CHINA TIGHTENS REINS ON OVERSEAS TV SHOWS

You won’t find many U.S. TV hits, such as The Big Bang Theory and Breaking Bad on Chinese television, but you will find them online on such video sites as Sohu and iQiyi — unedited and in high definition, thanks to licensing arrangements between the producers and those websites. But all that could change, according to reports in state-run newspapers that appeared on Monday saying that beginning next year those Chinese websites will be required to submit an entire season to authorities for approval before they can be aired. Inasmuch as many U.S. episodes are carried by the websites just days after they are broadcast in the U.S., the new regulation will impose long delays and encourage piracy, some industry observers have remarked. Only two weeks ago, at an industry convention in Cannes, Sohu CEO/Chairman Charles Zhang, declared "We solved the video piracy problem" by offering foreign TV shows online at low prices just a day or two after their original broadcast.