To do that, CGTN has also opened production facilities in London and Nairobi, Kenya. The Nairobi bureau has a staff of 130, producing at least three hours of English-language news programming a day, specifically on Africa. Overall, CGTN intends to put out 17 hours daily of news in English.

Then there are the versions in Spanish, Russian, French and Arabic. And the expansion into talk shows and political commentary programs with brand-name hosts. And the maintenance of 42.9 million Facebook followers.

“There’s a lot of interest in news from places that aren’t just Israel and Paris, but parts of Africa people haven’t heard from,” said University of Montana School of Journalism Dean Larry Abramson. “I’m glad to see people stepping into that gap. But if the idea is simply that the government will fund this stuff so you can turn out an endless number of stories, you still have to engage listeners and viewers. It’s incumbent to demonstrate they’re doing more than just spewing information out into the ether.”

Abramson added other government-supported news organizations, including the United States’ National Public Radio and Great Britain’s British Broadcasting Corporation, have taken steps to display independence from the governments they cover.