| The conception of Mainstream Newspapers is a product of Post-City Newspaper Age in China.We could make a definition over the mainstream newspapers on the basis of studying the general state of influential newspapers both here and abroad:spreading the dominant societal values as our objective,making the social elites as our core audiences who grasp the notion of decision,information and consumption,making the influential events coming from current politics and finance which would bring about strong influences as the main content of communication,making the reflection of the mainstream life status,trends and disciplines as our responsibility.This kind of newspaper which has great credibility and influence could be called mainstream newspaperAnd Pro-Mainstream Newspapers can be defined like this:Trying to spread the dominant societal values as objective,making the social elites as core audiences who grasp the notion of decision,information and consumption,making the influential events coming from current politics and finance which would bring about strong influences as the main content of communication,making the reflection of the mainstream life status,trends and disciplines as responsibility.This is Pro-Mainstream Newspapers.The conception of Pro-Mainstream Newspapers stresses the attempts and efforts to make it become a real mainstream newspaper, and is not equal to it.In recent years,there's still no Mainstream Newspapers in typical significance in China; however,we have three typical Pro-Mainstream Newspapers,like Southern Metropolis Daily, the Beijing News and Times＆Truth News.In the first half of the year 2000,based on thorough investigation over the market, Southern Metropolis Daily adjusted its orientation into Mainstream Media,strengthening the spread of main values and the reports about mainstream information,establishing opinion page,and intensifying in-depth reporting.After making an effort on these points above mentioned nearly 10 years,Southern Metropolis Daily has been considered to be a solemn newspaper and a mainstream newspaper with its serious feature,unremitting pursuit of mainstream social values,thorough and professional reflection of social evolution of China.But in fact,the reason why Southern Metropolis Daily was in trouble during its process of mainstreaming significantly lies in its high-end positioning and market attribute.when the newspaper enters an area,it is very hard to avoid force out by local media which's accustomed to exercise a monopoly in such circumstance.Pro-Mainstream Newspapers would expose the local governments' dirty linen and meet with retaliation.The concept of torunanewspaper and the product structure of Beijing News are similar with Southern Metropolis Daily,however,as compared with mainstream newspapers and profound newspapers in the world,Beijing News lags fairly far behind.There are a lot of problems such as homogenization with metro newspaper,unqualified personnel and so on. Most importantly,"responsible for all news coverage" disturbed local newspaper monopoly power and local interest groups during the Beijing News' process of mainstreaming.The biggest problem of Times＆Truth News is its pseudo higher level,and this feature lies in stronger official color.From the facts above we can come to the conclusion that three Pro-Mainstream newspapers would face the following problems in varying degrees:pendulous positioning, miscommunication over high-end positioning,scarcity of talents reserve,weak differentiation compared with metro-newspapers,unsatisfied market needs.On the other hand,all Pro-Mainstream newspapers also face the common exogene media environment - its influence on the process of mainstreaming of the metro-newspapers will be more profound,more extensive,and more enduring.For instance,the role conflict between metro-newspapers and government-operated newspapers,possession control and local protectionism in news management,the loosening inter-province policy of running newspaper still can not remove obstacles,and middle class has not came into being either.With the development of politics,economy and literature of china society,the pro-mainstreaming process of metro-newspapers will continue,but the speed would not be so fast and we might meet with unpredictable situations on the whole process. |
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