Businessinsider.co.za | Chinese shoppers sent in so many preorders for Black Friday they crashed online shopping app Taobao

Hordes of Chinese shoppers looking to cash in on sweet deals on the shopping app Taobao may have caused the platform to temporarily crash on October 20. The platform was hosting a nationwide preorder event ahead of its annual Singles Day Shopping Festival, which is akin to Black Friday in the US. Known as "Double 11," last year's shopping festival reaped the Alibaba-owned platform some $56 billion in sales . The preorder system involves people putting down a deposit to reserve items instead of rushing to snap up limited quantities of coveted goods on November 11. When Insider visited the…