Hosting Site for Users in Mainland China

Singapore, Taiwan, or Hong Kong

[simplesimon]

I'm creating a website aimed at users in mainland China and would like to avoid hosting within mainland China due to the cost and government restrictions. The site will be small, simple and non-controversial. I've read some of the threads about the problems hosting both in the mainland, and outside the firewall. From what I gather, it looks like it would be best to host my project either in Hong Kong, Singapore or Taiwan, as long as I keep the page load times down. Does this make sense, and does anyone know if any of the options are preferable, and why?

Thanks

[bill]

You're going to see a very noticeable difference in speed from within China. I was quite surprised at how dramatic it was. There are also sporadic accessibility issues when you host outside. Then there's a rumored preference of Baidu for sites hosted in China. All these things add up highly in favor of hosting within the Great Firewall rather than outside of it.

Of the options you listed the only one I might recommend would be the Hong Kong option.

[simplesimon]

Thanks for the response. That makes sense. Would it be workable for a non-chinese speaker to obtain hosting within the firewall and navigate the necessary red tape?

[bill]

If you went with the Hong Kong option I'm sure you could find English service options. On the mainland that would be more difficult. Without a Chinese speaker your options would be limited.

[Asia_Expat]

My server is in a major datacentre in Singapore. My target audience is all over Asia. Here in Thailand, my websites load incredibly fast, loading time barely perceivable. Connectivity to the rest of Asia is excellent. The site also works quite well in the rest of the world...

However, I agree with bill... go with Hong Kong, or mainland if you can swing it. If you're worried about censorship, host outside China. If you're worried about your visitors being blocked, host inside China... I know that doesn't make sense, but "Toto, we're not in Kansas any more"...

To clarify something though... are you targeting English speakers (expatriates?) or Chinese speakers?