The city government also decided that all elementary and high schools in the capital are prohibited from subscribing to the group's Apple Daily until it observes the rating regulations for Internet content.

People wishing to read and borrow the daily at municipal libraries will have to show their ID cards proving they are above the age of 18.

After imposing the first fine a day earlier, Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin said at a press conference that the city government respects the freedom of the press. But he vowed that the youngsters and schools will not be contaminated by the bloody, violent, and pornographic images which Next Media plans to quickly build up a huge clientele for its new mobile electronic information service. Hau urged the National Communications Commission (NCC) and other government agencies to set up specific guidelines on how to handle mobile motion graphics news as soon as possible. City government officials said new fines will be meted out on Next Media until necessary improvement is made.

The group was already told to correct its practice of providing a serial bar code on Apple Daily's front page that can be used as a password for access to all motion graphic news on the Apple Daily's Web site.

Mayor Hau said the city government's Department of Education will ask teachers and students not to circulate Apple Daily on campuses and said the newspaper's Web site access will be blocked from schools.

Next Media, publisher of the Chinese-language Apple Daily and weekly magazines in Taiwan and Hong Kong, started its online motion graphic news service Nov. 16. Its reports about sexual assaults, incestuous and kinky sexual relationships, homicides and suicides with highly disturbing motion graphics and narration, drew immediate complaints and stirred anger among many civic groups and parents.

More than 20 civic groups, including the welfare and reporters associations, staged a protest in front of the Apple Daily's Taipei office building yesterday, demanding that the media group establish self-discipline guidelines within two weeks and stop producing motion graphic news about sexual assaults, sexual harassments and molesting, child abuse and domestic violence.

However, the Apple Daily's editorial management did not accept those requests and instead issued a statement expressing their willingness to accept criticism and saying that they had stopped posting controversial news content and would not present controversial news in details with a sensational manner in the future.

Next Media also published a statement in yesterday's edition of the Apple Daily, drawing a clear line between its controversial motion graphic news and its TV stations, for which the group is seeking the NCC approval for operating licenses.

It said the motion graphic news belongs to the Apple Daily's mobile phone and Web site service and has nothing to do with its new TV stations.

The public outcry against the spreading of offending materials in the name of press freedom and the central government's inactivity to redress the problem prompted Premier Wu Den-yih to issue an instruction asking several Cabinet agencies to work together to calm public anger as soon as possible.

While praising Mayor Hau's swift iron-fist action of fining Next Media NT$1 million within 24 hours, civic and educational groups as well as lawmakers have stepped up criticisms against the departments and agencies at the central government for belated actions.

They listed the government's condoning of Next Media's abusing the privileged rights of operating media business as another “public grievance” that should be addressed. The NCC has been discussing the case with various departments and will make an announcement on the case next week, an NCC official said.

NCC Chairwoman Peng Yun told lawmakers the previous day that the Cabinet panel will take the issue into consideration when it examines Next Media's TV license application in early December.

NCC Vice Chairman Chen Cheng-tsang said the media group from Hong Kong is very unlikely to obtain a TV news license if it wants to deliver news containing motion graphics unacceptable to the Taiwanese public.

The Taipei Prosecutors Office said it has assigned prosecutors in charge of women and children affairs to start an investigation into the spreading of vivid motion graphic images about sexual and criminal offenses.