From Yulun Jiandu, translated by CDT:
Li Xinde, a former reporter, started his citizen journalism with a “mission impossible” – to check the power of the government and scrutinize officials and expose their corruption deals.
He was inspired to this career by a lawsuit involving his brother, who was ruled to pay damages of 380,000 yuan to someone who, in a previous ruling by the same court, was supposed to pay his brother 2.46 million. He figured the most effective way to check the power was media supervision.
In 2001, he was enlightened by the power of the Internet when one of his articles got widely distributed online about a village party secretary freely firing his gun, terrorizing the whole village. Only then, he realized the ease and power of the online medium.
Now, Li is the only full-timer for the web site, Yulun Jiandu. There are a few part-time volunteers, including a technician, an editor, and some journalists as contributors.
To get around the blocking by the authorities, he opened more than 80 blog sites, all of them hosted by overseas servers.
Li is proud of his reporting on corruption, especially the story that led to the downfall of Jining vice mayor Li Xin, who was better known as the “mayor who knelt down.” [Full Text in Chinese]
Here is a list of media monitoring web sites run by individuals:
China Media Supervision (Yunlun Jiandu), created by Li Xinde http://guduyan.bloghome.cn/
China Civil Supervision (Minjian Jiandu), Jiang Huanwen, http://blog.sina.com.cn/u/1094566415
Shiye Focus (jiao dian), Shiye, http://www.shiye007.com/
China Public’s Throat and Tongue (Baixing Househ), Lu Ningping, http://www.cnbxw.net/
Central China People’s Lifehood (Zhongyuan Minsheng), Li Xinhua, http://www.zymsw.com.cn/
Public Viewpoints Focus, Zhang Pengfei, http://www.luningping.com/
China Famous Journalists Online, Xu Xiang, http://www.007news.net/default.asp
Justice Anti-corruption, Zhengyi, http://www.zyff.cn/news/
Relocation Rights Protection, Lu Xizhen, http://news.net4free.org/sdlxz/
Read an article by Li Xinde: “Land enriches Lihai officials, enrages farmers”
