Each section is to be approximately 400 words. They’re quite strict on this. My section is about the commercialisation of the media environment in China – so, basically 400 words or so explaining how China’s media environment has gone from being completely state-controlled and funded to it’s present more market-oriented situation where a few of the largest and most influential state-controlled mouthpieces such as Xinhua, CCTV and People’s Daily are heavily subsidised with the remainder relying on commercial advertising and other business models such as subscriptions, premium content, etc. to survive.
Should touch briefly on topics such as:
– Traditional media (TV, newspapers and magazines) vs. so-called ‘New Media’ (i.e. internet-only news sites like Jiemian), news aggragators like Sohu, Sina, as well as microblogging/social media like Wechat, Weibo) and how traditional media has had to embrace new media concepts in order to survive
– Different types of commercialisation, but mainly advertising
– Growth of China’s ad industry which is now largest in the world – http://adage.com/article/digital/57-china-s-ad-spending-internet-year/309046/
– How increased competition for ad revenue and audience has led to more diversified content in the confines of strict censorship – i.e. relative freedom to report on entertainment, finance, lifestyle and anything not related to politics, as well as hard-hitting, often sensational journalism from the likes of Caixin that has sometimes sailed close to the wind (i.e. coverage of 2011 high-speed train disaster, exposure of corrupt local officials, etc.) but is popular and sells news
– Opportunities that financial freedom and free market have created for corruption from relatively harmless paid travel to ‘paid journalism’
– Other stuff I’ve overlooked
Given it’s 400 words, these things can only be touched upon very briefly. Basically, I need a good general overview for the uninitiated.
Given this will go out to our clients, it MUST be original content and CONFIDENTIAL. Please delete any documents I send afterwards.
Just to give you an overall idea of the style, here is what a colleague wrote:
““Traditional players are transforming along with market forces”
Although accounts of the Chinese media landscape tend to pit traditional media organizations against digital outlets in a fight for survival, this narrative overlooks the traditional players’ adaptive transformations to attract more eyes to their content. Although experiencing relative decline, these outlets have largely been successful in following media trends to survive in a new market, and the government continues to support the largest and most authoritative outlets, including People’s Daily, CCTV and Xinhua, as its official mouthpieces. But it should also be noted that the Chinese media market is not a zero-sum game; Chinese media consumers may rely on both traditional and up-and-coming outlets for various types of news. Both can survive in the same space.
Nevertheless, traditional media players are changing their means of distributing content, to meet Chinese consumers where they are. They have adopted new types of content creation, including images, infographics, and even video, with a prime example being Xinhua’s now-infamous rap video explaining the 13th Five-Year-Plan. Traditional media have also adapted to popular new platforms to reach viewers. For example, People’s Daily runs the most-followed news account on WeChat, with the second-most-popular being CCTV Finance. People’s Daily also operates Weibo and Toutiao accounts, as well as a proprietary mobile application. Some consumers may even find the professional content produced by the long-established traditional media players to be a welcome contrast to more ad hoc offerings on social media sites.”
