Many people have observed that social media in China are having a profound impact on them and that impact is increasingly extending to the government. Recent TV drama guidelines that seemingly were issued by the State Administration for Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) at the beginning of the month, and then denied a week and a million mostly negative micro blog postings later, is a recent example.

I'd like to believe that the guidelines were a trial balloon put up by SARFT that was shot down by public opinion. The Internet is the perfect information tool. Previously, it was not always easy to discern public opinion. Now, people's attitudes are available for all to see and policymakers can act accordingly.

The now denied guidance from SARFT to TV stations sought to eliminate "vulgar" and "overly entertaining" material from China's airwaves. These included banning Chinese remakes of foreign shows. They also sought to reduce "low taste" references to violence, organized crime, family conflict and even humor in historical dramas.