[pjc50]

> an article of how to rent a VPS in China would be interesting

Given that apparently it's quite difficult to even get a WeChat account without a national ID, I suspect that step 1 is "learn mandarin" and step 2 is "get a Chinese national ID".

[vbezhenar]

I didn't have any problems creating wechat account. May be I was lucky, I don't know, I just typed my phone number and it went pretty smooth, like whatsapp. Also was able to connect my visa card. I did it in the Kazakhstan and then was able to pay in China, no problems. May be they got exception for Kazakhstan specifically, we recently got visa-free travels there.

[thenthenthen]

Also your home modem/router is often tied to your ID and then there is ofc the firewall. IIRC You can get vos hosting and ICP code through Ali Cloud somewhat automagically. Agree it would be nice to give it a try some time.

[TobTobXX]

Did you try? It's a few years ago when I had to create one, but it was just as simple as WhatsApp (just a few more CAPTCHAs). And no VPNs or whatever, straight from a Swiss IP.