Audits of newspapers

For the record, the GAPP in 2005 created the 国新出版物发行数据调查中心 Sino Publication Audit Center (SPAC), see details on their site www.sinoabc.org
It is said to be independent but is managed and sponsored by the GAPP (under supervision of vice-GM Mr Shi Feng, who supervises the magazine business)

The idea was to imitate the well-known press audit organizations in developed press markets, BPA (USA...), ABC (UK, USA), OJD (France, Spain), etc., which are independent and sponsored firstly by advertisers, the main users of their audits giving exact circulation figures for newspapers and magazines. These audits are usually freely available online, see for ex. www.bpaww.com or www.hkabc.com.hk

In Beijing the creation of SPAC was following a training period in the UK at UK ABC's, with the blessing of the FIPP. SPAC (and the GAPP) also organizes every year now a seminar about the press business, with foreign speakers. What was suprising with the creation of SPAC, as well as the above mentioned audits in this post, was that the powerful advertisers and press associations were not involved, and that it was hard to see the interest of the GAPP and its press publishers (they are all controlled by the government, one way or the other, at least for magazines; newspapers are more directly controlled by the CCP). Because it is well know that in China, especially for the 20 RMB magazines, which make money mainly with advertising (e.g. fashion magazines), audits would be a catastrophy, as they all lie and that their claimed circulation figures are usually multiplied by 4 or 5. Indeed, big advertisers start being a bit fed-up, such as Zenith last year, which started doing its own surveys concerning magazines, before renegotiating rate cards for some magazines... For the record one of the largest press auditor in the world, BPA from the USA, has opened an office in Beijing and started auditing a few titles (mainly controlled circulation titles, such as Fortune, Forbes, IDG's ComputerWorld, etc... others like Time-Out tried a season and stopped, why ?).
Concerning the SPAC and governmental audits, the reality is that the SPAC, and all these audit efforts by the government, are not directly related to an independent demand from advertisers. The governments, central and local, want to know for themselves what's going on with their press publishers, not to help advertisers. Main reason goes back with the demand to press groups in the 90's to be more independent financially (while still remaining non-independent concerning editorial of course), but today for some press groups, the big and increasing flow of advertising money and some scandals worries the governments (or make them jealous) and they want to know more about what's going on... Of course, the SPAC has very little means and experience, advertisers won't have access to these governmental figures, and all this will end up probably with banquets and red envelops probably... So if you are a serious advertiser, better call BPA, or even just an international auditor such as the big 4 or 5, if you want a serious and independent audit (and even that won't be easy; best thing is to start with a visit to the printer)...

Chinese nannies...
(a joke)
It works for taking care of oldsters as well. Wasn't it Rupert M who launched the fashion ?

Welcome back Cestmoi!

In Taiwan, back in the bad old days, one way people researched newspaper circulation was to uncover how much blank newsprint each paper was ordering.

anyone know how to translate "au pair" into Chinese? is it the same as nanny?