Blogging in the 中国 (Center Country)

Since we've been ask to jump into the "blogosphere" this semester, I have been wondering what this new arena is like in other, more censored parts of the world. Blogging in our democracy is the latest place where people can voice and vent their opinion-- no matter who they are or where their beliefs fall, whether you have "followers" or write to no one at all. Blogging in the United States is simply and obviously for us protected by the first amendment-- freedom of speech. I wonder how it is for bloggers in China. China is the emerging nation that is said to be the next global superpower. Chinese production and energy is said to be leaving Americans in the dust. Since 1949 China has been ruled by a communistic style of government where one council is controlling and screening the information and messages that their public sees.
As their government as opened up economically and jumped into the global economy they have to manage opening up technologically too. This week I read an article from the New York Times called Power to the (Blogging) People(click here to view article) by Thomas Friedman. The Chinese generation like my own has the ability to blog just like us. However, it seems that generation of Chinese people grew up thinking that they were being oppressed by the west, being considered the backward, rural economy that Mao built. Their government sold that idea in their controlled message to their people to motivate and stir nationalism. Apparently, the message got beat into them loud and clear. The article says that this generation through blogging is showing nationalistic views and is angry with the government for compromising or trying to be too diplomatic with the US/Western world. The odd thing is that the Chinese government is now the one trying to be a moderate player in the world community while the Chinese people are saying to forget about accommodating the US! The Chinese blogs claim they can do it on their own, that they are the superpower and they are the ones who should be directing the international community.
It is interesting to me that the Chinese character for China is 中国. Because the second character is pronounced "guo" meaning country and the the first character "zhong" means center. Which shows us the historic view the Chinese have had of their global position. They believe China is the center of everything. The blogoshpere in China is their only place for democratic expression. As the bloggers express different opinions from the state it should be interesting to see how the Chinese government controls the blogosphere.
Will the Chinese government move toward moderating their communistic ideals and controls? Fidel Castro recently kind of renege on communism in the economic system (see last week's blog), will technology push the Chinese communists to loosen or at least change the state messages they feed their people? It seems like lots of walls are crumbling down- power to the blogging people.