Showing posts tagged rupertmurdoch

卫星电视 (satellite television / wèixīng diànshì) is TV programming broadcasted by a communications satellite orbiting the earth and received by households via an outdoor antenna, generally known as a satellite dish.

Why it is blocked: This is another fairly obscure word to be blocked (searching for 卫星电 returns 87 results, 5 of which are for 卫星电视), but at least there’s a reason. Installation of satellite TV dishes is regulated in China, with private ownership of them illegal in a number of cities (compelling some citizens to creatively conceal and hide theirs), though workplaces which need to monitor foreign news and establishments that cater to foreigners are allowed them. Satellite dishes were banned in China by Li Peng in 1993, supposedly in response to Rupert Murdoch’s declaration that satellite television would be “an unambiguous threat to totalitarian regimes everywhere.” (His company, STAR TV, would spend more than a decade trying to make up for that speech.) However, those restrictions are openly flouted by residents and marketers. Besides China’s desire to control overseas content entering the country, it’s reported that satellite programming is hampering the government’s efforts to transition cities to digital television (satellite TV service is earmarked for hard to reach rural villages).

Note: Satellite dishes themselves are more colloquially referred to as woks/pots ( / guō) or plates/dishes ( / dié). The more standard word for satellite dish is 卫星天线 (天线 / tiānxiàn literally means “sky wire/line,” aka antenna). 卫星天线 and 卫星碟 are not blocked on Weibo, but 卫星锅 is. [Status]