Sina Weibo has banned celebrity microblog columnist Ranxiang from posting for 15 days after she implied on Friday the death of Kai-Fu Lee, IT venture capitalist and microblogger.

About 9 pm on Friday, Ranxiang, whose microblog account has 880,000 followers, published a post implying Lee had died at 8:47 pm on Friday.

The post was forwarded by many, some attaching a candle to the post to express their grief. Two hours later, Sina Weibo denied Lee's death.

"The behavior shows someone is so boring," responded Wang Zhaohui, a spokesman for Innovation Works, the company Lee founded.

Wang posted again about 1:30 am on Saturday stating Lee was still being treated for cancer and would spend the weekend with family members.

In September last year, Kai-Fu Lee revealed he had been diagnosed with lymphoma. He posted on Saturday 9:15 am denying his death.

Cao Fan of watchdog group Sina Weibo Community Committee posted about 2 am on Saturday saying the post did not directly say Lee was dead, but it clearly meant that.

Ranxiang, whose true identity is uncertain, did not apologize.

Global Times