Global Voices translates a conversation, via twitter, between two of China’s Internet pioneers, Isaac Mao and Hu Yong:

Q10: If the Internet had been around twenty years ago, do you think society would have been a bit more optimistic than it is today?

A10: Haha, back to the future…..the eighties were the best years of China over the past sixty years. Back then, we at least had the “Two Majors”, the ‘Major Affairs The People Need To Know’ and ‘Major Affairs The People Need To Discuss’…if you think about it, using the Internet fulfills both the Two Majors, isn’t that a bit more optimistic?

Read also notes from a roundtable discussion at UC Berkeley last month which included both Mao and Hu.