Popular Chinese news app Jinri Toutiao offers rewards to stories that quash rumours amid government campaign to 'clean up' online content
- The '100' project will reward 100 best stories at quashing rumours, according to Toutiao
Jinri Toutiao, the popular Chinese news aggregator, is offering cash rewards of up to 3,000 yuan (US$432) for articles that refute rumours.
Dubbed “100”, the project was launched on Monday and will reward 100 best articles that debunk rumours, Toutiao said. The app is operated by Beijing-based Bytedance, one of the most highly valued start-ups in the world.
“We would like to invite the whole society and users of the platform to be supervisors and together participate in the governance of online platforms!” Toutiao said in the official anti-rumour account on its site. The news aggregator’s new initiative came amid Beijing’s broad “clean-up” campaign to tighten control over online content.
The “clean-up” campaign is aimed at any content deemed inappropriate, including sensitive political news, celebrity gossip, reporting of violent incidents and off-colour jokes.
Earlier this month, Chinese media regulator said people can be rewarded with up to 600,000 yuan for reporting pornographic and “illegal content,” online or print, starting December 1.
People’s Daily, the official mouthpiece of China’s ruling Communist Party, warned content providers last month that “rumours cannot possess peoples’ minds,” and called upon all internet participants not to create rumours or believe in speculation.