“Generally, China’s leaders have been obsessed with the containment of negative coverage,
and under Xi Jinping we’ve seen a rather dramatic decline in serious coverage by China’s media,” David Bandurski, editor of the China Media Project at the University of Hong Kong, said in emailed comments, referring to the Chinese president.
Since that meeting, reported by the state broadcaster China Central Television, major Chinese internet companies like Tencent
and Baidu and the news aggregation platform Jinri Toutiao have shut down more than 80 popular entertainment-related public accounts, according to state news outlets.
At a meeting on Wednesday with representatives from China’s leading internet companies, officials from the Beijing bureau of the Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s top online regulator, called on the companies to “actively promote socialist core values”
and create a “healthy, uplifting environment for mainstream opinion” by combating vulgar and sensationalist coverage of celebrity scandals and lifestyles.
