By In Depth special report team

QQ (left) and Microsoft Messenger are the most popular instant messengers in China. Photo: CFP

Every day when Aitike turns on his computer, he logs on at four different instant messaging accounts: Microsoft Messenger, fetion, ali wangwang and GTalk.

“I use one QQ (Tencent QQ, the most popular instant messaging computer program on the Chinese mainland) account to communicate with friends in real life, one to talk with acquaintances on the Internet and the other with online strangers,” he said.

Microsoft Messenger is for friends abroad and those who work in big companies. Fetion is for sending free text messages to friends' mobile phones. Ali wangwang is necessary when he wants to buy something at taobao. com. And GTalk? “Just to have a try,” the 22-year-old said.

As the number of online Chinese climbs at a brisk pace – 40 million new users in the first half of this year according to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) – instant messaging has become the most popular communication tool in offices and homes.

There was a stir among white-collar workers when Microsoft Messenger was shut down in cities last week after damage to an underwater cable during an undersea earthquake.

“It's really annoying when MSN (the name Chinese use for Microsoft Messenger) gets disconnected,” said Wang Guyue, a 25-year-old employee with a Beijing property brokerage firm.

“We have a lot of contact with media through MSN. We lost contact with them when MSN failed.”

In the Chinese mainland, Microsoft Messenger is a major online chat tool, especially in offices. The number of active Microsoft Messenger accounts in the country is 25 million, according to Cao Fei, senior analyst at Analysys International, a Beijing-based consulting company.

In forums and blogs, people wondered why Microsoft Messenger was down again for the same reason – the same thing happened in 2006.

Citing a source from the instant messaging industry, itxinwen.com reported last Thursday that the fundamental reason was not natural damage, but that Microsoft Messenger's server was not in China.

However, this was denied by Microsoft China's vice president Liu Zhenyu. He told sina.com on the sidelines of a meeting with Kaspersky that their server had been moved to China in 2006 but this could not keep Microsoft Messenger from being affected by natural disasters.

“We have QQ and ali wangwang as alternatives,” said Ye Xiaoxiao, a State-owned company employee in Shanghai, “At work, though MSN is popular, we have our own corporate IM [instant messenger].”

Wang, a property broker employee, said some local messengers are much better than Microsoft Messenger. “FreeEIM is popular in our office. It's much faster in transferring files.”

The latest version of UC-messaging, an instant messenger for registered users of the leading portal sina.com, has the function of establishing a group of 1,000, and multi-platform communication with users of Microsoft Messenger, GTalk, and Yahoo Messenger.

Despite all these competitors, QQ remains dominant in the local market as the government-preferred pioneer. CNNIC data showed that by the end of June, China had 338 million net users. In comparison, active QQ accounts were 448 million by that time, according to QQ's developer Tencent.

MSN vs QQ

The two most popular instant messengers in China, Microsoft Messenger and QQ, didn't mean to compete in the first place.

Cao, an Analysys International analyst, said, “MSN was designed for corporate customers. It was for people who knew each other and only after you get the other's account could you add him.

“QQ was different. I'd rather say it was a tool for making friends because you can search online users and add them directly.”

As a result, QQ covers almost all net users, no matter their age, their education or what they do for a living. Microsoft Messenger covers a much smaller range of people, mostly white-collar workers, Cao said.

And despite its higher level of government censorship, QQ is catching up even in this field. The disconnection of Microsoft Messenger last week generated a surge in the number of QQ users. “In Beijing and Shanghai, the number of simultaneous QQ users rose by a million more than usual,” Tencent told the Global Times in an e-mail.

More than 40 million business people last year used QQ for work simultaneously, hinting that “a large portion of MSN users are using QQ for business talk at the same time.”

The advantage of QQ is obvious: It has more functions, more value-added services, more alluring skins, and is more thoughtful for individual needs, Cao said. Cao did not mention the lesser-known disadvantage: the closer relationship of Tencent with State police and heavier government interference with freedom of expression.

“All services provided by Windows Live Messenger are free and cater to individual personal favor. MSN aims at establishing a human-oriented online net which connects people together in a real and reliable environment,” a Microsoft spokesman told the Global Times via e-mail.

“The new MSN has surpassed the conception of traditional instant messenger. It has developed into an entrance to various kinds of internet services and a multi-functional aggregation carrier.”

Despite Microsoft Messenger's efforts at enriching its functions such as the introduction of Microsoft Plus ! Live, the corporate giant's best attempts at localization still reportedly fall short of many local expectations.

In a blog post on instant messenger, Internet commenter Aitike wrote “MSN surely doesn't know Chinese very well.”

Cao agreed Microsoft Messenger still has much to improve in terms of localization. As an international magnate, it has to keep local development in line with its global strategy and therefore it's harder and takes more time to localize.

Compared with local companies, it's also more difficult to execute improvements. Cao said in such an international company, the post rotation system usually affects the stability of a team and the shift of top and senior management also influences its localization.

Despite all this, he didn't expect the number of Microsoft Messenger users to decline as people often use several instant messengers at the same time.

“The rise of one instant messenger doesn't mean another will fall.”