Shanghai, China: The Twitter booth at the inaugural Consumer Electronics Show Asia is prompting many quizzical and dumbfounded looks from passers-by, both Westerners wondering why the social media giant is even here – the site is blocked in China – and locals.
Next to the booths filled with drones, robots, tablets and audio products, the empty, grass-covered Twitter booth seems pitiable, but its aim may not be to attract Chinese consumers of technology at all.
Though Chinese people can access Twitter using a VPN on their phone or computer, most opt for local alternatives such as Weibo and Wichat.
However, Chinese companies that need to market to an international audience, including Alibaba, China Air, and Lenovo, do use the microblogging site, and that means advertising bucks for Twitter.
The walls of the CES booth are covered in framed pictures of Twitter pages belonging to famous Chinese companies, showing how they reach out across the seas for new customers. A stand at the front advertises a forum at a nearby hotel which will help locals "understand how Twitter can help Chinese export-driven businesses reach out on a global scale".
However, if the sole visitor to the booth when I arrived – a young man clutching a pamphlet for the ViLover VR girlfriend experience from two booths down – is any indication, the message may have been falling on deaf ears.
The writer travelled to CES Asia as a guest of Ford
