Mainland newspapers can no longer be dismissed as state-owned propaganda machines.
Many are now subject to the same rules of the jungle as applied in any open society. The use of half-baked truth and even outright fabrication in pursuit of readers is as rampant there as it is in Hong Kong.
Three recent cases in particular catch the eye. A Beijing paper on July 30 reported that the country's fourth-biggest producer of colour TVs, Chuang Wei, was poised to bow out of the industry. The item was widely rehashed by other publications across the country.
Beforehand, the manufacturer had registered a 50 per cent increase in first-half sales and was on target to meet its annual sales goal of three million sets. However, after the report the firm claimed to have lost business worth 100 million yuan (HK$93.3 million) in August alone.
The company, adamant it has no plan to quit the lucrative market, later found out the article was an advertisement paid for by a competitor.
In the second case, a police taskforce was set up in Wuhan to investigate a highway robbery reported in graphic detail by two daily papers on August 22. Reports said four young men boarded a bus, hit the driver and robbed the passengers - one of whom was reportedly stabbed in the arm.
As part of the investigation, the People's Police interviewed all 10 bus drivers plying that route and more than 200 vehicles were intercepted, but no one could shed any light on the incident.
