Chinese people freely discussing the situation in Xinjiang, the region where Beijing pursues an aggressively discriminatory policy against the Uyghur Muslim minority, online.

Others who debate with Taiwanese nationals the comparative advantages of political systems in mainland China and Taiwan.

A freedom of tone that seems impossible under the yoke of the very sophisticated Chinese censorship.

And yet.

Thousands of Chinese have registered in recent days on Clubhouse, an American audio social network that has been in existence since March 2020, reports the South China Morning Post, Monday, January 8.

This application, initially designed as a virtual meeting place for the Happy few from Silicon Valley who received an invitation, found an unexpected audience in China.

Rush for invitations

“There, I am listening to a Uyghur woman who explains to Han Chinese (the majority ethnic group in China) what the re-education camps in Xinjiang look like, where members of her family have been sent”, said told a Chinese journalist based in the United States on Twitter.

She spent her weekend participating in discussions on ClubHouse which sometimes brought together over 700 Internet users simultaneously. 

In other chat rooms, debates lasting more than 120 hours without interruption addressed subjects traditionally taboo on Chinese social networks, such as the status of Hong Kong or the situation in Tibet, relates James Griffiths, an American journalist, author of “The Great Firewall of China”, a book on Chinese censorship.

The promise to be able to express oneself freely has led to a scramble for invitations to be snapped up on major Chinese e-commerce platforms, reports the Financial Times.

On Taobao, the online sales site of the giant Alibaba, more than 200 e-merchants offer these precious sesames for an application which, in theory, is free.

"Internet users pay up to 500 yuan ($ 77) to have it", specifies the British financial daily.

One of these sellers of invitations confirmed to have passed more than 200 since the beginning of the month, underlines the South China Morning Post.

Beijing censors did not anticipate the popularity of ClubHouse, which does not appear, a priori, to have been thought to become a tool for promoting freedom of expression in China.

This app, created by two former Google employees, presents itself more as a new kind of social network for small groups of insiders.

Everything, or almost, goes through the voice, which lends itself more to discussions in small committees to avoid sinking into cacophony.

This more intimate aspect of the debates attracted big names in tech like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, who spoke about their vision of the future.

What push all the gratin of Silicon Valley to want to enter this circle of "early adopters".

In addition, it is also necessary, in addition to an invitation, to be the proud owner of an iPhone and an American Apple account to be able to join this new social network.

In other words, ClubHouse had nothing in particular to appeal to the average Chinese internet user in a country where Android smartphones are much more popular.

No written records for censors

But ClubHouse has two advantages that make it the unlikely star of the moment for free speech advocates in China.

First of all, there is no written record of the words exchanged, since it is an audio social network.

What complicates the task of the "moderators" in the pay of Beijing, who tirelessly track down the use of terms or expressions prohibited in the writings on traditional social networks like Weibo (the Chinese equivalent of Twitter). ClubHouse does not. also does not record discussions, allowing users to express themselves more freely without fear of leaving "proof" of what they said.

Above all, ClubHouse is not yet subject to the same moderation or self-censorship rules as other sites or apps used by Chinese people.

As a result, the Chinese want to take advantage of it as much as they can, the Guardian notes.

“On Weibo, early ClubHouse users were quick to share the Mandarin chat rooms they discovered, which created a snowball effect that did a lot for the popularity of the app,” explains the UK site.

But make no mistake: "Just as the messages on the highly censored Weibo site do not reflect Chinese public opinion, the exchanges on ClubHouse should not be taken as an expression of the point of view of the majority of Chinese, "said James Griffiths. Those who can afford iPhones and know how to get an American Apple account belong" mostly to the dissident community in exile, or to the upper middle classes in big cities " Bloomberg notes.

However, everyone expects a reaction from the authorities.

It doesn't matter if this social network can hardly break through to the general public in China.

Its very existence is a challenge to authorities, as demonstrated by the popularity on Weibo of the hashtag “Chinese Renaissance”, circulated by ClubHouse users and which has been viewed more than 50 million times.

“The question is not whether the authorities will censor, but when they will act,” said James Griffiths.

“We will have the real-time demonstration of the diversity of methods available to Beijing to reduce freedom of expression,” predicted on Twitter James Palmer, expert on Chinese issues for the journal Foreign Policy.

Pro-Beijing users have already started to put pressure on other ClubHouse attendees by warning that they are recording what is being said and then transcribing it, the Guardian said.

Another technique is to copy for better control.

“Chinese developers have already started working on national alternatives to ClubHouse,” notes Protocol, a US technology news site.

A Chinese entrepreneur has even announced on Twitter the launch of the “Chinese ClubHouse that we have decided to call Two!”.

And this is only the first of a likely long list.

Chinese copies which, of course, must respect all the limits to freedom of expression set by Beijing.

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