Nowadays in China it is common for ratings companies to conspire with TV stations, content producers and media agencies to rig the ratings of TV programs, helping them rake in over 4 billion yuan (US$600m) a year from the TV drama industry alone. Advertisers demand that broadcasters ensure stable viewing figures, and so production companies have to purchase falsified viewing figures to ensure that TV stations air their dramas, in turn adding to the production cost and subsequent price of TV dramas, making the entire industry a victim of counterfeiting. Producers with good programs who are unwilling or unable to pay for faked figures are marginalized and those who have inferior products yet are willing to pay, get all the green lights. Experts cautioned that as long as the profit chain that links all the parties remains unbroken, the manipulation of ratings will continue even though the government watchdog had released national standards on TV show ratings, introducing 22 regulations to rein in the market back in 2014.
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