The company that has purchased the publishing rights of Han Han's latest book, Rongshuxia Information and Culture Consulting Company, has grown out of Rongshuxia.com (also Rongshu.com), the largest Chinese-language literature website.

While the public has yet to know about the company, Rongshuxia.com is well-known among many netizens interested in literature.

The newly established Rongshuxia Information and Culture Consulting Company, which specializes in trading books and copyrights related to the Internet, has maintained its affiliation to the Germany-based media giant Bertelsmann.

However, the website, which was sold to Bertelsmann in 2001, has already been resold, and thus it has no link with the German publisher anymore, as some of its employees have admitted to China Daily. They declined to give specifics of the deal.

Lu Jinbo, the former editor-in-chief of Rongshu.com, is now general manager of the new company.

Bertelsmann was one of the first international media companies to enter the Chinese market. It established its first book club in China in as early as 1995. Its operations have been confined to book clubs and Bertelsmann Online (www.bol.com.cn). The company has been making efforts to enter book publishing, and Han Han's new book is just one of its attempts.

Rongshuxia.com was established by American-Chinese William Zhu in 1997. Rongshu is a Chinese word which means banyan tree, and Rongshuxia means "under the banyan tree."

The website grew very quickly by attracting tens of thousands of young people who love to write. They posted their essays and novels on the website which otherwise would never get the chance of being published.

Between 1997 and 2000 when the Internet economy was still bustling and everyone was seeking ways to make a fortune on the Internet, Rongshu.com was like an ivory tower reserved for those who still believed in the power of literature.

It now boasts more than 2 million registered users, a daily page view of more than 5 million and more than 500,000 unique IP addresses. Over 1.9 million original literary works have been posted on the website.

Rongshu also gave birth to one of China's most famous Internet writers, Ann Baby, who was sought after by readers after she published her compelling essays.

Rongshu.com hit headlines in 2000 when cancer victim Lu Youqing posted his "Death Diary."

In 2001, Rongshu.com was thrown back into the public eye when an AIDS victim, who used the pseudonym of "Li Jiaming," published an online account of his battle with the incurable disease. However, some media questioned the authenticity of "Li Jiaming," accusing Rongshu.com of making up the writer to win attention.

(China Daily December 14, 2005)