--- BusinessWeek widmet sich in einem langen Report unter dem Titel China.Net der kommenden Internet-Generation Nummer Eins weltweit: China's Internet is booming. More than 22 million newbies piled on to the Web last year, bringing the total number of Chinese online to 80 million. That makes China second only to the U.S. in Internet subscribers -- and the Middle Kingdom won't remain No. 2 for long. By 2006, it is expected to overtake the U.S., with 153 million Chinese online, estimates investment bank Piper Jaffray & Co. The surge is being driven by several factors, including a strong economy that's letting people buy PCs and the opportunity the Net provides to skirt China's tight government censorship. "The Internet is growing like crazy here," says Craig Watts, managing director of Norson Telecom Consulting in Beijing. The expanding audience has set off a building spurt in recent months reminiscent of Silicon Valley in the late 1990s.