Guangzhou is the television, broadcast, and news center of Guangdong Province. It has five television stations, 8 radio stations, and 3 major daily newspapers. In 1996, 1.658 billion newspapers, 196 magazines, and 403 million books were published in Guangzhou.

Mass media in China used to depend almost exclusively on government funding. Its purpose was to "uplift" the common people, and it was used to educate citizens and support Party policies. However, since the 1978 economic reforms, mass media organizations have been required to generate most of their own funding. This is done primarily through advertising, leading to increased competition among stations for larger audience shares. As a result of competition, programming has become much more diverse in its attempts to attract and entertain as well as inform. Increasingly, programs are being brought in from abroad: Cantonese programs are purchased from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore, while foreign language programs come primarily from the United States, Japan, and Great Britain.

Guangzhou's proximity to Hong Kong has also influenced its popular culture. Guangzhou broadcasters have always faced competition from Hong Kong stations, which can be brought in with a special antenna or cable subscription. Prior to Hong Kong's handover in 1997, the Chinese government was extremely wary of Hong Kong programming, especially news, because it portrayed a different view of the world and of China itself. The government would occasionally jam signals from Hong Kong stations if they portrayed China negatively.

Traditionally, the content of Chinese programming has been heavily influenced by Party policy and by considerations of "suitability." Although Party control over the media is waning, Guangzhou television stations still get much of their news coverage from China Central Television, and even stations that produce their own news coverage support the Party's view of the country. Typically, Guangzhou news includes more economic coverage and less crime reporting than local American stations, and is almost unwaveringly optimistic about conditions in the country.

As the mass media in Guangzhou liberalizes, the influence of Western ideas becomes stronger and stronger. The availability of Satellite Television Asian Region, better known as Star TV, has exposed Guangzhou viewers to foreign news, MTV, and virtually uncensored foreign movies and programming. Guangzhou is opening up culturally as well as economically, and the results are evident. This recent exerpt from a Guangzhou newspaper demonstrates just how much things have changed in the last few decades:

HAVE you ever wondered just what it is that compels otherwise perfectly sane young men and women to go out and have their tongues pierced, or their eyebrows, or navels, or certain other body parts better left unspecified in a family newspaper?

Or why teenagers continue to get addicted to smoking when it has been clear for more than a quarter of a century that cigarettes are killers? Sociologists or psychoanalysts might give you any number of answers to such questions, but if you ask the kids themselves you are likely to get a single straight-forward answer. You know what it is: Because it is cool.

The same news source includes flirting advice from a British expert, "secrets of the super-young" (according to the article, they have "very active sex lives"), and a tribute to Marilyn Monroe. To see it for yourself, click here.