TVCC of CCTV on fire
The northern building of the new CCTV complex was caught fire on Feb. 9, at around 8:00pm. The fire spread quickly and soon the entire structure was in flames.
The 44-storey building, about 200 meters from the iconic CCTV tower, houses the Television Culture Center (TVCC), the luxury Mandarin Oriental Hotel and an electronic data processing center.
According to Juliet Ye of WSJ, “people packed China’s online forums and blogs, uploaded pictures taken from the fiery scene and hit the streets to conduct their own reporting.” You can also find some collections in Danwei, or CNReviews, and “A Photo Play Of The CCTV Fire”, from ESWN. Click here to see the video filmed by BBC staffs.
The incident hasn’t been featured all that prominently on news portal front pages. An unproven guideline on the fire report was distributed online,
“All networks:
Regarding the “CCTV New North Side Building on Fire” report, all sites must use only the Xinhua news script. Do not post pictures, videos; do not report in depth; only post in Domestic (Chinese) news; close all posts and replies; do not put this as the “top topic”; do not place this in “Recommended Articles”.” — source: CNReviews.com
It turned out that CCTV itself is responsible for Monday’s massive fire (via China Daily). At the day after the fire, an office director at CCTV and 11 others have been detained by the Beijing police for questioning, according to state news agency Xinhua. Chinese continued to dissect the event online with a sardonic tilt. See EEO’s story about Chinese online reaction.
Via China Digital Time,
China’s young and hottest blogger Han Han (韩寒) took fire at CCTV once again. This blogpost, written on Feb. 11, has once again been deleted from his Sina blog, but remains on the recently “resurrected” Bullog International website (hosted in United States.) The witty, sarcastic content is being re-posted by thousands of netizens within the Great Firewall.
You can find Han Han’s article in English (translated by CDT) in the link above.
The China Blog of TIME, “The Problem With CCTV” mentioned a pointed critique of one recent CCTV program after the fire.
Publishing still hot
China Daily says, Publishing still hot on bourses,
If you think the publishing industry is going irreversibly downhill in this Internet age, think again. It is fast becoming one of the hottest sectors in the Chinese stock market, thanks to government support, in a big way.
The State Council issued a new provision last year to support development of the culture industry. It is believed that the policy has underscored the future profits and development of publishing companies. Below is another news about publishing industry in China, “Media reform in China by the end of 2010, says GAPP”,
“By the end of 2010, all for-profit news media and publishing entities will be decoupled from the government institutions they are affiliated with and transformed into separate companies. The government will no longer place restrictions on them in terms of ISBN numbers, publication licenses, and content.”
Journalist “black list”
Via Reuters,
Li Dongdong, a deputy chief of the General Administration of Press and Publication, told officials that proposed strengthened regulations for Chinese journalists would include a “full database of people who engage in unhealthy professional conduct”, the China News Service reported.
“People entered into the transgressor list will be excluded from engaging in news reporting and editing work,” the report said, citing Li.
Other links you might be interested in
- Danwei: Hoax dictionary entries about legendary obscene beasts
- Danwei: Youku’s plans for 2009
- MacKinnon’s Research Paper: China’s Censorship 2.0: How companies censor bloggers