I knew it was a mistake to go on vacation in the run-up to the upcoming Party Congress. I was bound to miss a few interesting developments as the government busily harmonized the country in preparation for the event. This didn't stop me from going, of course, but it didn't take long for the consequences to emerge, in the form of a 4:30 AM phone call on September 23rd from a journalist who didn't know I was in Europe.

I'm not much for keen insight at 4:30 AM, if ever. So he called back at an only slightly less bracing 7:30 (I was still asleep) and said that SARFT had just decided that using the Internet or SMS to vote on reality shows was not on. What did I think?

A couple of weeks ago, when this policy was first announced, Danwei did its usual thorough job of commenting on it, pointing out that the voting scandals have been one of the problems plaguing reality shows, hence the inclusion of the off-site voting ban in SARFT's basket of new rules.

Truthfully, I wasn't at my most articulate during the conversation, so it's just as well that he didn't write up a story. Also, under my professional hat I don't like to comment directly on government policy, so I kept my on-the-record comments largely confined to the PR implications. From a PR point of view, I really don't care if Internet or SMS voting on reality shows (or reality shows altogether, for that matter) is canned. What worries me is if the same policy was ever to be applied to Internet marketing campaigns.

Voting in online marketing campaigns --whether for some piece of creativity submitted by the public or among choices offered by the marketer-- is a pretty standard gimmick because voting is a nearly effortless way to encourage public involvement. Not everyone wants to submit their own screenplay or user-generated commercial. But plenty of people will tell you what they like and don't like. If that element of online marketing was to be killed off we and our colleagues across the street in advertising would all have to get creative in a hurry to find a similarly low-effort way of encouraging involvement in online campaigns.

I'm not sure this would ever come to pass. Online content is supervised by a different regulator with a different set of concerns (MII) and the stakes and participant numbers tend to be significantly lower online than on television. Still, any hint of a regulation that could so substantially rewrite the rules for online PR and marketing makes the eyebrows twitch. It will be interesting to see if no-vote fever is catching.

But perhaps more alarming than all of this is that SARFT's new regulations for reality shows not only ban off-site voting, they also prescribe a sweeping and detailed set of rules for the content and presentation of reality shows. I reproduce here the excerpt of the regulations as translated and posted by Danwei's Joel Martinsen:

The design of participatory competitions must place constraints on the content. Speeches by the hosts, critiques by the judges, personal expressions by the contestants, emotional displays by family and friends, and interstitial scenes must be significantly reduced; they may not make up more than 20% of the total program time. The competition content itself must make up at least 80% of the total program time. In singing competitions (apart from competitions devoted to foreign songs), domestic songs must account for at least 75% of each episode's songs.

Competitors' stage presence, language, hairstyle, and attire must be in line with mainstream aesthetics. Contestants must be strictly screened; morally and behaviorally deficient contestants may not be selected. The contestants' fortitude, maturity, independence, confidence, health, and ambition must be shown off. Programs are not to manufacture gimmickry, sensationalism, or exaggerated grief, and they may not openly broadcast or allude to negative information and gossip about contestants. Contestants must be above 18 years of age....

Program hosts must be be aware of the nature of their position. They must strengthen their sense of social responsibility, and they must be adept in handling problems that may break out during the course of the program. Hosts may not express personal emotions or likes and dislikes during the program; they may not call attention to personal expression. Their words must be concise. They may not use intimate forms of address like "sister" or "brother" when talking to contestants, special guests, judges, or any other performers. Hosts may not mock, flatter, or flirt with each other.

Judges and special guests must be authoritative and professional, and must be acknowledged within their field. Judges and guests must have a good social conscience and personal morality, and they must be cultivated and self-restrained. Judges and special guests must make their judgments fair, professional, appropriate, and concise. They are there to increase the audience's level of artistic appreciation and are not permitted to discuss matters unrelated to the competition itself. They may not use their position as judge or special guest to promote themselves. Their attire and hairstyle shall be in good taste.

That is beyond micro-management. In fact, much like the recent episode concerning patriotism in Chinese films, these regulations seem to indicate either a deep misunderstanding of how to develop a successful reality show, or a wicked stealthy attempt to kill off the entire genre and blame it on market forces.

Seriously: "Programs are not to manufacture gimmickry, sensationalism, or exaggerated grief." Are you kiding? After all, once you remove the flirting, gossip, sex appeal, weeping, theatrical tantrums, bitchy hosts, rampant favoritism, taint of scandal and trainwreck contestants from reality shows, what have you got left?

Hollywood Squares with bad music? Yeah, I'm lining up to watch that.