About William Moss
Trans-Pacific spin doctor. Head of Global Media Relations at TSMC. Occasional writer of humor and PR analysis. This is a personal blog and opinions are my own. More information at “About Imagethief“.
Also on Substack (where full posts live now), Bluesky, the usual places.
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Tag Archives: Propaganda
If you’re angry about Guns’n’Roses surely it must be 1991
Let’s all take a moment to appreciate the Global Times, the nationalist tabloid cousin to the staid People’s Daily, which has decided to get indignant about the new Guns’n’Roses album, “Chinese Democracy”. It’s not that the Chinese people don’t have … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, Global Times, Media, Pop Culture, Propaganda
Comments Off on If you’re angry about Guns’n’Roses surely it must be 1991
Tibet and the trouble with unassailable national myths
Outside of Young Frankenstein there isn’t really any such thing as a “good time” for rioting, but this might be an especially bad time for China to have a bout of punishing ethnic unrest. It hasn’t really been a banner … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, Crisis Management, Media, Nationalism, Politics, Propaganda
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Was the China corruption website collapse story “newsiness”?
The greatest contribution that comedian Stephen Colbert has made to modern society is the concept of “truthiness”. Reading from the Wikipedia definition, truthiness is: …a satirical term to describe things that a person claims to know intuitively or “from the … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, China in the News, Journalism, Media, Politics, Propaganda
Comments Off on Was the China corruption website collapse story “newsiness”?
What to make of Edwin Maher?
Imagethief found the LA Times article on CCTV9′s western anchorman, Edwin Maher, quite interesting. I didn’t have time to comment on it when it first appeared, but in general I found the story balanced as it presented both criticisms and … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged CCTV, China, Journalism, Media, Propaganda, Reputation
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Notorious MDA: The Singapore government raps
From time to time someone will ask me why I left Singapore for China. This is a fair question. I lived there for nearly a decade, Mrs. Imagethief is Singaporean, and I have great affection for the place. Usually I … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Politics, Propaganda, Singapore, Soft Power, Weird
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The up is red
Imagethief was enrocketed to read on Friday that China’s taikonauts –whom I prefer to call “astronauts” because “taikonauts” sounds like they should be exploring my sugar bowl– are considering starting a Communist Party cell in outer space: “If China has … Continue reading
Bang! China shoots its own Olympic PR in the foot
Imagethief, who has bid for something on the order of RMB12,000 worth of Olympic tickets, is trying resolutely to remain optimistic about the Games. Unfortunately, it’s proving harder as time goes by. Tomorrow marks the one-year-remaining milestone. This should be … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, China in the News, Crisis Management, Media, Olympics, Propaganda
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Bullet in the head: Marquee executions and public communication
As has been widely reported, the Chinese government has got round to making an official example of Zheng Xiaoyu, the disgraced former head of the State Food and Drug Administration who became the poster-boy for China’s rippling food and drug … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, China in the News, Crisis Management, Politics, Propaganda
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We’re Hu Jintao’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
Imagethief was interested to see on the front of the Saturday South China Morning Post a segment of a painting that has just been unveiled in Hong Kong to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the 1997 hand-over of sovereignty. This is no … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, Propaganda
Comments Off on We’re Hu Jintao’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
I say “tomato”, you say “massacre”, let’s call the whole thing off
It is a truism of public relations and communication that he who controls the language with which an issue is defined controls the debate. If you can attach your terminology to a situation, you have leverage over public opinion. Don’t … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged China, Journalism, Politics, Propaganda
Comments Off on I say “tomato”, you say “massacre”, let’s call the whole thing off
Imagethief 