[huangc10]

How can we trust any of the analytics coming out of mainland China? Can you be 100% positive that Toutiao is not controlled by the Chinese government? They can easily funnel all internet traffic to Toutiao and control it, and use it to their advantage. Curate the news to whatever way they want.

Toutiao is a privately owned company held in Beijing. Am I being paranoid? They can claim machine learning (and they probably do). However, until we can be 100% certain the Chinese government is not involved, I wouldn't personally trust any of the stats.

[toephu2]

It's public knowledge in China that all tech giants are in bed with the government. Considering Toutiao is one of the fastest growing media companies in China, you can be sure they too will bend to the will of the government at a moment's notice.

[zodiac]

> They can easily funnel all internet traffic to Toutiao

They can't force users to download the app and use it (without us knowing it), can they? They could control the content it shows users, but how does that make the stats inaccurate?

[anuh]

I can’t convince you to be a believer :) That is totally up to you!

[ComodoHacker]

Couldn't government-controlled company publish their real stats?

I personally think any sufficiently large company in China is partially government-controlled. But does it change any of the business analysis presented here?