Bruno again?

He has featured here before (see here and here) and once again we find ourselves wondering just what Bruno Wu of Sun New Media (latest name of many) is up to.

At a time when the world is watching aghast at Xinhua's antics in trying to collar the financial information market, he has announced a deal with The China Periodical Management Center that would give Sun New Media:

* Exclusive access to a state-owned content library, which houses 6,500
      books, 1,500 audio and video products, 44 journals, and 3 newspapers;
* An exclusive partnership with the Chinese Government to issue digital
      publishing permits for business-to-business (B2B) online publishing;
* Support for developing a B2B search engine for all of China that will
      enable users to search for information within specific industries;
* Ongoing government support for e-publishing as the industry undergoes
      regulatory changes.

As you might guess, that piece about the exclusive partnership to issue digital publishing permits (I wonder what they are exactly) caught our eye. The PR Newswire press release says that the China Periodical Management Center is a division of the State Administration of Press & Publications. We've never heard of it and googling it only throws up references to the Sun New Media deal but we'll put that down to our own ignorance and mistranslations. We also thought that the Ministry of Information Industry was in charge of Internet Content licenses but I guess this is something different and we don't understand.

Meanwhile, on Danwei, we find Bruno and his lively wife again, mixed in with stories about the late and lamented Oriana Fallaci and a penis transplant reversal. This time he is telling how he lost $100 million on his Sun TV ventures and blames this on Murdoch (him again). He is, apparently, seeking his revenge with a 5-Year Plan to dominate the Chinese internet. Hmmm. This startling insight apparently first popped up in the UK's Independent newspaper.