Chinese authorities have ordered leading video streaming websites to stop showing four popular American TV shows, including The Big Bang Theory and The Good Wife.
China is stepping up their censorship of foreign television shows by banning video streaming of the popular shows The Good Wife, The Big Bang Theory, NCIS and The Practice (which ended its domestic run in 2004), as noted by The Hollywood Reporter. The move comes from the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television and there were not any specific reasons for this action. Leading site Youku confirmed the news that they had received a notification from SAPPRFT saying that they could no longer stream the shows.
In general, the online streaming sites had more liberty in showing edgy material such as The Walking Dead and House of Cards than cinemas of TV. Last month, South China Morning Post said that the the internet users were up in arms over talk of the new censorship guidelines, as noted by Deadline.
Even though House of Cards, which in the second season had a storyline critical of Chinese government corruption, the show has been extremely popular online. China’s ambassador to the U.S., Cui Tiankai, has said the he has seen every episode of the show starring Kevin Spacey and even the one that includes the line ‘Mao’s China is dead!’
The Associated Press said that the leading site Sohu, counts Nikita and Masters of Sex among its most popular shows, but neither of them was included in their recent SAPPRFT order.