China's .CN: 1 Billion Internet Users, 21 Million Domains, and the Platform Economy That Ate the Web
We parsed 22.4 million entries in the .cn namespace from our dataset and found 5.65 million unique registrable domains — roughly 27% of CNNIC's 21 million registry count. China has 1.09 billion internet users but only one .cn domain for every 52 of them. The data reveals why: a regulatory gauntlet of real-name verification and ICP licensing, a super-app economy where 4.3 million WeChat Mini Programs replace websites, and the aftershocks of a 2009 crackdown that crashed registrations 75% overnight.