Many huge companies from the United States or Europe would think twice before entering the Chinese market because they are perturbed over the fact that Chinese tend to imitate “so well” that you can’t possibly spot any difference between the genuine and the fake. It has happened countless times before and many people around the globe would guffaw whenever the “Made in China” phrase appear right in front of their eyes. Apparently, the serious imitation issue in China seems to be getting better each day, but it still has a long way to go.
Recently, clones websites of YouTube and Google have emerged in China. Unlike other imitation products or websites which are mainly used to generate revenue, the gist of setting up YouTubeCN and Goojje is to pay tribute to Google, which threatened to leave mainland China over Web censorship and cyberattacks.
Created by Guangzhou-based tech geek Li Sinhe, he shamelessly ripped off almost the entire original YouTube site — offering videos from the video-sharing platform using YouTube’s standard API, including an identical logo and layout. Li claimed that he completed the website in just one night. YouTube is currently blocked in China, resulting in many Chinese Internet users to use home-grown sites such as Youku and Tudou.
Goojje, a spoof of Google.cn, is a combination of Google and Baidu. Developed by a female college student in Guangdong and put together by a group of about 20 people around the country, the Chinese clone isn’t as despicable as YouTubecn after all. A plea has been put up on the home page, hoping that the search engine juggernaut will cooperate with the Chinese government and abandon their initial idea of leaving China.
Both websites were set up in mid-January, just after Google’s threat to cease its operations in China.
“This should be an issue with Google’s intellectual property, also with China censorship,” said Xiao Qiang, director of the Berkeley China Internet Project at the University of California-Berkeley. “I cannot see how these sites can survive very long without facing these two issues.”
Till date, YouTubeCN and Goojje are still up and running and it’s unsure whether the local authorities will rectify the copyright issue.