AOL Time Warner/News Corp. Deal: Win-win or not ?

By Ting Shi

In the recent international communication circuit, AOL Time Warner and Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation are becoming the envy of all the trans-national media corporations. The two multi-media giants have just grabbed the right to penetrate part of the huge Chinese market by striking a deal with the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) in early September.

In what is considered an unprecedented relaxation of China's tight control over all domestic media, the two companies now can beam their programming directly to Chinese audiences in Guangdong Province, a prosperous area close to Hong Kong.

Another side of the story, which in comparison went unnoticed, is that under the deal, AOL Time Warner and News Corp. will in exchange broadcast a Chinese state-owned English-language channel, CCTV-9, by cable in the United States. According to AOL Time Warner's announcement on Oct 23, the deal will be carried out in January.

Although China's Central Television (CCTV) has already transmitted international programming (CCTV-4) via satellite across the United States, an all English-language, around-the-clock channel will expand the reach of China's message.

Unlike CCTV-4 that serves the international Mandarin-speaking community in the United States with entertainment-heavy programming, CCTV-9 is mainly a news and current affairs channel. It broadcasts seven days a week and 24 hours a day via six satellites over the Pacific Ocean. Its news-oriented programming (especially news events in Asia and China) also includes Chinese cultural feature programs, documentaries and education programs. According to sources at the station, CCTV-9 will not make any major changes in their current programs to cater to American viewers.

The idea for English News on CCTV dates from 1979 as being a means for English learners in China and a window on China for the world. The service was formally launched in 1986, originally on the CCTV2 domestic channel. In 1993, CCTV moved the English News to CCTV International, better known as CCTV4, where it shared space with Chinese-language programming. On September 25, 2000, CCTV officially launched its global English channel - CCTV-9 - with the news the centerpiece of programming.

The philosophy behind creating a global English channel in China, despite western media opinions that it's meant to be another political mouthpiece or image polisher, is to give an objective and complete picture about the changes in China, said sources at the station.

"CCTV-9 is basically the voice of China, but it tries to give balanced reporting and has somehow successfully made its agenda far more palatable compared with our Chinese language newscasts, largely because we use much of the WTN or Reuters inputs," sources said.

According to a case study of CCTV-9 by John Jirik, a communications scholar at the University of Texas, Austin, nearly 84% of foreign news coverage is from news video wholesalers Associated Press Television (APTN) and Reuters Video News (RVN).

"Although we depend on the agencies for supplying us with international coverage, we find that their news values are sometimes different from ours. So we need our own reporters to look at stories from our own viewpoint," said Sheng Yilai, Deputy Director of CCTV International, during an interview with TVNewsWeb.com on August 23, 1999.

CCTV-9 is the production of such thinking. It is intended to present a Chinese perspective on events and issues within China and abroad, and provide an alternative to news about China from sources such as CNN, APTN and RVN, which offer the bulk of images from China seen abroad, said Jirik.

"So the deal is a much needed opportunity for China to present its own side of the China story - surely a more nuanced story, given the familiarity of the story to Chinese journalists and their far greater access to sources - than what is presented by Western media based in China," he said.

Though there is likely to be a small audience for CCTV-9 in the United States, the AOL Time Warner/News Corp. CCTV-9 deal will still be a gain for China, as well for the two companies, the Chinese media specialist said.

"I believe few Americans, except occasionally out of curiosity, will watch Chinese programming in English. Nevertheless, if it costs CCTV nothing to bring CCTV-9 to the U.S., then nothing is lost by entering into the exchange agreement. And every viewer exposed to CCTV-9 is a gain for CCTV," Jirik said.

An additional plus for the Chinese side is the possibility of greater cooperation with AOL/Time Warner / Murdoch. Although Chinese journalists are well-trained, CCTV lacks resources compared to the U.S. side. If the deal involves personnel exchanges and technical cooperation, this would off-set the advantage the U.S. side has commercially from the deal, said Jirik.

Many media observers are of the opinion that there is likely to be little short to medium term interest in AOL-Time Warner / Murdoch in Guangdong, since much of the province is already well-served by Hong Kong's Cantonese-speaking media, as well as Phoenix TV in Mandarin. However, if AOL Time Warner/Murdoch are interested in long term gains, it is quite possible that both companies can leverage their assets in terms of existing and potential programming content into a winning formula in Guangdong, especially if programs are translated into Cantonese. CCTV-9 simply does not have the resources to tailor its programming to U.S. tastes. Therefore, in the longer run, the American side stands to gain far more commercially than does CCTV-9 out of the deal.

Yuezhi Zhao, communications professor at Simon Fraser University and author of "Media, Market and Democracy in China", said:" I don't think it is a win-win situation - it is a major breakthrough for AOL/News Corp., but I don't think China has much to gain from the deal."

However, given that the deal is an exchange, it is certainly not a win-lose situation for either side, since no money is involved, Jirik argued.

For the foreseeable future, China's goal is simply having a window in the U.S. through which to project a Chinese perspective, regardless of who is watching, he said.

Francis Lee, a communications scholar at Stanford University, agreed. He said the American public isn't necessarily the target audience of China's English channel.

"Few people in the U.S. would watch the channel, and even fewer would think it is a credible source of information. But one possible significance of having a channel like that is to provide the opinion leaders in the United States another way to observe China. Basically, don't assume that every broadcasting channel must be aiming at the large public," he said.

Min Dahong, a high-profile media critic in China, said it is significant for China to have its own channel to broadcast in the United States.

"It's important to have China's voice heard in the world, " he said. "It's in the interests of China's development and modernization. Everything has to start from the very beginning, and CCTV-9 is a very good beginning."