Quoting The HiPiHi CEO, Xu Hui

If you follow this blog, you will know I have a keen interest in the development of virtual worlds in the Far East, and especially China. Why China? The first point is the sheer size of the potential user base, which could run into the tens, or even hundreds, of millions. A virtual world with resident populations of this size would be hard to ignore! However, I am also intrigued to see how the Chinese state reacts in the face of open virtual worlds, with an international population - as envisaged by Mr Xu, CEO of HiPiHi.

I was therefore interested to read (and thought I would repost) the following quotes from Xu Hui, given in his presentation to Virtual Worlds 2007 and recorded in Virtual Worlds News:

I’ve been interacting with the users, and when I meet those not from China, they’re surprised at how the virtual world replicates the real and how much they’re learning from just a 30-minute walk in the virtual world. Most people only experience China through products made in China. That’s not the best way. There are around 1.6 billion internet users in the world, but virtual worlds could be the best way to experience the web.

With time virtual worlds will mature as mainstream society increases in understanding. We will collaborate with industry providers and content providers to make that happen. We have a large market and a great desire for globalization.

And on HiPiHi:
We will launch our own virtual currency in the future. But we won’t manage this brokerage. We want to encourage existing financial services from the real world to come in. Brokerages are not run directly by the government. So we will use that real world model to replicate them in virtual worlds.

We will be focusing on tracking down the identity of avatars in the virtual world. They won’t be able to be changed easily. Your address and information will stay with you throughout your virtual existence. Second, we don’t intend to be a government in the world. We don’t operate in that kind of top down fashion. We will operate in a more self-policing mechanism. The community and users will flag unacceptable interactions. The third part is again on the self-policing mechanism. We won’t have any strict rules for all users to follow. We will have a guideline that is currently in development.

And finally, here is far and away the coolest thing I've read in a while:
I am of the belief that the modern soul can be partitioned into two parts. One is the real self, and one is the avatar. We spend so much time creating identity online that is can’t even really be considered a virtual identity anymore.