To anyone who actually cares, I thought I might pass this news blurb which appeared in our UNC Journalist paper. Communism meets the media ARe tightly controlled messages more influential than "competing messages?" Or, in more concrete terms, are the Chinese media, which are more controlled, more influential than the American media, which are among the freest in the world? The answer seems to be yes. Assistant Professor Xinshu Zhao and doctoral student Glen Bleske researched this topic for "Media Effects under a Monopoly: The Case of Beijing in the Economic Reforms," to be published this year in the International Journal of Public Opinion Research. Athough media in the United States affect attitudes, the messages, which are often objective, shift some people in one direction and others in another, according to the article. Individuals are affected, but the net effect appears minimal. China, on the other hand, has a more contro lled media, with only the government viewpoint, so people are more like- ly to adopt the government view. "The (Chinsese) media may not be effective enough to motivate the Chinese public to hail the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, or to preserve the Leninist system forever, or to prevent democracy from eventually pre- vailing," says the paper. "But the gigantic machine was still power- ful," at least during the economic reform in the mid-1980s. The impact of the Chinese media, say the researchers, can be explain ed by what they call the "message competition theory." The theory posit s that the media have an effect, but that the effect is difficult to de tect because some people change their minds one way, while others change their mind the opposite way. The net effect is neutralized. But such neutralization does not occur under the controlled Chinese media.