Scholar Yu Jianrong launched a microblog site for people to post photos of child beggars, in an effort to raise awareness of the issue and even reunite parents with their kidnapped children. From the Ministry of Tofu blog:
On January 25, 2011, Yu Jianrong, a famous human rights activist and sociologist, launched a Sina microblog in which he called on Chinese netizens to wield their camera lenses, expose child beggars and upload the pictures to the blog, a cause he believed can save the mistreated children and help battle such crimes.
The microblog has sent immense reverberations throughout the country’s cyberspace. 74,834 have followed the microblog and thousands offered their clues and pieces of evidence.
The campaign has also had a repercussion that Professor Yu probably didn’t expect: it has become a lost-and-found platform. Many bereft and disheartened parents pin their last flicker of hope on posting pictures and info of their missing kids on the microblog, whereas a mother recognized her son in the vast sea of pictures.
See also reports from Shanghaiist and China.org.cn. Read also an essay by Yu Jianrong about the power of microblogging (translated by CDT).
