March 8 turning point for bloggers By Yu Ji
KUCHING: For a long time now online news portals and blogs have been tagged as ‘alternative’ — an adjective that seems out of date given the enormous readership they command.
Since the invention of the printing press, newspapers have been the primary source of information. But since the March 8 polls, there has been a lot of focus on the influence of this so-called ‘alternative’ media.
Bloggers have been catapulted from being regarded as “unemployed housewives” and people who ‘syok sendiri’ (self-indulging) to key players who have substantial say in forming public conscience.
News portals like Malaysiakini are even finding it easier to interview high-ranking politicians than established newspapers.
Public opinion and perception towards news provided by bloggers are definitely changing. As such, how do the mainstream media — television stations, radio and newspapers — keep up?
A keen observation is that while mainstream media content often find their way onto blogs online, the reverse has not happened. Indeed, popular blogs like Malaysia Today have attacked mainstream media as lacking credibility.
On Labour Day, the See Hua Group and Angkatan Zaman Mansang organised a forum looking into the issue.
Titled ‘Challenges posed by alternative media’, participants comprised journalists, academics and university students.
It featured two prominent experts in the field: one a renowned media lecturer from Universiti Sains Malaysia, known for his hard-hitting criticism, and another a newspaper columnist and blogger.
Associate Professor Dr Zaharom Nain, of the Centre for Policy Research and International Studies of USM, spoke on media-government structures, and why he believes there is “a window of opportunity” for change now.
The second speaker was Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir, daughter of former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed, best regarded as a social activist for AIDS, who talked about Internet media.
“You must talk about real openness,” Zaharom said. “Of course, there is a real sense of bitterness towards rules and structures, but there is a lot of sloppy writing (on reporter’s part).”
The professor hit out at reporters who were not trying to “push the boundaries” especially after the March 8 polls.
“Looking ahead, I do not think the environment is static,” he said. “While I do not disagree that rules and structures in place are inhibiting, it is certainly not impossible to change.”
The professor also criticised the autonomy of universities, when asked whether professors were ready to train a new generation of reporters.
“I’ve always maintained that universities in Malaysia are not ready to produce first class journalists; meanwhile, there are also journalism students who don’t even read newspapers!”
In this respect, the academic lamented that students and academic staff in general were not critical thinkers.
Earlier, Zaharom also questioned the media’s juggling between toeing the ‘party line’ (linkages to political organisations and the fear of not having printing licences renewed) and the ‘bottom line’ (media market monopoly by a small group of organisations and a preference for tabloid style reports).
On the former, he called for certain laws to be repelled, and on the latter, he noted the increase of media, such as magazines, and television stations that did not bring about greater diversity. A lot of new mainstream media products were still in the hands of a few, Zaharom pointed out.
Describing the scenario as ‘much of muchness’, the professor said mainstream media content continued to be ‘safe’ and that there were a lot of ‘PR and spin’ on matters deemed ‘sensitive’.
“Traditional (mainstream) media is still relevant – but not in its present form,” Zaharom stated.
The lively forum saw comments from editors, some of whom defended newspapers’ limitations, and a panel that lamented the government’s overriding influence.
Words like ‘too idealistic’ (in contrast to the ‘reality’) were levelled at Zaharom while others opined reporters had to ‘cari makan’, and thus, adhere to guidelines.
Focusing more on her personal experience, Marina felt that ‘the acceptance of censorship first’ had gone too far.
“Several years ago, I was involved with an architectural magazine where there was so much talk about whether the photo size of a Buddhist temple could be larger than that of a mosque,” the writer recalled.
“To me, I felt that the pervasive sense to self-censorship had gone beyond the law. There is the acceptance of censorship first,” said Marina, who started blogging in December 2006.
Because of this, Marina said people were ‘reactionary’ and tended to be ‘abusive online’, where there is no government censorship.
On the pre-election coverage, she said at times she felt ‘fed up’ with the direction of mainstream media.
“There was definitely a sense that the pre-election media ignored bloggers, especially when you look at comments from certain politicians.
“But to me, the world is not divided into mainstream and blogs. There is definitely a cross over,” Marina said.
Turning her attention to other forms of media, she cited social networking sites like Facebook, video sites like YouTube, and even newsgroups, as ways people could discuss and influence one another.
She said a growing number of people were getting ‘sceptical’ and were looking for news elsewhere.
“The three most important aspects of alternative media is that they are updated frequently, blogs offer more ‘personality’ and lucidity”, and they were interactive.
“While a blogger does not have the resources to cover news like a newspaper can, i.e. sending reporters to everywhere in Malaysia, blogs draw strength from the fact that one blogger would write about one place/issue, while others contribute stories from elsewhere.”
She described this plurality of writers and views as a ‘more holistic’ way of capturing people’s opinions.
“Blogs are a personal platform and newspapers are more corporate. It’s like a lot of people talking in a big room. This is what worries the government,” she added.
