese dance music scene, I believe that websites such as Yesdj.com and mailing lists of event schedules such as those operated by Beijing clubs Vogue and Orange have played a very significant role. It is important to note that besides the Internet, there are virtually no other forms of mass communication available to the Chinese dance community. Access to print media is strictly controlled in China, and information on non-government sponsored cultural activities is extremely difficult to come by. It is impossible, for example, for Chinese dance promoters to simply take out advertisements for their events in local magazines. In the recent past, information about dance events could be communicated only by word of mouth or by the distribution of party fliers, but Chinese clubs are now increasingly making use of the Internet for this purpose. INFORMATION WANTS TO BE FREE: MP3 FILE SHARING ACROSS THE GREAT FIREWALL OF CHINA In addition to bringing new tools for producing music to electronic musicians in China and tremendously facilitating the circulation of information within their scene, the Internet is also having a massive impact in terms of the vastly increased access to music from outside China which it has brought to its users. The Chinese government strictly controls all cultural imports, including music, and most imported dance music recordings are completely unavailable through legal channels. As Internet usage has increased in China over the past few years, the Net has started to become the main source of information about music for more and more young urban Chinese. DJs and producers, many of whom have their own computers with Net access, rely increasingly on the Web to learn about the latest trends in dance music styles around the globe. Virtually all of the major DJs in Beijing, for example, use the Internet extensively to keep up with international music trends, learning about new styles at the same time as their counterparts in other countries. As I noted earlier, some Chinese DJs even use music downloaded from the Net in their live sets, making their own compilations of MP3 files of music from China and abroad and recording them on CDRs; I have observed DJs at some of the largest clubs in Shanghai and Guangzhou using these CDRs in the DJ booth. Among some in the Chinese underground hiphop scene, only tracks which have been downloaded are considered truly "underground" and thus valuable, while any music which is available for purchase in physical form is seen as being tainted by commerciality to some degree. RECORDING THE FUTURE In considering the long-term effects of these developments in the context of modern Chinese society, we might recall the oft-quoted ideas of Jacques Attali about music as a predictor of social change: Music is prophecy. Its styles and economic organization are ahead of the rest of society because it explores, much faster than material reality can, the entire range of possibilities in a given code. It makes audible the new world that will gradually become visible, that will impose itself and regulate the order of things; it is not only the image of things, but the transcending of the everyday, the herald of the future (Attali, p. 11). It is easy to be critical of Attali for his vagueness and sweeping generalizations. Yet the ideas he first presented in his book Noise in 1977 seem to be resonating more strongly than ever at present, with many writers on digital music culture both in academia and in the popular media citing Attali.s ideas to help explain the phenomena they observe on the Internet. If we are willing to grant some degree of truth to what Attali is saying, that music may indeed be a "herald of the future" in some sense, we can only be led to consider some startling possibilities about the future of modern China. The rapidly evolving Internet-based music scene on the mainland may have radical implications for a society based on the principle of monolithic state control of information. The Chinese government has been very active in efforts to combat the spread of dissident activity and "harmful opinions" on the Internet, even going so far as to construct a security firewall around the entire country which ensures that CNN.com (for example) cannot be freely accessed by Chinese Web surfers. Nonetheless, the government.s control over the flow of information into and out of China has already been seriously weakened by the Web. A report prepared in January 2000 by the United States Embassy in Beijing explains this situation in more detail and raises questions for the future: The Chinese government filters the flow of information into China. Dissident groups mail thousands of electronic periodicals into China. They constantly switch originating addresses to evade filtering. Some foreign websites are blocked but Chinese surfers often use proxy servers to evade the Great Red Firewall. Email from China cannot reach certain foreign addresses but using a foreign email account (such as Hotmail) can solve that problem. The old Chinese saying "For every measure taken on high there is a counter measure down below" is illustrated by the wide use of anti-filtering countermeasures (US Embassy report, 2000). Shanthi Kalathil and Taylor C. Boas of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace have studied the political impact of the Internet in China in greater detail, noting that while many observers continue to believe that rising use of the Internet poses an insurmountable threat to authoritarian regimes, the reality in China is that the government has managed to control the impact of the Net to some degree and in the short term via both reactive and proactive strategies (Kalathil and Boas, 2000). However, other commentators look to the future and question how long any kind of effective control can be maintained. Kalathil and Boas themselves outline some of the specific mechanisms by which authoritarian regimes can be gradually undermined by the Internet: ONE Exposure to outside ideas and lifestyles may spur a revolution of "rising expectations" as citizens begin to wonder why they are denied rights and freedoms enjoyed by the people of other nations. (It is believed that this was an important factor in the revolutions in Eastern Europe which overthrew the Communist regimes there, although television rather the Internet was the crucial media technology there.) TWO The widespread use of email, Internet chat rooms and the Web by ordinary citizens may contribute to a greater degree of "ideational pluralism" as more and more information which contradicts the official party line becomes available to users. THREE Civil organizations may use the Internet for the dissemination of information among members and for large-scale organization. (The most striking example of this in China thus far has been the Falun Gong, a banned religious organization.) Kalathil and Boas note that these civil organizations have often played a crucial role in undermining authoritarian regimes elsewhere. FOUR The Internet creates new opportunities for entrepreneurship and wealth creation. FIVE Finally, Net usage provides increased scope for foreign influence within countries hitherto isolated from the world community by censorship and control over the free flow of information. Looking again at the Chinese dance music scene, we can clearly observe the operation of many of the mechanisms identified here. The Internet has contributed significantly to the spread of new musical ideas in China, encouraging a greater degree of musical pluralism; websites and mailing lists are routinely used by participants in the scene to communicate with each other and to organize and promote dance events; the rapidly growing dance music scene is creating new economic opportunities for some young Chinese in the underground economy; and there is an increasing degree of foreign musical influence due to the access to music and information from overseas provided by the Internet. If Attali is right and developments in music do foreshadow changes in other social practices, then the long-term success of China.s efforts to control public discourse on the Internet must be placed in doubt, with potentially profound consequences for the future of the country.s political system. Although the dance scene is not overtly political for the most part, it should be noted here that there are already signs of a developing "ideational pluralism" among its participants which may have significant political overtones. An article in Asiaweek magazine in May 2001 noted early signs of politicization within the Chinese dance scene, such as the popularity of a locally-produced dance track called "No Communist Party." Taking its melody from a song associated with the Cultural Revolution, the lyrics ridicule Communist Party icon Lei Feng, the selfless PLA soldier who has been held up as a model of good character to generations of Chinese students. THE DRIVING FORCE OF CHANGE? Some observers of the Internet music scene even follow Attali.s trajectory one step farther and argue that the drive to distribute music on the Internet has itself become a cause of future change in other areas and not just a predictor of it. They point especially to software tools developed for the purpose of distributing music that may ultimately have a far greater impact when applied in other areas. Freenet, a decentralized and anonymous music file trading system, provides us with an interesting example here. Freenet makes it possible for users to trade any kinds of digital data files among themselves completely anonymously, without fear of being identified by government authorities or copyright holders. Ian Clarke, the founder of Freenet, has reportedly been contacted by someone who is already using his software in a totalitarian, Middle Eastern country to share information banned by the government (van Buskirk, 2000). Technologies developed to share music such as Freenet, which enable users to communicate on a mass scale with no possibility of governmental censorship, may ultimately play a key role in evading the mechanisms of online control identified by Kalathil and Boas. CONCLUSIONS As I have tried to show here, increasing Internet usage among participants in the Chinese dance scene seems to be contributing significantly to the rapid growth of that scene. Participants are exposed to a wide variety of new ideas and lifestyles through the widespread use of email, chat rooms and the Web, members of the community are using the Net to organize and promote their activities, and new opportunities for entrepreneurship and wealth creation are emerging within the scene: these characteristics of the new dance subculture illustrate specific ways in which I believe the Internet is acting to significantly reduce the Communist government.s control over the Chinese population as the government loses control of the flow of information. Bearing in mind again Attali.s idea of music as prophecy, I wonder about what kind of messages we might read from the chaotic freedom of the main dancefloor at Club Rojam in Shanghai, where on any given weekend more than a thousand clubbers might typically be found dancing to a mix of electronic beats from all over the world... BIBLIOGRAPHY Attali, Jacques. Bruits; essai sur l'economie politique de la musique. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1977. Published in English as Noise: the political economy of music, tr. Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985. China Internet Network Information Center. January 2002. 17 Feb 2002 <http://www.cnnic.net.cn/develst/rep200201-e.shtml>. DJ Tadi. Homepage. 18 Feb 2002 <http://artists.mp3s.com/artists/233/tadi.html>. Freenet. 6 Dec 2001 <http://freenet.sourceforge.net>. Kalathil, Shanthi and Taylor C. Boas. "The Internet and State Control in Authoritarian Regimes: China, Cuba, and the Counterrevolution." Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Information Revolution and World Politics Project, Working Paper #21, July 2000. 18 Feb 2002 <http://www.ceip.org/files/Publications/wp21.asp>. Oster, Shai. "It.s My Party." Asiaweek 18 May 2001. 20 Feb 2002 <http://www.asiaweek.com/asiaweek/magazine/nations/0,8782,109279,00.html
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US Embassy Beijing. "China.s Internet Information Skirmish." Jan 2000. 5 Dec 2001 <http://www.usembassy-china.org.cn/english/sandt/webwar.htm>. van Buskirk, Eliot. "How Music Is Changing the Internet." 26 Nov 2000. 5 Dec 2001 <http://music.cnet.com/music/0-1652424-7-2130087.html?st.mu.2130086.txt. 2130087>. Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ADVERTISEMENT <http://rd.yahoo.com/M=261419.3724993.5015550.1269402/D=egroupweb/S=1705 004924:HM/A=1724960/R=0/SIG=136uf918b/*http://ads.x10.com/?type=href&lin eid=3724993&property=egroupweb&aposition=HM&random=1061464879471298> <http://us.adserver.yahoo.com/l?M=261419.3724993.5015550.1269402/D=egrou pmail/S=:HM/A=1724960/rand=329097097> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: chineseinternetresearch-unsubscribe@egroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> .