Electronic Bulletin Board Systems (BBS) that allow online news readers to respond to specific stories offer a new way to increase interactivity between mass media and readers. In China, which has traditionally controlled information in all media, BBS systems permit readers to post responses directly after reading news items online. The purpose of this study was to examine one popular BBS in China to see the number of responses to news items, and the extent to which items that generated responses contained high levels of traditional news values. The study also examined a small group of studies that generated the highest responses in order to better understand what types of news trigger a large reader response. A composite week of top stories was examined across a number of topics. Results showed that more than 30,000 reader responses per day are being posted just to the top 100 news items on this single site. This number far exceeds more traditional methods of interaction such as letters to the editor. The top 10 news items per week had significantly higher levels of newsworthiness as defined by Pamela Shoemaker and her colleagues (statistical deviance, social deviance, etc.) than non-top-10 items. The majority of stories not in the top 10 lacked high levels of any of the six newsworthiness factors. Stories that triggered large responses tended to include themes about nationalism, sports heroes, or stories including strong cultural themes (such as a proposal to change a traditional holiday).