Chair and key presenter: Qian Gang, Co-Director, China Media Project, Journalism and Media Studies Centre, The University of Hong Kong
Moderator/facilitator: David Bandurski, Research Associate, China Media Project, Journalism and Media Studies Centre, The University of Hong Kong.
Panel of Chinese journalists and bloggers:

* Hu Yong, Associate Professor, Peking University
* Li Yong-gang, Assistant Director, Universities Service Centre for China Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
* Song Zheng, Editor-in-chief, Tianya
* Zhang Dong-sheng, Editor-in-chief (Editorial Department), QQ.com
* Zhai Minglei, Editor-in-chief, 1 Bao

(NOTE: THIS IS A SUMMARY, NOT VERBATIM TRANSLATION)

Qian Gang opens the session:
June 12 was the 1-month anniversary of the Wenchuan earthquake. He opens with a question about how Chinese news media and internet have responded to the earthquake.

Song Zheng: In ‘76, during the Tangshan Earthquake he and his family were affected by the earthquake and didn’t know what was going on, living in shelter and didn’t have much information. Now with the internet we can find out what’s going on much more quickly.

Li Yonggang: Weve been talking a lot about changes. We often talk about China as a slow moving dragon. The Internet is provoking that dragon to react more quickly. In the first half of the year, the government had to deal with the snowstorm, Tibet, and the torch relay protests, making it feel defeated, the earthquake was a way to boost the government’s confidence.

Zhang Dong-sheng: The earthquake reaffirmed the ability of the Chinese press to act like real journalists, but there were still a lot of restrictions.

Zhai Minglei: Showed how the Chinese people can take initiative and action.

Hu Yong: The earthquake: people started watching TV instead of the internet initially after the quake, but then a group of civilian reporters emerged. Like the “tent incident”

Bandurski then asks a question: to what extent can citizen media act as social watchdogs and to what extent does that role continue to rest with traditional media? Also what are the latest measures by govt to control the internet?

Song Zheng: Tianya is more of a platform than a media. Tianya has “wumaodang” and “fenqing,” it is also a place where people have exposed the nailhouse, the brick kiln incident, etc. It’s used by all kinds of people We wish we didn’t have to delete anything but of course there are times when we have no choice. A lot of reporters use Tianya as a place to find news tips. Then they’ll go and follow up with reporting and investigation, then the netizens will pick up on the reports, then they will advance the story, and it goes back and forth. Some reporters also post the reports their editors won’t publish on the Internet. It’s impossible to say who is going to replace whom. It’s a mutually-reinforcing symbiotic relationship.

Li Yonggang: What is the logic of Chinese government controls? China is a big body of water. The control system is like a water management system. They have 2 rols: one is to manage water flow. The other is to prevent droughts or floods which will threaten the government power. So the government is better and better at managing the water system. They know they can’t manage too tightly and they will allow maximum and minimum levels which change according to the general environmental circumstances. Though of course their ability is not as great as they would like. This is a huge resource-heavy enterprise, requiring a lot of people and money to manage this system. However it doesn’t want to privatize this entire system. At the same time this system is comprised of many parts and shouldn’t be viewed as a monolith either.

Zhang Dongsheng: The whole management system has a certain amount of effectiveness. But online media isn’t just the portals, renminwang, xinhuawang. Also blogs and QQ groups. It’s impossible to manage all of these latter things effectively.

Zhai Minglei: The GFW is not a wall between two ideologies, especially since China isn’t actually a socialist society anymore. Fear is what holds the GFW together. We should work to reduce the number of people who use threats to manage us, and encourage the increase of those who use trust and information. There are a lot of issues that mainstream media can’t report, but which citizen media can successfully report. But the best strategy for citizen media is to act in a non-threatening manner so that more people in the government will realize that information is not a threat.

Hu Yong: Earthquake – coverage went through several stages: emergency response, then adjustment in which the media got organized, mourning period, then the assertion of control. Most chinese people got their information about the earthquake from broadcast mainstream media. But Internet information spreads and flows around flexibly.

Another question from Bandurski: how much space is there for online discussion?

Song: Most grassroots netizens aren’t equipped to act as professional reporters. But the internet is a great platform where people can exchange information and opinions. It’s very important that the internet has become a place where people speak their minds. Chinese people for centuries have been used to receiving the truth from above, not contributing to it.

Li: People who’ve been acting as citizen reporters for a long time, they’ve gained credibility over time. Many citizen reporters are also actors in events as well as being reporters. Many times the control of internet platforms like Tianya are not due to a central order, but rather due to the initiative of an individual official. So you can’t look at the whole situation as a monolith.

Zhang: So far China still doesn’t have a citizen media platform like OhMyNews that combines citizen contributors with professional editors. There are a lot of hurdles in terms of law, etc. before this can be possible.

Zhai: A real citizen reporter is an ordinary person who is observing the events happening to themselves and the people around them. So he doesnt think that 1 bao qualifies really because he’s a solo ex-reporter. His experience with 1Bao has been cat and mouse with the authorities.

Hu: Citizen reporters will have a surge on an issue, then get beaten down via censorship/removal of blog posts. To analyze what’s going on you need to look at 4 moving parts, the Internet, mainstream media, citizen media, and the propaganda dept.

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