End of sound wave

The Chinese audience will soon bid fare-well to radio and TV broadcasts of the BBC and Voice of America (VOA) in the Chinese language. VOA is the second mainstream Western media to announce plans to end its radio broadcasts in Chinese. Earlier, the BBC World Service decided to cancel a number of foreign-language services, including Chinese.

The cut in the major Western media organizations' Chinese language services will not have much of an impact on Chinese people, because now they have multi-media channels for information and entertainment both with domestic and international content. So, when the two media giants stop broadcasting their services in Putonghua, the farewell will not be bitter.

Besides, the global trend of a decline in traditional media has in recent years made radio and TV a much less significant source of information for people. Surveys show that the number of shortwave radio listeners has declined in most regions of China.