Rumor: China’s largest video site Tudou shutdown?

At the end of 2007, two Chinese government ministries, SARFT and MII, announced a new set of rules to govern online video websites like Tudou.com, Youku.com, 56.com and other Youtube clones.

Last night Chinese language portal Netease published an article saying that SARFT had made use of these new online video regulations and ordered Tudou to cease operations because it was suspected there was porn on the site.

Tudou is the world’s largest video sharing website, claiming three times the traffic volume of YouTube. During the summer of 2007, Nielsen/NetRatings reported that Tudou was one of the fastest growing websites on the Web, growing from 131 to 360 million video clips per week in just three months.

The article on Netease have been taken offline but unfortunately for Tudou the story already was picked up by several bloggers and quickly made its way into the English blogosphere with posts on CNET Asia and David Feng’s Techblog86.

In an email reply to me Tudou co-founder Marc van der Chijs says that Tudou didn’t received a take-down notice and that the story is nothing more than a rumor. He regrets that some bloggers do little research to back up there claims “It’s hard to find out where this rumor is coming from but I am pretty sure the competition don’t have any problems with the fact that this kind of rumors about Tudou are created and spread. ”

I share Marc’s opinion about the fact that many bloggers and even journalists shoot from the hip without checking there sources. I just hope for him this rumor will stay a rumor.