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{{short description|Hong Kong English-language newspaper}}{{more footnotes|date=September 2017}}{{Use Hong Kong English|date=November 2018}}{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2020}}

factoids

| founder = Aw Boon Haw(part of Sing Tao News Corporation, majority stake in turn held by Guo Xiaoting, vice-chairwoman of Kaisa Group)}}| publisher = The Standard Newspapers Publishing| language = English| headquarters = | publishing_city = | publishing_country = Hong Kong1949|1986 (evening edition)}}WORK=TA KUNG PAOPAGE=4LANGUAGE=ZH-HK, | circulation = 200,450| circulation_date = 2012| circulation_ref = Sing Tao Daily (in Chinese)Headline Daily (in Chinese, free)>Sing Tao Wan Pao (in Chinese, defunct)《華僑日報》與香港華人社會(1925–1995)>LAST=丁LOCATION=HONG KONGJOINT PUBLISHING>LANGUAGE=ZHVIA=GOOGLE BOOKS PREVIEW, Singapore Tiger Standard>Singapore Standard (in English, defunct)other newspaper owned by Sally Aw}}weblink}}Pro-Beijing camp (Hong Kong)>Pro-Beijing}}

factoids

{{Conservatism in China|Media}}The Standard is an English-language free newspaper in Hong Kong with a daily circulation of 200,450 in 2012.WEB,weblink Certificate of circulations, 2012, circa, 3 October 2017, Hong Kong Audit Bureau of Circulations Limited, 3 October 2017,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20171003225247weblink">weblink dead, It was formerly called the Hongkong Standardweblinkweblink and changed to HKiMail during the Internet boom{{when|date=March 2024}} but partially reverted to The Standard in 2001.The South China Morning Post (SCMP) is its main local competitor.

Format

The Standard is printed in tabloid format rather than in broadsheet. It is published daily from Monday to Friday.

Ownership

The Standard was published by Hong Kong iMail Newspapers Limited {{as of|2001}}BOOK,weblink 2001 Annual Report, 9 May 2002, 2 October 2017, Sing Tao Holdings, Hong Kong, Hong Kong Stock Exchange, Index of download link of multiple PDF files, 76, 2001 audited financial statements, (previously known as Hong Kong Standard Newspapers Limited)WEB,weblink GLOBAL CHINA PROPERTIES HOLDINGS LIMITED – 香港公司註冊信息查詢, hongkongdir.hk, PRESS RELEASE,weblink Statement by the Secretary for Justice at the LegCo AJLS Panel, 4 February 1999, 3 October 2017, Leung, Elsie, Hong Kong Government website, but currently The Standard Newspapers Publishing Limited. These enterprises are owned by Sing Tao News Corporation Limited, also the publisher of Sing Tao DailyWEB,weblink 2004 Annual Report, 2005, 3 October 2017, Sing Tao News Corporation, and Headline Daily;WEB,weblink 2016 Annual Report, 2017, 3 October 2017, Sing Tao News Corporation, the firm also has other businesses including media publications, {{fact span|text=human capital management and Broadband service.|date=September 2017}}The Standard was previously owned by Sally Aw's Sing Tao Holdings Limited. Aw is the daughter of the founder Aw Boon Haw. In 1999 Holdings was acquired by a private equity fund,NEWS,weblink Sing Tao's Aw Agrees to Sell Off Her Controlling Stake to Lazard, Hong Kong, 24 March 1999, Christina, Mungan, New York City, The Wall Street Journal, and in January 2001 by Charles Ho's listed company Global China Technology Group LimitedNEWS,weblink Lazard's Sale of Sing Tao Holdings Proved Some of Its Skeptics Wrong, 11 January 2001, 30 September 2017, The Wall Street Journal, UWA Library's ProQuest subscription, (whose name was changed to Sing Tao News Corporation Limited in February 2005).{{rp|24}} In mid-2002 the ownership of an intermediate holding company of The Standard, Sing Tao Media Holdings, was transferred to Sing Tao News Corporation.WEB,weblink Circular (Disclosable Transaction, Disposal of 74.5% Interests in Sing Tao Holdings Limited), 2 August 2002, 30 September 2017, Global China Technology Group, Hong Kong Stock Exchange, WEB,weblink Circular (Voluntary Conditional Securities Exchange Offer by Global China Corporate Finance Limited on behalf of Global China Multimedia Limited to acquire all the issued shares in Sing Tao Media Holdings Limited), 2 September 2002, 30 September 2017, Global China Technology Group, Hong Kong Stock Exchange, At the same time Sing Tao Holdings, without its main business, was sold to a Chinese private company.

History

The Standard was originally named the Hong Kong Tiger Standard. The newspaper was founded by Tycoon Aw Boon Haw after the end of the Chinese Civil War.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}} He incorporated the publisher The Tiger Standard Limited on 23 May 1947.Filing in the Hong Kong Companies Registry On the backs of financially successful Sing Tao Daily and Tiger Balm, he attacked the English-language newspaper market by launching the paper on 1 March 1949 to give a Chinese voice to the world and to advance the interests of Chinese in all their endeavours and defend them against all kinds inequalities, challenging the procolonial establishment press.NEWS, Tiger roars for HK, The Standard, Castro, Alan, 26 March 1999, 21 March 2007,weblink dead,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20071229025014weblink">weblink 29 December 2007, dmy-all, It started life as a broadsheet, largely edited and run by Chinese, though not to the exclusion of other nationals. Politically, it shared the Sing Tao and Aw's allegiance to the Kuomintang.These early editors were all thoroughly U.S. educated and trained, the first being L.Z. Yuan (father-in-law of Golden Harvest founder, Raymond Chow). There followed C.S. Kwei, a leading Chinese lawyer and bilingual intellectual–author, and Kyatang Woo, an alumnus of University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri. In 1985 Robert Chow, who later became a staunch and vocal pro-establishment advocate of restrictive democratic elections for Hong Kong's chief executive, became the editor in chief of The Standard and worked there until the 1990s.NEWS,weblink Robert Chow Yung: There is another voice in Hong Kong, Kang-chung, Ng, 28 July 2014, South China Morning Post, 15 August 2014, Hong Kong, During the 1990s, when Sally Aw (Aw Sian, adopted daughter of Aw Boon Haw) chaired Sing Tao News Corporation Limited, The Standard was the only English newspaper in Hong Kong that was allowed to be circulated in China.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}}In 1994 a third English-language newspaper, the Eastern Express, appeared. Its bold headlines and large photographs provoked a radical redesign at the Standard, which also suffered the loss of a great many reporters, sub-editors, and advertising to the Eastern Express, tempted by its boasts of generous pay. The new paper quickly pushed the Standard into third place for full-price sales. The Standard adopted a distinctive orange and black masthead and an advertising campaign that used a carrot logo and the maxim "clearer vision." Meanwhile, an emergency recruitment drive brought in new staff from the UK and Tasmania, mostly from regional newspapers and on fixed contracts. Its Sunday supplement, Hong Kong Life, began free distribution in bars and clubs.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}}On 27 May 2000, facing challenges from its biggest competitor the South China Morning Post, the Hongkong Standard was renamed Hong Kong iMail ({{zh|t=香港郵報}}) and reduced to tabloid sizeMAGAZINE,weblink Hong Kong Gets a Tabloid, I.N., 5 June 2000, 30 September 2017, Time, ......rechristened the Hong Kong I-Mail (the I stands for interactive, as the paper will provide handy links to its website). The goal is to take the paper down market and attract younger readers...., to attract more younger readers, and was refocused on business issues. On 30 May 2002, following the burst of the dot-com bubble, the paper reverted to being The Standard.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}}The current editor in chief is Ivan Tong, who replaced Mark Clifford.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}}From 10 September 2007, The Standard, then sold at HK$6, became a free newspaper.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}} It is now Hong Kong's first and only free English newspaper. The newspaper is considered pro-Beijing in its editorial stance.BOOK, Sonny Shiu-Hing Lo, Steven Chung-Fun Hung, Jeff Hai-Chi Loo, China's New United Front Work in Hong Kong: Penetrative Politics and Its Implications,weblink 2019, Springer, 9789811384837, 307,

Circulation fraud

In August 1996 the Independent Commission Against Corruption in Hong Kong found that 14,000 copies of the paper had been discarded at Wan Chai Pier and therefore started an investigation. The ICAC discovered that from 1994 to 1997 the circulation figures of the Hong Kong Sunday Standard and the Hongkong Standard had been routinely and substantially exaggerated, in order to attract advertisers and to raise the revenue of the newspapers. Circulation figures had always been somewhat obscure, owing to the Sing Tao group's longstanding agreements with hotels and clubs where the newspaper was distributed free.As a result, the ICAC arrested three staff members of the Hongkong Standard and investigated Aw Sian as co-conspirator. The case was heard from 23 November 1998 to 20 January 1999, at the conclusion of which all three were found guilty and sentenced to 4 to 6 months in jail. Aw Sian was not charged, after the secretary of justice Elsie Leung decided not to prosecute her owing to insufficient evidence and in the public interest.NEWS, Why I didn't prosecute Sally Aw, The Standard, de Silva, Neville, 5 February 1999, 21 March 2007,weblink dead,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20071229025025weblink">weblink 29 December 2007, dmy-all, The decision generated controversy among a skeptical public who saw this as discrimination in favour of the powerful and well-connected.NEWS, Newspaper chief faces fresh probe over fraud, The Standard, 29 January 1999, 21 March 2007,weblink dead,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20071229025020weblink">weblink 29 December 2007, dmy-all,

References

{{Reflist}}

• BOOK, The Newspaper Society of Hong Kong, 2004, 50 Years of Hong Kong Newspaper, 香港報業50載印記, Hong Kong, Ming Pao Newspapers Limited, zh,
• Sing Tao News Corporation Annual Report 2004

External links

• {{official websiteweblink}}

{{Newspapers in Hong Kong}}

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