Mobile News in Chinese Newspaper Groups: A Case Study

of Yunnan Daily Press Group by Liu Cheng and Axel Bruns 2009

In China

• Mobile phone – fifth media

• Modes of gathering news with mobile:– Short-message services (SMS)– Multimedia Message Service (MMS)– 3G– 4G

SMS news service

• Yunnan Daily Press Group (Yndaily)– Sends 2-5 SMS everyday• However, SMS is limited to 70 Chinese characters

• September 2002 – 1,500 users• January 2005 – 290,000 users• January 2006 – 120,000 users– Service Providers exploited the absence of clear

rules• Limited users trust remains a key barrier

MMS news service

• June 2006 Yndaily utilize MMS– MMS allows transmission of audio and video

content• End of 2007 – 100,000 MMS users, 50,000

SMS users

3G services

• 3G phones – multimedia and networking devices

• Opportunities for user participation• 3G mobile media actively attracts, rather than

annoy, their target audiences• It’s more flexible, customizable and interactive

news service

Developing mobile technology

• Participatory journalism helps develop loyalty and trust with their audience

• Yndaily will no longer be considered as a newspaper group but as a multimedia company

Mobile News Market in China

• Development of China mobile Market• Market Size: China and USA• Position of Mobile News in China• Censorship and Regulation in China• Grass Mud Horse (CAO NI MA) Spirit

Development of China Mobile Market

Market Size

Largest Internet Market in the world+Largest Mobile Market in the world=Largest Mobile Internet Market in the world

News is most popular internet service

Censorship and Regulation in China

Self-Censorship &Key Word Filtering

Grass Mud Horse (CAO NI MA) Spirit

A Chinese Internet meme widely used as symbolic defiance of the widespread Internet censorship in China.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWfUOG0EA9w (2:46-3:33)

4G Networks• In Australia:

– 4G network announced to go live in Australia late 2011

– Telstra, Vodafone, Optus, VHA

• In America:– HTC & Sprint released EVO 4G

March 2011

• Japan, Korea, Scandinavia and Russia already had 4G networks by 2008

4G Features• Ultra-broadband internet

access, IP telephony, gaming services, streamed multimedia

• High speed mobility communication

• LTE - Long Term Evolution technology

• Applications - run as on desktop computers

The Future?• Recent release of iPhone 4S • 5G networks

– Korea/Japan 2012

• 3D without glasses

Question time

• How do you think the inevitable and rapid expansion of future generation technologies will change the way we perceive mobile news?

• Tomorrow’s mobile phones will watch your every move, should we afraid or should we embrace the new move?

• Do you think the censorship in China will become more strict in concurrence with the technological advances?