China signs up four million new internet users per month

China has now 172 million internet users, according to this report from Danwei, that mean an increase by four million new users each month. Danwei speculates that the increased control of the media because of the just-closed party congress might actually increase the interest in signing up:

Indeed, it's possible that the restrictions on press reporting, both on- and offline, is actually spurring Internet use. In the first half of 2003, for example, during the SARS crisis, 9 million Chinese people went online for the first time, and almost 50% of users reported an increase in their Internet usage during SARS. Silencing the press anywhere is likely to pique interest, and despite the surveillance, China's Internet is still a place to sate such curiosity. As blogger Lian Yue said in a recent email interview with your correspondent, "For people who have even just a little Internet experience, you can pretty much get any information you want to know."