Taiwan News (formerly China News[2]) is an English and Chinese-language[3]online newspaper and former print newspaper in the Republic of China (Taiwan). It was purchased by I-Mei Foods in the 1997, who eventually transitioned the publication to a fully online venture. I-Mei also publishes the Chinese-language news weekly of the same name.[1]
China News was founded on 6 June 1949 in Taipei by James Wei,[6] a journalist with close ties to the KMT and former employee of the Ministry of Information.[5]: 1858 The newspaper was established to cater for foreign residents and the local population in Taiwan.[5]: 1858 At the time it was the only English-language daily newspaper in Taiwan and it was a newspaper published in the afternoon. Later on, in order to compete with its new competitor, China News had to change and was published in the morning in order not to lose its advertisements.[1]
In 1960, the newspaper switched to block printing in a full-size page format.[2]
Wei left the newspaper in 1965. Wei was also a Reuters correspondent and deputy director of the Central News Agency. During his later years he was the sixth Director of the Government Information Office, serving from October 31, 1966, to June 1, 1972. Wei was a close advisor to Chiang Ching-kuo.[7][8]
China News ran into financial difficulties in 1996 and received capital injection from I-Mei Foods, but the management of the newspaper was unchanged.[5]: 1858 In May 1999, I-Mei Foods acquired 50 percent stake in the newspaper for NTD$60 million (US$1.8 million).[6] The newspaper's name was changed to Taiwan News to reflect the newspaper's new focus on readers in Taiwan and to avoid confusion with China Daily and China News Service.[6] After the change in ownership, Taiwan News increased its page count and lowered staff wages.[9][6] Under the ownership of I-Mei Foods, Simone Wei became the newspaper's chairperson and I-Mei CEO Kao Chih-ming became the publisher.[10]
By 1998, 63 percent of Taiwan News' readership were local readers and the rest were businesspeople, diplomats, academics, teachers and students from outside Taiwan.[11]: 149 Former editor Anthony Lawrance said in 2001 that Taiwan News mainly republished wire stories and had few articles with original reporting due to a lack of financial resources to hire English-speaking journalists and produce good translations from Chinese news articles, the high turnover of foreign editorial staff and the absence of an English speaking environment in Taiwan.[5]: 1859
In 2010, Taiwan News went digital and simultaneously ended its weekly financial and cultural magazine.[12] In 2015, Taiwan News became an all-digital publication when it ended all print editions.[13]
^Frazier, David; Scanlan, Sean (1 August 1999). "Paper Tiger". Asian Business. Vol. 35, no. 8. ISSN0254-3729.
^"Taiwan's China News gets cash boost, changes name". Reuters News. 12 May 1999.
^Lams, Lutgard (2008). "Media Panic or Manic: The 2004 Taiwan Parliamentary Election in the Local English-Language Press". Taiwan International Studies Quarterly. 4 (4): 145–184. S2CID73641302.
