Beijing pressures Alibaba to offload media assets, including Hong Kong's top newspaper
- Reference: 1615876213
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2021/03/16/china_concerned_about_alibabas_portfolio/
- Source link:
Numerous reports say the request comes amid governmental concerns that the e-commerce giant has amassed undue influence over media and China in general. The company has assets across many sectors, including retail, media, technology and fintech to name a few.
[1]
Alibaba’s other media assets include the microblogging website Weibo, streaming platform Youku Tudou, entertainment company Huayi Brothers, video-sharing site Bilibili and a stake in the state-owned China Business Network. The company [2]reported a whopping 902 million mobile monthly active users generating $33.9bn of sales in Q4 2020.
Alibaba announced it would purchase the Post for US$266m cash in December 2015. The newspaper was founded during British colonial rule in 1903 and operated without a paywall following its acquisition by Alibaba until August 2020.
[3]
Following the purchase, Joseph Tsai, executive vice chairman of Alibaba Group gave an [4]interview about the publication and described it as "uniquely positioned because from the vantage point of Hong Kong you can cover China very well."
Hong Kong teases tech to track residents as they move past QR codes [5]READ MORE
“It is not just for expats or senior executives or companies in Hong Kong, but it is for anybody who cares to know more about China and to understand China - whether you are in New York City or London or Sydney or anywhere where English is spoken, the content of SCMP should be available.”
This isn't the first time Beijing has curbed Alibaba. In mid-2020, regulators stepped in as scandalous posts about Alibaba's C-suite execs started going missing from Weibo.
China also stopped the float of Alibaba's financial services arm the Ant Group, after which Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma [6]mysteriously went silent for three months.
[7]
Beijing’s latest actions follow changes to Hong Kong's electoral laws last week, which effectively make it impossible for members of pro-democracy parties to be elected to public office. The new laws were described as an "improvement". ®
Get our [8]Tech Resources
[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/legal&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YFCPzauCAiiLFRMKxKc8QAAAAAw&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2021/02/03/alibaba_dec_2020_quarter/
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/legal&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YFCPzauCAiiLFRMKxKc8QAAAAAw&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1890057/alibaba-buys-south-china-morning-post-full-qa-executive-vice-chairman
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2021/03/04/hongkong_qr_code_scanner/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2021/01/05/jack_ma_missing/
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/legal&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YFCPzauCAiiLFRMKxKc8QAAAAAw&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
HK democratic aspects are being crushed, and I doubt nobody can do anything about it. China knows it, that's why it isn't shy about destroying any opposition to its dictatorship.
At least they aren't pacifying the population a la Uyghurs. Small mercies.
China has to be bigger than one man
Xi is getting older, makes more mistakes, and all Jack Ma did was be mildly critical of one of Xi's decisions.
China has to outgrow one man and his frailties.
Remember Chairman Mao? A foolish old man doing a food export drive that killed so many Chinese people. His pride and vanity wouldn't let him admit his mistake and so he continued the food export drive and continued to let his people starve. The food rotted at the port, there was simply no market for it within export range, but to let his people eat the food, he would have to admit his mistake, admit his imperfection.
Xi is the new Mao. Full of pride, unable to admit mistakes, his mental cognition fails as gets older, yet he's unable to admit mistakes.
China shouldn't keep making the same mistake over and over again. Men get old, senile, incoherent, and intransigent in the face of their mistakes, and Xi is just a man. Why should China follow him into decline?
The SCMP actually was a good read, not just a mouthpiece for the CCP. Until last year.