Global Media Journal

China's New Media in the 21 Century

From: Hongyi Yin
Date: 12 Nov 2002
Time: 02:50:51 -0600
Remote Name: 202.108.198.219

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Jumping On the Internet Bandwagon: China’s New Media in the 21 Century By Hongyi Yin Adjunct Researcher in Innovation Policy, Public Policy Institute, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China

Beginning with the electronic versions of Chinese Wonderland Scholars and the China Trade News in 1995, China’s media organizations have been hopping onto the Web at a breakneck speed. For the past 7 years, wave after wave, radio and TV stations, news agencies, newspapers and publishing houses have been seizing this fad. According to incomplete statistics, by 2002, more than 1,000 of the country’s traditional media groups, excluding those from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao, have adopted the Web, with nationwide newspapers and cosmopolitan newspapers such as evening and morning ones taking up the largest portion. Next come business newspapers, economic and trade news, financial and securities news. Media dinosaurs like the People’s Daily, Xinhua News Agency, CCTV, China Radio International, Guangming Daily, China Youth Daily etc. have thrown their weight behind their own websites. With all this fanfare, one would expect some results. But ever since economic reforms were first implemented and China’s doors swung open in 1976, the Chinese mind has been after fashions. Even diehard Communists have discarded Mao clothing and started to don Western suits. And face has been more important than substance. So when the Internet arrived, not adopting it began to stand for backwardness itself. The result is that traditional media organizations are ambivalent towards the Internet. While they all claim to own websites and do own them, they have been afraid that Web media might occupy too much of traditional turf and upstage old-time journalism. Partly due to this, although the websites have mushroomed, except for Xinhua.org and Peopledaily.com, most are still in their infancy. And a growth model has yet to materialize. The fact that they have shortchanged the Internet is also reflected in their wholesale adoption of traditional media’s content for publishing on the Web, without due consideration for the Web’s own advantages. The interactive nature of the Internet would have enabled different types of journalism, various kinds of chat rooms and discussion zones, and online counseling by experts, but is viewed as anathema. The Internet means more and better multimedia, which can only enhance the traditional roles of these organizations. But their response has been that they should stick to serious journalism as their raison d’etre, and leave entertainment to be added to sites by third-rate newcomers to mass media. It seems that people have difficulty getting to know their place in the new game. The wiz kids have been too confident in working wonders using their expertise, only to find that it is good content on websites that ultimately calls the shots. And on the part of traditional media veterans, it is high time that they realized that only by combining their size and time-honored strengths with new media methods can they hope to succeed. In fact, many of those who have been remotely successful are mainstream and government media, whose skills have been honed in their traditional roles. Bridging the gap between technology and the humanities, and between tech wiz kids and veterans, has always been a problem. It is now an uphill battle. And it will be hard for new media in China to prove that they are more than a fad, despite the recent bursting of the Internet bubble. So, do your stuff, boys and girls!