Live Issue... Media owners must wait for the Olympic storm to pass

From outdoor to online video, Beijing is flexing its muscles over media owners. So what is behind this sudden flurry of regulation?

Recent, rather sensationalist, headlines in Western-focused media point to the Olympics, with the authorities keen to be in control when the eyes of the world turn upon China. Even the shutdown of TimeOut Beijing has been linked to the upcoming sports extravaganza.

It appears that there are two distinct forces at work influencing the media limitations.

The first, unarguably the handiwork of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), is the drive to protect sponsors. This has been achieved by removing as many as 30,000 outdoor advertising sites in Beijing and putting in place controls to limit non-sponsor access to Olympic athletes.

The licensing of online video sites, meanwhile, along with a strict ban on Olympics-related user-generated content, reflect the focus that Beijing is trying to bring to the area of intellectual property rights.

According to Ed Hula (pictured), editor and founder of aroundtherings.com, the need to protect broadcaster rights is a definite priority, even if, for example, it is hard to envisage similar controls in place when London hosts the 2012 event.

“With the growth of sites, such as YouTube, there’s just more and more potential for broadcasting rights to be infringed,” he notes. “Whoever won the right to organise the 2008 Olympics would have had to be vigilant about user-generated content, to make sure that broadcasters’ property was protected - it just so happens that China is organising the Olympics at the point in time when this has become an issue.”  

The crackdown on video-sharing highlights the second force at work, namely the perceived rollback of media freedom in response to the emergence of new, largely unregulated digital channels.

Chinese authorities have been seeking ways to ensure video providers monitor content closely.

This attitude will be tested during the Games, given Beijing’s initial promises that it would offer complete freedom to report. In this area, it appears that Beijing is considerably less willing to play the role of pliant IOC partner.

“Every Olympic organisation has had politically sensitive information - but I’ve never known broadcasting restrictions like these,” says Hula.

Wolf Group CEO David Wolf is a little more positive, pointing out that the recent decision to allow foreign journalists access to non-Olympic sites “may very well have been influenced by the IOC.”

For the first time in two decades, foreigners will be permitted to uplink TV signals directly from Beijing.

They are still waiting, however, for licences to operate the relevant satellite equipment.

The priorities of the IOC and the Beijing authorities have combined to create a ‘perfect storm’ of regulation; media owners will have to wait until the storm passes before the new media landscape becomes clear.