China's mass media industry has claimed 32.7 million yuan (about four million US dollars) in market scale in 2004, according to a blue book jointly published by domestic academics Thursday.

The blue book, titled "The development report on China's mass media industry: 2004-2005", is the first of its kind in China.

"The market scale we worked out is different from the previous version of 10 million yuan (some 1.2 million US dollars) which has proved quite popular, because we have a different understanding of the components of the industry's structure and scale," said Cui Baoguo, the book's chief editor and a professor with the school of journalism and communication of the prestigious Tsinghua University.

In addition to profits in traditional media, including newspapers, periodicals, broadcasting and TV, in which advertisement revenue is one of the major sources of income, circulation and cable TV revenue should also be taken into account, said Cui, "That is why our calculation differs from the other version."

Fourteen businesses are cited as the core businesses of China's mass media industry: advertisements in newspapers, TV, periodicals, broadcasting, general advertising, cable TV access charges, book publication, newspaper and periodical publication, film box office revenue, audio and video products, text messages, Internet access fees and online games.

Predicting further growth, Cui said "New businesses' appearance and development will help to expand the whole industry."

Source: Xinhua