I sincerely hope that my country, Great Britain, shows the same concern if China ever attacks Taiwan. As Taiwan did with Live 8 and the London Tube and bus bombings.
Bugger All !
Do the people of Taiwan have any knowledge whatsoever of world affairs ?
A lot of Taiwan people care about world affairs and what happened in London recently. The problem is that Taiwan like the USA has no public TV news stations like the BBC, DW, or ABC in Australia. Therefore, they only put on stupid gossip crap among other dumb topics that keeps the attention of the masses. It is about ratings and with so many different news channels in such a small market, it gets very competitive for eyeballs and ad $$$, so international news yawn takes a back seat to news about which model is dating which TV host, etc.
Hobart -
The USA does indeed have a “public TV news stations.” Its called PBS. The USA also has the most vibrant and diversified media news availability of any country in the world.
Thanks to the wide useage of satelite TV the USA also has an availability of non-USA news and media programming that rivals abywhere in the world.
PBS also receives US Gov’t funding.
Your comparison of Taiwan to the USA in this particular instance is the proverbial “apples to oranges.”
Of course many do, just as many, say, Americans do. And unfortunately, many more don’t. In both places. I imagine there are various factors at play here in terms of awareness of the details of the London bombings (I’m sure everyone here knows that the bombings did take place!) – America tends to focus on events in Britain and Europe more than Taiwan does, due to its historical connections, just as Taiwan is historically connected with Japan and China, and so pays more attention to news there than would, say, a Spaniard. Another factor is the crap quality of the news services here, as has been mentioned above.
In general, 90% of the locals I hang out with here have a fairly mediocre understanding of world affairs by my standards; but so did 50% of the Americans I used to hang out with back home. I prefer conversations with the remaining 10 and 50%, respectively, of course.
There may be a significant difference in the stats there, but my sample sizes are too small to meaningfully generalize, and I generally try to avoid painting whole populations with a broad brush.
TainanCowboy: PBS rocks, but they are not similar to BBC or DW. NPR is like the BBC, even better IMHO, but that is a radio station. PBS only has a few new programs, but what they have is great, I agree.
CNN, FOX et al are mostly too commercialized. Of course, I enjoy watching them as I am American, but they are embarassing when compared to some of the public news channels from other countries. Remember CNN’s LIIIIIVE from Bagdad reports with the Solid Gold Dancers? CNN isn’t as commercialized as the Taiwan TV News, but they are not like the BBC or DW.
Taiwan new is censored and monitored by Government still. Not to mention very commercial concept of sensationalism in the news makes it difficult to distinguish from “news” and “entertainment” at times.
For instance during the week of the London attack I’m pretty sure 林志玲 6 ribs got more airtime. I think I even saw on TV new a few report of famous singer getting a divorce becoming a least 5 minutes segment.
Just like in the West I rarely see news about Taiwan, unless it is part of a larger story to feed the “Sino-phobic” spin in the USA. Right now the USA is worry about PRC companies buying up the US companies. Barely a peep about Taiwan.
[quote=“ac_dropout”] Right now the USA is worry about PRC companies buying up the US companies. Barely a peep about Taiwan.[/quote] To clarify, I don’t think the USA cares about the PRC buying US companies. The problem is that a real Cold War between the US and Communist China is starting to gear up and the Communists are trying to purchase US companies with access to US military technology and strategic oil supplies among other things.
Now it seems that you are up to your old tricks AC of trying “to Shanghai” benign Forumosa threads to use them for political purposes.
[quote=“Hobart”]Remember CNN’s LIIIIIVE from Bagdad reports with the Solid Gold Dancers? [/quote]Hobart…lol…indeed I do. The premiere of Wolf “Scud Stud” Blitzer…lol…oh yes I remember…
In the news of PRC purchases are Maytag, Unocol, and IBM. Let’s be real, I don’t see any as grave as your interpretation.
PRC has been getting foriegn investment for the past 20 years. USA Bank of American has just bought a PRC bank. USA fast food and big box retailers are also all over PRC. You don’t see PRC congress going up in arms about these economic trends.
In any event, you touch upon the reality of the news and Taiwan. Besides the Taiwan market, nobody outside of it really cares about ROC news, unless it is the Greater Chinese market for entertainment news.
How often does CCN or the BBC cover ROC news?
[quote=“ac_dropout”]
In the news of PRC purchases are Maytag, Unocol, and IBM. [/quote]
The PRC certainly did NOT purchase IBM! Try IBM’s personal computer business. Sheesh! And a Chinese company wants to buy it, not the PRC. Although, I wouldn’t doubt the company isn’t in cahoots with the PRC government. 
Not even purchase, Lenova leased IBM “thinkpad” name for 5 years and IBM still has about 19% interest in the PC division.
But that’s my point, USA is driven by Sino-phobia angle in the news. Like Hobart parroted “US companies with access to US military technology” was an angle that was reported in the USA media. It’s a free market, the USA government could do what the rest of USA has done and go to Dell, Compaq or HP.
When PRC was afraid of USA spying using Microsoft OS. It started using Linux and requested Microsoft to make it source code available. The difference is that the PRC government identified the “threat” and took realistic action. The USA is just making these wild speculations into the hypothetical.
Thus Taiwan, will always take a back seat to the “China threat” reporting in the USA. So the diginity and recognition Taiwanese seek on the international theater will not be reciprocated by the USA because its attention is focused on China, not Taiwan.
Monitored? Of course. Censored? No, at least not in my experience.
AC, you sound similar to the official communist propaganda from Beijing, by pretending that China is so innocent and the USA is so paranoid. Remember just last week a Communist General threatened to use nuclear weapons to destroy USA cities.
Again, what did this have to do with the Taiwan media?
It wants the source code not beacuse of spying… but beacsue China is one os the countries likes to steal others intellectual property rights…
You think Microsoft is going to part with it’s source code :loco: :loco: :loco:
Hobart,
Wasn’t there an American General that threaten to invade China through North Korea and also treatened to nuke the mainland.
Satellite TV,
It wasn’t the only the PRC that wanted MS OS source codes, the USA wanted them as well. Under the Clinton administration MS was treated in a pretty hostile manner.
In addition MS could have continued refused all request for their source code as they have in the past. But the free market forced their hand if they wished to retain market share agianst their competitor Linux.
That’s how it should work, allowing free market forces to reward and penalize corporate behavior. Not some political witch hunt.
In any event, Taiwan is not a saint when it comes to TI laws either, but you rarely here any peep about in the USA media.
Also if Lenova purchase of IBM was such a sensitive issue, why wasn’t there a huge protest on Taiwan, since the implication is that IBM Taiwan is now under PRC management. So as you can see there is a gap between how USA percieves news and how ROC percieves the same news.