A creative product released by Tencent and Palace Museum. [Photo/Weibo of China Daily]

Tencent, China's internet giant, has signed a three-year deal with the Palace Museum to promote traditional Chinese culture through the creativity of today's youth. The two will work on emoticons on QQ (the most-used instant messenger in China), games, animation and literature based on traditional cultural stories in China. Competitive events and cross-industry cooperation are in the works.

Pony Ma, CEO of Tencent, said the fusion of social media and traditional culture has provided an opportunity for more ideas to flourish.

"Next Idea Tencent Creativity Competition" will be held for applicants to design new QQ emoticons. As of today, QQ has registered 877 million users in China, of which 60% are born after the '90s. The most popular emoticon is used more than 5.2 billion times a day. Tencent hopes that the design of a new cultural emoticon will build a bridge between youth and traditional culture.

The Palace Museum has worked intensively to promote traditional Chinese culture through modern technology in recent years. Aside from the deal with Tencent, the Museum has also created Apps and educational games for both youth and children. It has began selling entrance tickets online to suit the needs of today's youth, and offers a variety of products on its official store on T-mall, an online sales platform of Alibaba.