Wechat? Operated and owned by Tencent? Maybe you'll just get five or ten years in prison. Your Chinese friends might become organ donors. Even Yahoo sold out pro demo Chinese and helped identify them. I trust Google since they flipped the finger to them a few years ago and pulled out of Beijing. I heard Yahoo is finally closing their China offices. Hopes this helps them grow a backbone.

An how much will that cost?

Last time I checked, the monetary cost was free but you pay with your privacy. So it just boils down to which company do you think will do less harm with it or won't sell you out cheaply.

@Alex: Not sure what you mean - doesn't yahoo make money through selling ads in China?

@Alien. You asked about cost? I assumed it was about the cost of using services from google, wechat, or yahoo.

Not sure what your Yahoo ad comment is directed at, but yes Yahoo is an advertising distribution company like Google, so yes they get revenue from ads in China. It's inconsequential for either since they have given up or been forced out as players in China.

Edit: oh, I see you were just referring to Yahoo closing their China offices. It's an internet company. They don't need to have offices in China to do biz. Also, closing offices doesn't mean pulling out. Most of their office was probably sales and marketing.

@alexKMG
Your comment about google flipping the bird to China is amusing - in that the EXACT reason they gave for exiting China was horse manure - as they do EXACTLY the same thing if not MORE, for US law enforcement agencies aka the NSA/FBI/CIA/Homeland Security.

Google was simply losing market share in China, Baidu was crushing their search engines, QQ already had a stranglehold on IM, youku, tudou, et al were already crushing the online amateur video market, while youtube was being increasingly blocked and they needed a plausible if not debatable exit strategy to explain WHY they could NOT compete in the single largest IT market in the world.

Google is a publicly held company and subject to investor and shareholder criticisms, revolts, etc aka back seat drivers - they simply elected to withdraw from the market, justifying an incredibly poor decision with an allegedly moral decision - which in historical retrospect was both hypocritical and utter manure...but sounded good and noble, despite it's deceptive nature.

Google scans ALL of your google services for keywords, so they can target on-screen ads aka click ads at you - which is their right - but a severe invasion of privacy with incredible opportunity for abuse.

Google also purchased youtube company - but refused to comply with China's censorship laws, so key parts of google's strategies were simply incompatible with China's emerging internet rules - no porn, criminal drug trading, gambling, cults, hate crimes, inciting public unrest, rumor mongering - the negative things that we scoff at as silly are much more believable in an emerging, developing nation - susceptible to information without the ability to discern right from wrong, truth from fiction.

As for Yahoo closing their offices - that's Yahoo USA/global/corporate, drawing down their presence to reduce operating cost. Yahoo China is quite alive and kicking.

Google's China historical exit remains both controversial and debatable - their return is a given - it's just a matter of time, assuming they don't get M&A'd by Apple, Alibaba, or some other humongo megacorp...or vice versa.

'Baidu was crushing their search engines'. In what way exactly? Why were leading Chinese academics and researchers up in arms at losing the ability to search use various Google engines?

@laotou. Just for the record, Google had gained market share steadily every year before they left. It's a common misperception Google was losing market share in China. Both Baidu and Google gained share from 2006-2009, but Google at a faster pace. A graphic is always more illustrative.

graphics.thomsonreuters.com/119/CN_BAIDUG1109.gif

And even though Google is a public company, a controlling majority of the voting shares resides with Schidmt and the two founders. Brin can and does gives the finger to shareholders any time he wants.

I made this a separate comment as Google seems to be really unpopular right now. But as far as I know, Google hasn't helped ID any political dissidents to any authorities, of any country. I'd be interested in examples, if they have.

gov here has really got it in for google. never forgave for offerening non cens searches from hk. even though google gave in on some stuff they are still being punitive measured