HONG KONG (Reuters) – China will mandate a licensing requirement for broadcasting micro dramas, enabling it to foster their “healthy and prosperous development”, authorities said, in a move that will enable tighter control on what content gets published online.
The move comes as a boom in micro dramas in China has brought scrutiny from the Communist Party.
Micro dramas, vertically shot, minute-long episodes featuring frequent plot turns designed to keep millions of viewers hooked to their cellphone screens – and paying for more – have mushroomed in popularity in China in recent years.
China’s National Radio and Television Administration said on Wednesday all micro short dramas must first hold an online drama film distribution permit.
“Online audiovisual platforms must not go online to disseminate micro-short dramas that do not have a permit or filing number, nor must they attract or push traffic to them.”
Valued at $5 billion a year, the short format videos are an increasingly dominant competitor to China’s film industry, some experts say, which is second in size only to Hollywood and dominated by state-owned China Film Group.
Between late 2022 and early 2023, the National Radio and Television Administration regulator said it organised a “special rectification campaign” during which it removed 25,300 micro dramas, totalling close to 1.4 million episodes, due to their “pornographic, bloody, violent, low-brow and vulgar content.”
(Reporting by Farah Master and the Beijing newsroom; Editing by Jacqueline Wong and Michael Perry)
