Something that made the Sina Weibo (a.k.a. Chinese Twitter) rounds recently: this side by side comparison of two nearly identical front pages from The People’s Daily, China’s largest newspaper.
Left: The People's Daily from March 14, 2010. Right: The same paper on March 14, 2011.
Some background: the annual “Two Sessions” — a two-week-long series of meetings held by the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and National People’s Congress (NPC) — were held this March. The Two Sessions received extensive press coverage here in China, with many papers — including the one I work for, China Daily — devoting a few pages each day and special web sections to the meetings.
After the final day of meetings, the People’s Daily published a front page that looked almost exactly like one from the same event a year ago.
The Wall Street Journal’s China Real Time Report Blog did notice a few differences:
In both cases, a large photo of eight of Beijing’s top nine leaders sitting hands folded (and in the same order) on the main stage in the Great Hall of the People appears to the left of a smaller photo of CPPCC chairman Jia Qinglin standing before a bank of microphones holding what appears to be a copy of his closing speech in his right hand. Close examination reveals minor differences—a slightly different expression on Mr. Jia’s face, a slightly different bright-red necktie, a barely detectable upward tilt of the head from Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao.
This isn’t an uncommon practice, either. Here are some People’s Daily front pages from the Two Sessions throughout the years:
2001
2002
2003
2004
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