First Lifecycle for 2017

If you have not been keen on CCTV News recently, you might not have woken to the “new” CGTN. It is a network of the CCTV foreign language channels, including the major English language news channel, and a documentary channel. Mostly it’s the same people and programs, with some new graphics. Not possible to find out much more because at present, the website www.cgtn.com is not working. So it is not known if the old CCTV 9 documentary is now on cable, or still on satellite. The latter is a problem as satellite is not permitted in China. The presenters are still recommending Facebook with a straight face. One new program, The Point, strongly advocates following Facebook and Twitter and fails to mention the Chinese alternatives. All in all, it is now a modern television news service presenting the Chinese point of view. Do you miss the good old days when the lead stories were about the brown onion harvest and some obscure official visit to a country that you didn’t know existed?