Walking through the Global Times (one of the most influential English-language Chinese newspapers in the world) and Shanghai Television Station offices, I felt like a little kid in a candy store. It was exciting seeing the places where newspapers and television broadcasts all come together. Here are some things I learned:

– Global Times is a national newspaper.

– Global Times has done a lot of reports on environmental issues, more than before. A representative said that because air is not an exclusive thing, more importance can be attached to it, and there will be more policies on it.

– A spokesperson said she thinks the trend in online media will be more apps, and that the website is easy to access.

– A day at the Global Times is packed and moves quickly, and the stories must include foreigners, since it is an English-language newspaper.

– At the Global Times, before the paper goes out, the editor might call the reporter in charge of a story to fact check on seemingly small things like whether the source “told the Global Times” or “said” – there is a HUGE journalistic difference between the two! “told the Global Times” means that the newspaper directly reached out to that person, and the person responded as a result of that point of contact.

– The readership of the Global Times is foreign research fellows, diplomats, and business circles. The newspaper also functions as an English-learning entity for people.

– Professor Fang said that the in the West, the Global Times is seen as nationalist and conservative.

– The Chinese version of the Global Times has a daily circulation of more than 1 million.

– A spokesperson said she thinks journalists should be allowed to express their own views in opinion columns.

– The representative said she thinks the SPJ Code of Ethics should be universal, and the bottom line is that journalists should not and do not tell lies, and that every country has problems with journalism.

– The representative said that aspiring journalists should be passionate and should resist temptations of better-paying jobs.

– At the Shanghai Television station, examples of programs are Shanghai Live and Bridge to Japan.

– Shanghai is the first Chinese city to have English-language news.

– International Channel Shanghai has three branches – news, features, entertainment.

– ICS’s target audience is the expat community and people who speak English.

– Journalists focus on interviews, angles, and stories, and don’t feel limited or pressured.

– ICS keeps a neutral stance on general news reporting.

– TV journalism is facing a serious challenge from new media, and now, responsibilities including keeping up with what the new media releases round-the-clock. Working in TV journalism is not a 9-5 job.

– Traditional media quality controls content – microblogs might have inaccurate reporting, one of the people we talked to at STV said.

The representative at the Global Times touched on this, but journalism, in practice, can never truly, truly, truly be fully objective. For instance, if you interview five sources but only have space to include the three in your article, you are exercising selection bias on some level. If you were to write every single thing every single person said, paying no attention to spacing and other practical issues, then you would essentially be a stenographer, not a journalist. But, as the representative said, the bottom line is that journalists do not lie. I think good journalism is getting an accurate, representative picture of the event, and honestly writing an article on it. As Professor Fang mentioned during a conversation I had with her, to be a journalist is to accept great responsibility – it is to accurately portray what people who can’t clarify later said.

We spent our today immersed in media. Getting to ask Chinese journalists about their experiencing about working in the media — both print and broadcast– was very interesting. What struck me most about our conversations today was how passionate the women were about their jobs. There was not even a remote sense of criticism about the condition of the media in China today. We talked at length about an issue being focused on in the media recently; a terrorist attack in China being referred to with quotations around it on CNN, offending the Chinese in a profound way. Our lecturer at the newspaper made the point that the U.S. is wary of calling the incident a terrorist attack because of its disrespect of the condition of other countries. She mentioned that the U.S. would not stand for another country doing the same to them. This prompted me to ask the women at the news station about the representation of Muslims in the media. The responded that Chinese media keeps a fairly neutral view of Muslims as a group even when reporting on world issues. They also mentioned that make documentaries about ethnic minorities in China, including Muslim groups in the western part of the country, to educate the general public on new communities. They mentioned that the government supports these endeavors and is in favor of highlighting the diversity in China.

Today we met with employees of the Global Times, an English language Chinese newspaper, and the International Channel of Shanghai, an English language news television channel. In China, all mass media is state owned, but the nature of the arrangement between the state and the news organization is much more complicated than the typical view from the west. Both of the organizations we visited were profit driven. They were expected to earn a profit (some percentage of which went back to the Chinese government) and fund their own operations, like a normal corporation. I had expected that Chinese media, being state owned, would serve primarily as a mouthpiece for the Chinese government. However, both of the organizations we visited appeared to be similar to western media outlets in that their concern was what the consumer of the news is interested in. Neither organization receives guidelines or was forced to report certain stories for the central government. The major difference is that the government has the authority to have articles pulled if they cover certain sensitive topics. This seems like a major restriction on the effectiveness of the news, but technological trends counteract government censorship. The rise of microblogging websites (like Twitter in the United States) has made it harder for the government to control the spread of information. This has allowed traditional Chinese media outlets more freedom in the content they are able to cover, especially as their role is often to provide facts and dispel rumors. Interestingly, both organizations stressed social responsibility as a part of their mission. In the era of the 24 hour news cycle, I’m left wondering if the profit centered focus of the news organization is any less limiting than government censorship and control of the media.