Wuzhen, a typical water town south of the Yangtze River on its lower reaches, seems an unlikely venue for the World Internet Conference. Yet, Wuzhen has been the event's regular host since it was first held in 2014. Wuzhen's emergence as both a tourist destination and a focus of the digital technology industry can be traced back to a 2005 visit by Xi Jinping, when, as secretary of the CPC Zhejiang Provincial Committee, he laid out a set of principles for its development.