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According to "Go Taikonauts" :
What is taikonaut? Taikonaut is the Chinese counterpart for astronaut and cosmonaut. If China become the third country to send men into space using its own rocket and spacecraft, what are they? Astronaut or cosmonaut? Both. Neither. It is reasonable to create a new word to reflect China's independent manned space capability, just like those for American and Russian.
How is it created? "Taikong" is a Chinese word that means space or cosmos. The resulted prefix "taiko-" is similar to "astro-" and "cosmo-" that makes three words perfectly symmetric, both in meaning and in form. Removing "g" from "taikong" is to make the word short and easy to pronounce. On the other side, its pronounciation is also close to "taikong ren", the Chinese words "space men".
Who use this word first? In May 1998, Mr. Chiew Lee Yih from Malaysia used it first in newsgroups. Almost at the same time, Mr. Chen Lan used it and announced it at "Go Taikonauts" site. They created this word in parallel, which shows it is probably the best candidate for Chinese spacemen.
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