Tag Archives: china

Media in China

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20111128 - Media in China Exam

This exam also signals the end of the Media in China module. I enjoyed this module and learnt more about the media landscape and operations in China.

China as the next big superpower will become more influential internationally through its people and soft-power. Going global, it is on the country’s agenda to expand their news agency network like CCTV and Xinhua News Agency to stand alongside powerhouses like CNN, BBC and Al Jazeera.

China had long been suffering from media biasness especially from the Western media. Hence with these global expansion plans, China can present its own views and perspective.

The Central government is known for its strict rules on media control. Sometimes, it is invitable to protect citizens from bad influences and maintain social order. Moreover, the country have lots of problems at hand like Tibet, Taiwan, Xinjiang, activists, corruption at different levels and the rich-poor gap.

Although Internet monitoring is present, the Internet users in China are spared from boredom. On the other hand, the cyberspace is a very interesting area and is in fact, constructing and de-constructing China.

Citizen journalism, forum discussions, QQ instant messaging and Weibo microblogs allow sharing of ideas, jokes and views on country’s affairs to everyday life. Exchanges of information on these platforms are shaping young generations in China.

In China’s social media, local start-ups ranges from companies like Sina Weibo(Twitter), Youku(YouTube), RenRen(Facebook), QQ(IM), Jike(search engine), xiami.com(Last.fm) and Lashou(Groupon).

There is often the perception of Chinese Internet companies copying from the West, but there are also exceptions like how Zynga’s FarmVille is ‘copied’ from Chinese game – ‘Happy Farm’ in China. And Twitter added its image function after Weibo’s image uploading function.

I guess copying is always part of learning and in business it is very common. I thought the more important part is how to copy and redefine to suit local audience’s needs.

For example, Groupon China with its one-size-fit-all expansion model didn’t do well in China. It’s mass-hiring policy failed and resulted in mass dismissal. On the other hand, local group-buying sites like Meituan, Lashou and Manzuo are doing well as they are custom to local tastes.

The saying goes “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.” I thought it is very important for any investors in China.

China’s Ghost Cities

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In this semester, I took up a module on ‘Media in China’. As such, I have been following China’s latest news and happenings and came across this interesting video. It talks about how China, in its efforts to promote GDP growth, spend huge amount of money on construction projects – by building cities! This is an effort to spurn domestic growth to raise their GDP. But these cities resulted in ghost towns as people couldn’t afford to buy the houses. As such, it is a struggle between the authorities, property developers and the citizens. For now, it is still kind of an irony as inflation and housing prices is still a big problem in China. In future, if housing prices become stagnant or dropped due to over-supply then I guess things could get better.

China Consumerism

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20110825 - China Consumerism

I was slacking in the library and picked up this book to kill time. I ‘survived’ some pages before closing the book entirely for good. The book talks about consumerism in China, the Chinese mindset of ‘life-extension’ and practices of ‘gift-giving’.

In China, it is very common for people to send gifts to friends, relatives, to the elders or even officials. It represent the respect or importance given to the receiver and also to build ‘Guan Xi’(connections). The interesting thing here is how businesses adapts to this kind of mindset – where often the ‘purchaser is not the end-user’.

Take for example, if I sell a health-care product for the elderly in China. All my advertisement are created to target the elderly. It is logical to do so and make sense. However, it is most likely not to work and sales could be low. This is because, it is usually the sons and daughters that will buy these health products to pay respect to their parents. As a result, the advertising strategy should be targeting the children of these elderly instead. This also explains why the ‘purchaser is often not the end-user.’

It is really interesting in terms of tweaking advertising strategies to suit the consumers here – where the ‘people who buy is for others to use!’ It is the same case for parents buying things for their only child, colleagues buying gifts for friends and businessmen sending gifts within their circle. It is a very Chinese thing and relationships are cultivated. It goes to show that respect, connections, statuses and ‘face’ are very important in China.

Google vs China

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This gets more and more interesting.

So now, Google had re-route its China’s site to its Hong Kong site.

Personally, I see it as an unglamorous move when not so long ago, the search engine giant just mentioned that they will be moving out of China with a high possibility 99.9%. So now they played with their words and escaped to Hong Kong. Smart move? I don’t think so.

At the initial stage of this thorny issue, China opened the door to them –  saying that a horse that turns back for greener pasture is a clever horse ( as contradictory to the common Chinese idiom that a good horse doesn’t turn back for greener pasture)

Google didn’t buy that and exclaimed that high chances they will be leaving. By declaring that they are leaving China, I believed was Google’s game of testing the depth of the water (meaning the limits of the Chinese govt). Of course the authorities would not be held to ransom and Google are stuck with their own words, they couldn’t take them back.

One thing that all of us can agree on is definitely China is too huge a market to ignore. And I believed Google surely knows this. Deep in their heart, they knew they had to stay. But to stay without giving out a signal of resistance or fight back China, would infer that they are giving in and being bullied and that means weak. The scenario is Chinese hackers are already stealing codes from them, with the govt closing one eye. How can Google accept that? Google knew they had to fight back.

The search engine giant did not want to comply to their censorship laws. They want to implement an uncensored google site for China, and this I believed is their way of fighting back. Imagine exposing China’s sensitive information – for example the Tiananmen Incident to its own people, China would definitely be angry. Google’s uncensored website for China is their “revenge”.

China definitely was not pleased. They insisted that Google obey the internet laws in the country.

Google says its either an uncensored version of google.com.cn or they are leaving. Chinese authorities of course will not buy that.

Here comes the critically part. Now, Google couldn’t take their words back. This time, I really thought Google was leaving for real.

But very unexpectedly, Google played their words smartly and “within the internet geographically” they really left. They moved from .cn to .hk. It’s amusing but I believed Google is buying time.

By moving to Hong Kong, the ball is now in China’s court. There are 2 ways China could reply.

One is to close one eye  - allowing Google to stay there with an uncensored HK Google site.

Second is to show their authority, and censor the Hong Kong Google site as well. But this could invoke protests from the Hong Kong netizens who are not afraid to show their dislike and make their frustrations known. And who knows they might really get to gain sympathy votes from the Hong Kong netizens who could support them with a protest? If it happens, Google could use the people’s voices against the government, which I believed they might if there’s any strong voices.

But at this point of time, Google.hk is already censored.

The ball is now back in Google’s court. Let’s see how they proceed. It’s a huge dilemma, but one thing I know for sure, is actually Google don’t want to leave at all.

Google vs China – The Early Stage

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Click on the picture and drag around.

It’s too detailed and imagine the size of the country, it’s really amazing and their web-makers/technopreneurs will catch up sooner or later!

I was reading newsweek the other day, and the focal point was on this topic: Google vs China. It goes like this: Google suspect Chinese hackers hacking into their system. However, Chinese officials did not admit. Then Google threatened to pull out of China using censorship issues as an excuse, China kept quiet throughout the whole issue. Then, Google reversed their words and said they will not abandon their computer engineers and staff in China, hoping to continue their operations in China and wants to begin negotiations with the Chinese authorities.

Google vs China? In the long run, I think China doesn’t depend on Google, definitely it will not want be held to ransom by Google. But if Google pull out of China, it could be a wrong move for Google as it will lose its market.

A Chinese scholar described the whole situation very appropriately by saying that “Google has fired an arrow that cannot be drawn back.”

Quite interesting to see how things will proceed. Personally, I think Baidu will be quietly watching this show! It definitely wouldn’t want to be involved. “Let the government deal with it.” One thing is for sure, China will definitely not be held to ransom by Google. That’s how I see it :)

By the way, pictures above:
Chengdu(China)