If you're like me, you like to think, whether true or not, that America is, has been, and always will be the first, best, and most of everything great in the world. When it comes to technology, especially, everyone else follows our lead, right? Well...

Want to see the future of online marketing and social media? Take a look at China. According to this report comparing Web 2.0 behavior in China with that of the United States, Chinese consumers have dramatically surpassed Americans in adopting Web 2.0 behavior...

There are a lot of interesting data points in the study, but here are two that stand out for me:

User-generated content (consumer reviews/rating sites, forum/discussion boards, blogs, etc.) influences 58 percent of all purchase decisions in China, compared with 19 percent in the US.

47 percent of Chinese broadband users post comments to a blog, chat room, listserv or forum, compared with just 28 percent of American broadband users.

Is this nothing more than a cultural phenomenon unique to China? Maybe, but I doubt it. Is it merely a function of the younger age of the average broadband Internet user in China? Certainly that's a factor, but I don't think it is the primary driver. Do the Chinese have a greater distrust of institutional and corporate messaging? Maybe.

The real question is: Will this behavior be the global norm eventually? I think so. And if so, where in the world will America rank among the leading users of Web 2.0 technology and social media solutions?

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