China's online population nearly 600 million

The use of instant messenger and microblogging is helping China's online population grow even bigger.

According to the China Internet Network Information Center, users of instant messaging reached 497 million by the end of June, up nearly 30 million in six months.

Services such as shopping, payment and gaming make instant messaging an integrated platform rather than just a simple chat tool.

Meanwhile, the growth of microblogging and use of weibo has been slowing after the rapid increase in 2010 and 2011.

The number of users of microblog, or weibo as called by Chinese, has now reached 331 million. An increasing number of organizations and public figures use weibo to publish information.