Support for upholding ideals – To readers

In nearly 12 years as editor-in-chief, I’ve never written any editorials, but now, sitting here in an empty office building, it’s necessary to pick up the heavy pen. I think back to the time when I was studying in the United States 20 years ago, when I was a reporter and an editor. I was inspired by the title of “uncrowned king” that the media held. I sought out social justice and journalistic truth, and I was excited by the progress of China’s reform and opening. Even now, all these old memories are still vivid in my mind, and the beliefs I’ve held have never changed.

The 300-desk Caijing editorial department on the 19th floor of [Beijing’s] Prime Tower could have been considered the most modern news bureau in the country, but now it’s just an empty office. Over the past week, the editors and reporters who stayed on only occupied a small corner of the big office. The current team of less than 20 people had to finish the work that was formerly done by 200. They worked very hard to get this issue to you — our most-respected readers. Right now, sitting among these hardworking colleagues, It’s very clear to me, this issue won’t be satisfactory enough for you.

Overnight, an editorial team that took 12 years to put together up and left. It was this team that achieved a leading position in the industry, and turned Caijing magazine into a top brand. Ms. Hu Shuli, the representative figure of this team, also won applause from both our readers and public, thanks to her sharp personality and her commitment to ideals. I deeply regret the separation from a partner of so many years.

Over the last two weeks I have spent a lot of time pondering this – why is it that this magazine, that holds such a special place in China, has to fact such a severe challenge? I’m still not sure whether I have found the answer yet. But one thing I understand very clearly is that the responsibility that I bear and the responsibility borne by the SEEC [Stock Exchange Executive Council], the owner of the magazine, is not is not alleviated by one bit, instead, it is heavier than before.

Twenty years ago, supported by a group of reform pioneers, the SEEC was launched by young people who held high expectations for China’s reform. Over the past 20 years, we have emerged from these reforms, we have grown as reforms deepened and we have followed their course. From the early stages of promoting the establishment of Chinese capital markets to participating in founding the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets, from promoting the reform of China’s investment and financing mechanisms to the establishment of the modern enterprise system, we have deeply experienced the profound changes taking place in this country. All of this is part of China’s 30-year reform and opening process, and also a part of the 60-year transformation of the republic. The institutional changes in China’s economic system over the next 30 years and the accompanying social changes won’t allow us to drop our responsibility towards society.

The most pressing task facing me now is to carry out and build upon the ideals that Caijing magazine has always supported and championed – Independence, exclusivity, and uniqueness. But it is really not easy to transmit such ideals.

In order to realize this, we must adhere to the spirit of “great virtue means great tolerance” and “harmony in diversity.” We welcome talent from all over the world, so as to build a democratic platform for discussion. I really hope to see more and more collaboration between the old colleagues and new colleagues, so that all of us can transmit and develop the ideals of Caijing magazine.

This idea is rooted in the newsperson’s sense of responsibility and mission, which is that “the public has the right to know.” We should defend this right, and moreover, we should act in the service of this right. Therefore, a commitment to editorial independence is at the very heart of our mission. Not only must we guard against the erosion of our independence from business interests, but we must also resist the imposition of inappropriate controls from above. As individuals, we all have our weaknesses. But as tool of the public, we are also aware of the price we must pay.

No matter what the price, there is one thing that we will never use in an exchange, and that is you — the interests and needs of our readers. In the depths of our hearts, we know that you have given this magazine more than trust, and far more than just liking it. We fully understand that this magazine belongs to you, as it belongs to the sense of social justice and conscience that you represent. Because of this, we should be able to do it, while maintaining a modest heart and listening to your voices. By fully understanding your hopes and desires, we will continue providing independent observations, exclusive reporting and unique insights.

Caijing Magazin’e columist [and poet] Bei Dao wrote in a famous poem 30 years ago. “A new turning point and twinkling stars / decorating the clear sky without any obstruction / 5000-year-old hieroglyphs / Those are the staring eyes of the future’s people.” These words express my current frame of mind. A more open and diverse platform opening up to more and more young people.

In my heart, Caijing doesn’t only belong to its founders and managers. Neither does it belong only to you — our most respected readers. Caijing also belongs to the social justice and conscience that you represent, and Caijing belongs to a more reformed and more open China.

The Cnzz.com report states that almost two-thirds of China’s 338 million Web users are now online game players. The online game industry, which currently accounts for more than half of the total Internet economy, will see strong annual growth at a rate of 20% future years, the report says.

The mainstream remains the awkwardly named sector of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs). In October, six out of the 10 most popular online games in China are MMORPG games, according to the report. World of Warcraft (WoW) by Activision Blizzard, Inc. still tops the list with the most registered players and peak simultaneous online users. But the current government regulatory fighting over its Chinese license, held by Netease (NTES), may yet have a negative impact on the game, according to the report.

Casual games – simple games such as card games — take second place with three ranked among the top 10 game list., while Web page games – such as Tencents’ QQ games– are emerging as a new growth area. According to the report, by the end of Octover 2009, there were 1.54 million users playing the top five Web page games, with each user playing for an average of 30 minutes a day.

The Cnzz.com report also discusses the problem of the “free-to-play” business model that’s prevalent in China’s online game sector. While many games companies in the U.S., for example, charge subscription fees, most Chinese games utilize the free-to-play (F2P) model, which allows players to try out a game without paying. The longer players stay in the game, the more likely they will be to pay for in-game items to move up into higher levels of play. But that also means that people who spend the most money are the best performers.

The report notes that China’s game developers have been considering subscription models since earlier this year. Among the top 10 game list, four are subscription-based titles and two were commercially launched this year, including Shanda’s (SNDA) major new title, AION. The Cnzz.com says that a shift to the subscription model would be more likely to create a sense of equity and fairness in the games, because the top players would be those who spend the most time playing, instead of those who spend the most.

China’s online game revenue in 2008 was 20.8 billion yuan, accounting for about 27% global share, ahead of South Korea at 21% and slightly behind the U.S. at 29%, according to an earlier report by Shanghai-based market research firm iResearch. The firm also predicted that China is likely to surpass the U.S. to become the world’s largest by the end of 2009 (read our earlier post on the subject here.)

–Juliet Ye

A little more than a month ago, the Xinhua-owned Economic Information Daily newspaper began reporting on allegedly illegal discharges from two iron ore mines owned by metals trading giant Minmetals Corp. into a river in the city of Wuan in Hebei province. The initial report drew strong protests from Minmetals. But the Economic Information Daily, later with clear support from higher levels of Xinhua, slogged on.

On Friday, the Economic Information Daily said that in an interview with Sun Xiaomin, deputy manager of production safety and energy-saving emissions reduction for Minmetals, conducted by a reporter from Xinhua Insight, an investigative section of Xinhua, Sun acknowledged Minmetals’ role in the allegations of environmental pollution in Wuan, which the paper said had damaged crops and sickened residents. Among Sun’s comments:

“Recently we have done some investigation ourselves. We did discover that the media-reported issues do exist, objectively, and that we need to immediately rectify them. We acknowledge that Minmetals is a company in the midst of transformation. We used to be a company focused on external trade, but in recent years, we have created a lot of policies in energy-saving emissions reduction and environmental protection; set up professional departments; and are recruiting professional talent. But we still have a lot of catching up to do with the requirements of the State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. Definitely, a lot of questions haven’t been smoothly resolved, and therefore we warmly welcome media scrutiny.”

“With regard to illegal discharge, I cannot go into details as this is still under investigation. This is more a matter of experience and a lesson. For example, from a strung-together reading of the law, we can infer that we can discharge into a river. But we need to carry out related studies, and must also get the written approval of government.”

“Currently, we are undertaking some environmental procedures. We are doing several sample tests, and have submitted to evaluation by local environmental protection authorities. If the environmental evaluation passes, we will continue to properly reinforce the agricultural land. If it doesn’t pass, we will stop the discharge and restore the land to its original form.””

Xinhua, in earlier comments to us, had said it has never shied from this sort of tough environmental reporting. Certainly, in recent months, in articles ranging from tainted milk to lead poisoning cases, the media appears to be stepping up as managers of the national conversation. To a Western audience which demands such a role of its press, that may not be the usual typecasting for Xinhua. As we’ve noted before, the incident in Wuan may be one of the markers of change.

– Chuin-Wei Yap

“Now, there’s this new stereotype — the friend-of-China stereotype,” Rowswell said. He made the comment in response to a question whether foreigners are intentionally portrayed on Chinese TV as “cuddly” pets not to be taken seriously. Rowswell explained that preconceived notions from audiences, directors and journalists are a job hazard in the entertainment industry.
In his talk Thursday, the 44-year-old Canadian traced how a chance appearance on a Chinese TV variety show in 1988 vaulted him from gifted language student into Dashan – one of the most famous people in the world’s most populous nation. “I hit a sweet spot” and 550 million people were watching, he said.

“It was a one-shot deal…all of a sudden I have this name,” he said.

It’s difficult to overstate the role of “Dashan” in personifying “the Westerner” for a generation of Chinese. Rowswell arrived just as China’s population was fixing eyes on the unfamiliar world and TV was its window. He gained wide acceptance by meeting Chinese on their terms: speaking excellent Mandarin and paying homage to local entertainment traditions with a comedy act.
How to benchmark Rowswell’s impact is trickier. He told the FCC he took some pride in a Chinese magazine report a few years ago that described Canadians as the “least annoying foreigners” and gave him some credit for it.

And while Rowswell said the buffoon-foreigner routine that launched him was later “done to death” in China, he doesn’t give much thought to how he is portrayed in the media. He said he can no more control what is broadcast on China Central Television than he can the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

He said the fact that he hasn’t used his fame as a platform for commentary on hot-button issues like Taiwan and Tibet reflects how his role is not political. “I’m not an apologist for China because I’ve got nothing to apologize for,” he said.

At another point, he noted, “When you see China from the inside, you see the progress that makes you more accepting of the problems.”

In his “Ottawa Valley twang,” Rowswell noted that he still regards himself as outsider and “I’ve never tried to pretend I’m Chinese.”

These days, Rowswell said he relishes being a “government bureaucrat” as the commissioner general representing Canada at the upcoming Shanghai World Expo since the post allows him to “bridge this gap between East and West.” Canadians, better than most people, understand the significance of a World’s Fair, he said, since Montreal’s Expo 1967 , “was sort of our coming-out party.” Rowswell played a similar role for Team Canada at last year’s Beijing Olympics.

In addition to employing Dashan to attract what it hopes will be 30,000 people daily or 5.5 million visitors in total to its Expo pavilion, Canada is also relying as a draw on another big homegrown name, Cirque du Soleil, which is designing the national pavilion’s creative content.

Rowswell said he continues to struggle with how best to harness his popularity in China. He makes numerous appearances, though some pay no more than “pocket change.”

In September, he was a featured star at an “international pomegranate festival” in a place so remote along the borders of Yunnan and Sichuan provinces that it took him two flights and a five-hour drive.

The other guest of honor was the Iraqi ambassador to China.

– James T. Areddy

There’s plenty of interesting stuff in the latest paper in Nature Geosciences about the growth in global greenhouse-gas emissions—that the growth is overwhelmingly concentrated in developing countries, for example, or that natural carbon “sinks” such as oceans appear to be less effective at absorbing carbon dioxide than in years past. (More on the paper here and here.)

But one thing in particular stands out: The role played by the rich world’s “offshoring” of manufacturing emissions to the developing world, especially China. The idea that rich countries are, fundamentally, responsible for a significant share of developing-world emissions just adds another wrinkle to global talks that are already going nowhere fast.

According to the paper, “Trends in the sources and sinks of carbon dioxide,” a big part of the emissions growth in developing countries is due to their manufacture of things for export—from flip-flops to iPhones.

In China, for instance, 30% of the growth in emissions from 1990 to 2002 is attributable to the production of exports, the paper says. In recent years, as Chinese factories ramped up production, that share has grown—accounting for 50% of Chinese emissions growth between 2002 and 2005.

Overall, the paper concludes, 30% of total emissions in China—the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases—came from “the production of exports” in 2005.

Not even Chinese officials have gone that far. In raising the issue earlier this year, Chinese government officials estimated between 15% and 25% of the country’s emissions came from the production of stuff the rich world no longer makes for itself.

This whole idea has a history. Academics have been arguing for years that part of China’s emissions growth should be chalked up to the Western consumers who buy the stuff. Indeed, the paper says that while U.S. domestic emissions grew only 6% between 1997 and 2004, “consumption emissions” grew 17%. “A key factor driving the growth of consumption-based emissions was the import of manufactured products from China,” the paper concludes.

And U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke sparked a brief firestorm this summer when he floated the idea that American consumers pick up part of the tab for those emissions, an idea the administration quickly squelched.

The point is—yes, China and the developing world are responsible for the overwhelming majority of new greenhouse-gas emissions, both in recent years and in years to come. But, as the paper notes, a “considerable share” of developing world emissions are now “associated with international trade.”

Which seems to suggest that not just the old Kyoto division between developed and developing countries is outdated—but also that the very idea that greenhouse-gas emissions carry a single passport in the first place is no longer totally valid.

All of which only promises to make already tortured climate talks an even bigger source of friction beteween the haves and the have-nots.

–Keith Johnson

Southern Weekend, a Chinese newspaper based in the city of Guangzhou, on Thursday carried an exclusive interview with Obama that its editor-in-chief conducted a day earlier at the president’s Beijing hotel. The interview was teased in large type on the front page of the paper, and splashed across half of page A02 with a big photograph. It was the only interview Obama did with Chinese media during his three-day China trip – his first visit – which ended Wednesday.

Southern Weekend isn’t just any Chinese newspaper. It has a history of enterprising reportage that sometimes pushes the limits of China’s censors. Over the years, the paper has had several editors and reporters fired or otherwise disciplined for articles that angered central or local governments. The White House’s decision to invite Southern Weekend to do the interview, on just a day’s notice, seems clearly to have been aimed at rewarding one of China’s most respected journalistic institutions in a week that was less than a shining moment for Chinese transparency and openness.

But something strange happened on the article’s way to some readers. Copies of Thursday’s paper were delivered to several foreign news organizations in Beijing – including the offices of NBC News and the Financial Times – without the page that carried the Obama interview. That triggered speculation among some observers that the interview might have somehow fallen afoul of China’s information-control apparatus, and been yanked. Further fueling those suspicions: The paper’s official “electronic edition” on the Internet entirely omitted page A02 – it skipped directly from A01 to A03.

After Obama’s experience at Monday’s “town hall” meeting with young people in Shanghai - which instead of being broadcast live on the Internet by the state-run Xinhua news agency, as agreed to by Beijing, was carried only on local Chinese television and transcribed on the Web – it’s certainly not hard to imagine that China’s censors might try to curb the U.S. president’s audience. Obama’s public charisma and engaging style clearly make the Chinese leadership uncomfortable.

But the Southern Weekend affair is no clear-cut case of censorship. For starters, many subscribers in Beijing did receive the full edition of the paper, interview included, and unexpurgated versions of the paper were also easily available at news stands. It would make little sense for censors to try to keep foreign journalists from seeing the article while leaving it easily accessible for Chinese readers. Moreover, while the interview was missing from the official electronic edition, a version of it was available on another Southern Weekend site – even if it required some digging to find it.

Also complicating things: Southern Weekend almost surely had to get official approval from Beijing before agreeing to do the interview with Obama. And, above all, nothing the president is quoted as saying in the piece appears even remotely likely to offend the Chinese government. The relatively brief printed exchange contains only seven questions - including one about whether Obama still gets time to play basketball – and the president’s responses basically all repeated points he made previously on the importance of Sino-American relations, trade, etc.

An official in the post office that distributes newspapers to the media outlets that received incomplete copied of Thursday’s Southern Weekend said the explanation was simple: The papers had arrived in the morning without their front pages, which came later in the day. She said this is a common problem with big news days. An official in the distribution department of Southern Weekend confirmed that the paper indeed had blown its production deadlines for the Thursday edition and delivered the front page late.

So what about the Web site? Officials at Southern Weekend were less illuminating on that. One staffer in the department in charge of the affected Web site said the electronic version of page two had been pulled after a “request” from “relevant departments” (有关部门) – sometimes code for the government. Two Southern Weekend journalists directly involved with the article declined to comment.

We may never find out for sure what happened. Perhaps the Southern Weekend editors kept the interview off their free electronic edition to spur sales of the paper. Or, perhaps envy was involved. Many Chinese media – including more powerful state-run outlets – had requested face time with Obama during this trip. That it was granted only to a provincial paper with a reputation for pot-stirring might have rubbed powerful competitors the wrong way.

– Jason Dean

UPDATE: Some readers have inquired about the Chinese’s government’s promise to broadcast U.S. President Barack Obama’s meeting with young people in Shanghai on Nov. 16.

Of course, in the event, there was no live broadcast on Xinhuanet, merely a real-time transcript.

Obama’s exchange with Chinese youth to be broadcast live online

为做好这次网络直播，新华网派出阵容庞大的网络直播采编团队和技术保障团队，在奥巴马对话现场进行了全面的准备。据新华网负责人透露，目前新华网独家直播奥巴马在上海与中国青年对话的各项准备工作已经就绪。届时，海内外网民通过新华网，可收看奥巴马与中国青年对话活动的现场网络直播。

Such a call may resonate among U.S. advocates of a stronger Chinese currency. But it’s unclear what that commitment really means in Chinese.

On Tuesday, the translation provided described the phrase as a commitment to move toward an exchange rate that “faces” more to the market 会更多走向面向市场的一个汇率机制. That would signal Beijing’s commitment to a more flexible exchange rate, consistent with and perhaps a tiny bit stronger than its previous rhetoric. Even stronger phrasing, in Chinese, came from the U.S., which translated it as a pledge toward an exchange rate that is decided by the market to a greater extent 更大程度上由市场决定汇率.

On Wednesday, however, the Chinese Foreign Ministry cited Obama as telling Premier Wen Jiabao exchange-rate reform 改革人民币汇率形成机制 is among moves by China that will help balance bilateral trade. Since July 2005, Beijing has repeatedly said it will continue to reform the exchange-rate mechanism. So such a wording would be consistent with — and no change from — Beijing’s previous rhetoric.

All this talk of yuan policy in the past few days is tricky to parse, partly because Hu and Wen didn’t talk about the currency in public and Obama’s own comments in English are themselves cryptic (It’s unclear whether Hu talked about the currency with Obama, or whether Obama is referring to earlier pledges by China).

And if Obama was indeed referring to something Hu or Wen had told him during their meetings, what did the Chinese say exactly? A staid pledge to continue forex reforms? A potentially stronger pledge toward a market-oriented yuan exchange rate? Or an even stronger pledge toward an exchange rate set to a greater extent by the market?

The ambiguity may reflect the intricacies of translation and mistranslation. The Foreign Ministry in 2006 initially translated Wen as saying Beijing would widen the range in which the yuan can rise or fall against the dollar each day (a specific move that would make the exchange rate more responsive to market forces) before correcting the translation to say Beijing would boost exchange rate flexibility (which is aspirational).

But it may also be an ambiguity of convenience. Obama’s comments give the impression, in English, that the U.S. pressed the Chinese and extracted something from them on the yuan exchange rate, an increasingly hot topic at international gatherings of finance ministers and central bankers.

For China, it’s unclear whether Hu and Wen made new promises in recent days to Obama on the currency or merely repeated their rhetoric. That ambiguity leaves them wiggle room to set their own currency policy.

As a participant at last week’s meeting of central bankers and finance ministers from Pacific Rim economies told Dow Jones Newswires: Yi Gang, a People’s Bank of China deputy governor, said at the meeting that Beijing won’t bow to any external pressure to let the yuan rise. And it won’t move faster on yuan liberalization than it deems necessary.

Thus, flipping through dictionaries may not help global observers of the yuan’s direction.

– Terence Poon