Media regulation

The travails of Tudou and Tang Wei

tudou_tudou.jpg
Tick tock

Update: Tudou is back up, 00:05 Beijing Time, 15 March.

The story about online video site Tudou, recently censured by SARFT takes another twist.

Since early this morning, the site has been offline, offering only the following message in explanation:

Potatoes:

To provide you all with better service, we are migrating and expanding Tudou's central servers.

Our service will be suspended from 0:00 to 24:00 on 14 March.

At 0:00 on 15 March, our migration will be complete and Tudou will promptly return home.

Nobody in the industry believes the explanation of the server move: see for example this article on Enorth.com.cn which says that the server moving explanation is "suspicious" and also says that this may be the "most serious case" of a website shutting down in the history of the Chinese Internet.

For their part, Tudou seem to be confident that they will restore services at midnight tonight: Tudou videos embedded in other websites currently show a clock counting down the seconds until midnight (see screenshot above).

Perhaps Tudou will return so harmoniously that their troubles will be over, but it is probably going to take some work. On Tuesday this week, research and consulting firm Marbridge released this bit of information:

42 Online Video Sites to Sign "Self-Discipline Agreement"

After 8 companies signed the "Self-Discipline Agreement for Chinese Internet Audiovisual Programming", another 42 online video sites have applied to join them. Among them, some of the better-known names include: Netmovie, Jeboo, Vodone, Sina, PPStream, Youku, Quacor, UUsee, 6Rooms (6.cn), Hupo.tv, UiTV, QQ.com, and PPLive.

Editor's note: Tudou, which recently saw its cooperation with CCTV.com put on hold and is now awaiting possible punishment from the State Administration of Radio Film and Television (SARFT) for alleged violations of rules on banned content, is not listed among either the first 8 or current round of 42 existing/applying signatories of the Self Discipline Agreement.

An expensive omission, perhaps?

*****

In other SARFT news, Normandy Madden of Advertising Age has an article about the crazy media regulator's ban on actress Tang Wei (reported on Danwei here), that looks at at affair from the point of view of Unilever, whose Ponds brand has been using Tang as a celebrity endorser:

[Unilever] recently selected Ms. Tang as the face of Pond's in the mainland, a major skin-care market, as part of an effort that began last month to lift Pond's into the mid- to high-end category. Ms. Tang's celebrity endorsement deal with Unilever is reportedly worth $845,000...

In a statement given to Advertising Age by Unilever in China, the company said: "The advertising itself was produced and distributed in accordance with Chinese rules and regulations. Government approval was received before distribution and airing. We have not received any official notice for the ban and we are currently trying to ascertain what lies at the root of the issue. The Pond's contract with Tang Wei remains intact."

The agencies handling Pond's creative and media in China, Ogilvy & Mather and WPP sibling MindShare, respectively, declined to comment.

There are currently 3 Comments for The travails of Tudou and Tang Wei.

Comments on The travails of Tudou and Tang Wei

现在12:10...土豆回来了...准时!

Yes, it's working fine for me too now - looks like they really were migrating servers after all.

I've heard from a couple of people now that they've actually seen Tang Wei's Ponds ad on BTV in the past week - including BBS thread that questions whether the whole controversy surrounding the banning of the ad is just some PR stunt.

Post a comment

All comments are moderated and subject to review by Danwei contributors and editors, but well-grounded and articulate comments will be published regardless of which way they lean. Because comments published on any website ultimately contribute to the character of that website, we may decline to publish comments that are irrelevant, redundant, or that do not adhere to generally accepted standards of courtesy; if you are looking for a fight, there are plenty of other venues available online.


Some useful html: <b>bold</b>, <i>italic</i>,
<a href="http://www.danwei.org">link</a>

Media Partners
Visit these sites for the latest China news
090609guardian2.png 090609CNN3.png
China Media Timeline
Major media events over the last three decades
Danwei Model Workers
laomo2008fpA.jpg
Recommended blogs and new media
Books on China
AXL090619paulfrenchbook.jpg
Foreign journalists in China, from the Opium Wars to Mao : Paul French, author of a book on Carl Crow has written a book about the lives and exploits of foreign journalists reporting from China from the 1820s to 1949.
Earnshaw Books' Tales of Old Peking: Tales from Old Peking is available from Earnshaw Books, and like its sister, Tales from Old Shanghai is a book of fragments of information about periods, events or places in Beijing's history, collaging together pictures and text about eunuchs, concubines, the Lama Temple, Opium Wars, art, emperors, and a miscellany of other interesting topics
Henry F. Pringle's "Bridge House Survivor": Pringle was imprisoned by Japanese forces from October 1942 to August 1945, and Bridge House Survivor, available from Earnshaw Books, is his harrowing account of torture under the Japanese.
Front Page of the Day
A different newspaper every weekday
From the Vault
Classic Danwei posts
+ A short interview with Muzi Mei (2004.02): Danwei interviews Muzi Mei
+ CCTV vs. classic movies (2006.03): A rundown of several pastiches of Chinese movies appearing online as 大史记 - "The Year That Was". Some from CCTV, others not. With links to video.
+ Street hawker cries of Beijing (2006.12): Yang Changhe demonstrates hawker's cries in a video shot by Muzimei.
Danwei Archives
Danwei Feeds
Via Feedsky rsschiclet2.png (on the mainland)
or Feedburner rsschiclet.gif (blocked in China)
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Main feed: Main posts (FB has top links)
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Top Links: Links from the top bar
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Danwei Jobs: Want ads
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Danwei Digest: Updated daily, 19:30