The Standard is an English free newspaper in Hong Kong with a daily circulation of 200,450 in 2012. It was formerly called the Hong Kong Standard and changed to HKiMail during the Internet boom but reverted to The Standard in 2001. The South China Morning Post is its main local competitor.
The Standard was published by Hong Kong iMail Newspapers Limited as of 2001 but currently The Standard Newspapers Publishing Limited. These enterprises are owned by Sing Tao News Corporation Limited, also the publisher of Sing Tao Daily and Headline Daily; the firm also has other businesses including media publications, The Standard was previously owned by Sally Aw's Sing Tao Holdings Limited. Aw is the daughter of the founder Aw Boon Haw. In 1999 Holdings was acquired by a private equity fund, and in January 2001 by Charles Ho's listed companyGlobal China Technology Group Limited. In mid-2002 the ownership of an intermediate holding company of The Standard,Sing Tao Media Holdings, was transferred to Sing Tao News Corporation. At the same time Sing Tao Holdings, without its main business, was sold to a Chinese private company.
History
The Standard was originally named the Hong Kong Tiger Standard. The newspaper was founded by Tycoon Aw Boon Haw after the end of the Chinese Civil War. He incorporated the publisher The Tiger Standard Limited on 23 May 1947. On the backs of financially successful Sing Tao Daily and Tiger Balm, he attacked the English-language newspaper market by launching the paper on 1 March 1949 to give a Chinese voice to the world and to advance the interests of Chinese in all their endeavours and defend them against all kinds inequalities, challenging the procolonial establishment press. It started life as a broadsheet, largely edited and run by Chinese, though not to the exclusion of other nationals. Politically, it shared the Sing Tao and Aw's allegiance to the Kuomintang. These early editors were all thoroughly U.S. educated and trained, the first being L.Z. Yuan. There followed C.S. Kwei, a leading Chinese lawyer and bilingual intellectual–author, and Kyatang Woo, an alumnus of University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri. In 1985 Robert Chow, who later became a staunch and vocal pro-establishment advocate of highly restrictive Soviet-style democratic elections for Hong Kong's chief executive, became the editor in chief of The Standard and worked there until the 1990s. During the 1990s, when Sally Aw chaired Sing Tao News Corporation Limited, The Standard was the only English newspaper in Hong Kong that was allowed to be circulated in China. In 1994 a third English-language newspaper, the Eastern Express, appeared. Its bold headlines and large photographs provoked a radical redesign at the Standard, which also suffered the loss of a great many reporters, sub-editors, and advertising to the Eastern Express, tempted by its boasts of generous pay. The new paper quickly pushed the Standard into third place for full-price sales. The Standard adopted a distinctive orange and black masthead and an advertising campaign that used a carrot logo and the maxim "clearer vision." Meanwhile, an emergency recruitment drive brought in new staff from the UK and Tasmania, mostly from regional newspapers and on fixed contracts. Its Sunday supplement, Hong Kong Life, began free distribution in bars and clubs. On 27 May 2000, facing challenges from its biggest competitor the South China Morning Post, the Hong Kong Standard was renamed Hong Kong iMail and reduced to tabloid size to attract more younger readers, and was refocused on business issues. On 30 May 2002, following the burst of the Internet Bubble, the paper reverted to being The Standard. The current editor in chief is Ivan Tong, who replaced Mark Clifford. From 10 September 2007, The Standard, then sold at HK$6, became a free newspaper. It is now Hong Kong's first and only free English newspaper. The newspaper is considered pro-Beijing in its editorial stance.
Circulation fraud
In August 1996 the Independent Commission Against Corruption in Hong Kong found that 14,000 copies of the paper had been discarded at Wan Chai Pier and therefore started an investigation. The ICAC discovered that from 1994 to 1997 the circulation figures of the Hong Kong Sunday Standard and the Hong Kong Standard had been routinely and substantially exaggerated, in order to attract advertisers and to raise the revenue of the newspapers. Circulation figures had always been somewhat obscure, owing to the Sing Tao group's longstanding agreements with hotels and clubs where the newspaper was distributed free. As a result, the ICAC arrested three staff members of the Hong Kong Standard and investigated Aw Sian as co-conspirator. The case was heard from 23 November 1998 to 20 January 1999, at the conclusion of which all three were found guilty and sentenced to 4 to 6 months in jail. Aw Sian was not charged, after the secretary of justiceElsie Leung decided not to prosecute her owing to insufficient evidence and in the public interest. The decision generated controversy among a skeptical public who saw this as discrimination in favour of the powerful and well-connected.
