Egypt protests with new media

The world is reeling from the shockingly quick descent of Egypt into chaos and destruction as the country implodes with riots and violence, with many of the Egyptians calling for President Hosni Mubarak to step down.

New media platforms in the likes of Facebook and Twitter have been added to the heady mix of volatile politics in the region. Often seen as tools for democratisation that give voice to the everyman, Facebook and Twitter were used by the Egyptians to stir up sentiments against Mubarak, and garner supporters to organise anti-government protest marches. This resulted in the government shutting down the Internet, adding much fuel to the already raging fire of hatred and discontentment.

To add to all this is Kenneth Cole’s infamous tweet: 

Millions are in uproar in #Cairo,” the tweet read. “Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available online at http://bit.ly/KCairo -KC

Kenneth Cole angered many, who saw him capitalising and trivialising the Eyptian political crisis. Cole has since tweeted his apology. An obviously offended person actually put up the tweet on one of the store windows. Cole has tweeted that it was a prank and that he was not responsible for the inappropriate store display.

Looks like Kenneth Cole’s new media faux pax serves as important lessons in new media PR for all. On, what a twit, er, I mean, tweet.

We can continue to follow the unfolding situation in Egypt through tweets: http://twitter.com/#search?q=egypt%20protests and http://twitter.com/#search?q=egypt%20. Youtube is also full of videos showing angry protests in Cairo. The political struggle is also one played out in new media.

Mumbai Terrorist Attacks and New Media

The deplorable recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai have made major news headlines all over the world.

For Singapore, the attacks have hit close to home as they have claimed the first Singaporean life due to a terrorist attack. Many mourn the loss of Singaporean lawyer, 28 year-old Lo Hwei Yen, who was shot execution-style while she was at the Oberoi Hotel in Mumbai on her fateful business trip.

Discussions in cyberspace amongst locals about Lo Hwei Yen’s capture and her sad and untimely death played out since the time news broke about her capture as a hostage. 

We can only hope that more can be done to prevent such attacks.

While the attacks were still taking place, a different but altogether, hectic and frenzied activity was also taking place in the ‘parallel’ universe in cyberspace. Bloggers all over Mumbai were posting live updates of the situation, and this truly underscores citizen journalism as an alternative/complement/supplement to news coverage.

Some were uploading photos of the damage from the attacks on the luxury hotels, and many of these were also loaded onto Flikr. The micro-blogging site Twitter also saw a lot of intense action as Tweets on the attacks were sent – at one point 80 Tweets were sent within 5 seconds!

There were also reports of survivors who were trapped in the buildings getting information from their mobile phones and Blackberries – they were surfing for information, ironically, on what was happening in the very same buildings they were in, but were left out of (in terms of info received).

There’s a blog that collects all the social media representation of the event.

All this goes to show that while mainstream news would not be able to provide such comprehensive coverage in such a short time, the world got to know about the events in such a short time, and while they were unfolding too, due to the ubiquitous nature new media has taken on, and new media’s role in news coverage. 

And with that, globalisation has taken on a new meaning and added dimension.

The modern online news site

I was just taking a closer look at the homepage of the Straits Times news site. I realised how much it’s changed from its earlier days, and it has now taken on a new dimension.

Besides the ‘traditional’ web news articles, the site has now incorporated various other new media platforms: blogs; forums; its video channel, RazorTV, its citizen journalist portal, Stomp; and even its online classifieds portal, ST701.

This multi-dimensional and multi-sensory approach to news sites seems to be the way to go, to reach out to a more IT and new media-savvy ‘readership’.

Not only that, with the online sales portal, Mocca.com, launching its FULL THROTTLE MocCarnival , an auto and car enthusiast event last Sunday on 23 Nov, it seems like a new trend has started, with online events spilling over into reality.

Newspapers like Straits Times and Today go Web 2.0

Popular local newspapers The Straits Times and Today have undergone some facelift and more! Their digital editions are going even more high-tech!

The Straits Times digital html version is now available for free for two weeks from 8 August. To complement their news, they now have RazorTV to bring videos, podcasts, blogs and forums to their viewers as well, probably inspired by the success of their citizenship-journalism portal Stomp.

Despite having many online and digital editions of publications, many still read the print versions. If not, all the print newspapers and magazines would have gone out of business long ago! Knowing that readers still prefer print versions, and also knowing that readers now are constantly on the move and want convenience and portability in their lives, the people at Today now have the Today Online Easy Reader  that allows us to read the digital edition and see it the way as you read it on print!

The application allows you to save the copy on your laptop and PC and read it any time and anywhere, and because of an intelligent feature, it will adjust the page to fit your screen so you never need to scroll!

I’m looking foward to many more Web 2.0 innovations!

Costly mistake by Malaysian PM for ignoring the Internet and bloggers

Malaysian PM Abdullah Badawi admitted that he underestimated the power of the Internet in garnering political support, in the follow-up to the biggest loss of political power for the ruling party of Malaysia. He felt that this was a costly mistake and that his party had lost the Internet war.

Due to being ignored by mainstream media, the opposition parties took their campaigning online through blogs and websites.

The recent elections in Malaysia show how the Internet could be galvanised as a political tool. “The Internet definitely played a role in getting young people to vote,” said 25-year-old Michelle Gunaselan, a founding member of online electoral education group VotED. Many young people are now generally more hopeful about their political future, and more interested in the politics of the land, given the Internet’s ability to engage them.

The ruling party is now more open to bloggers and also using new media to reach out to the masses. However, some of the opposition members are not convinced and remain sceptical. It remains to be seen how the ruling party will use the Internet and other online means to win back the political war.

Hm…do you think Singaporeans will take to the Internet for political issues, like the Malaysians?

Workshops, seminars and conferences on New Media

New Media is constantly evolving. Each day, new forms of using New Media emerge as well as new forms of New Media!

In order to keep up with all the developments as well better my understanding of New Media and its related issues, I’m looking out for seminars, conferences and workshops on New Media organised for this or next year. It would be great if they had a slightly more educational than technological slant, as I’m more interested in the various issues related to the use of New Media than the technology behind it, though I’m aware, often the two are related.

If you do know of any good seminars, conferences or workshops coming up, I would appreciate it if you could drop me a line or leave a message in the Comments box.

Cheers! 

Citizen Journalism Breaks New Ground

About a week ago, Singaporean blogger, Alex Au, kind of ‘blew the whistle’ on the rental story that was featured in one of the local mainstream print publications in his blog entry, S$2, 500 to rent a 3-room flat? The article was about the rental hikes in Singapore, and not convinced that  a 3-room flat in Jurong East was fetching S$2, 500 in rent as reported, Mr Au decided to do a little investigating around the block of flats which happen to be near his place. 

What he found out was that the flat was actually a two-in-one ‘jumbo flat’ and hence was able to fetch the high rent reported.

This goes to show how citizen journalists are also serious about finding out the truth and in this episode, blogger Alex Au helped to set the record straight on the rental yield of the flat.

Thus, it is little wonder that in an article entitled Citizen journalism aims high, we are told that NowPublic, a fast-growing citizen journalism website, has secured US$10.6 million dollars to finance its growth to become the world’s largest news agency. 

Looks like citizen journalism is poised for further growth and has developed a sense of respectability about it. 

UN blogger

Mr Matthew Lee is the only blogger at the UN with media credentials. What this means is that he has some entitlements that usually only invited press have such as free office space and access to UN briefings and press conferences. He is even allowed to ask questions. The information he gathers makes it to his website innercitypress.com in daily postings. He covers all stories and aspects in the UN, big and small. This is one way of bringing info about and from the UN to the common masses, many of whom now get their dose of info online.

What interests me is that UN has actually granted Matthew Lee, an independent blogger so journalistic credentials which goes to show the growing awareness of the important role bloggers and the blogospehere have in society today, especially in the area of media influence.

Which reminded me of O’Reilly’s proposed code of conduct for all bloggers in a bid to give some organisation and structure to the blogosphere. I was just checking in on O’Reilly’s Radar for any updates and here’s what the man says in Code of Conduct: Some lessons learnt so far:

Rather than responding in detail to the many comments on my Draft of a Bloggers’ Code of Conduct or the earlier Call for a Blogger’s Code of Conduct, as well as some of the thoughtful discussion on other blogs, I thought I’d summarize some of my chief takeaways from the discussion so far.

These include:

• The poor choice of the “badges” I proposed, together with a reiteration of why I thought badges might be useful.
• The need for a more modular code of conduct, a set of axioms rather than a single monolithic “code of conduct” or “terms of service.”
• A suggestion of some moderation mechanisms that might be more effective than a code of conduct.
• A discussion of constructive anonymity vs. “drive-by anonymity”.
• An acknowledgement that a “code of conduct” should be reviewed by lawyers lest bloggers incur additional liability for commenters.
• Why I think civility matters, despite all the nay-sayers.

Well, what do you say to that?

Virginia Tech and New Media…some new insight

This is a follow-up to yesterday’s posting on Virginia Tech and New Media. In the news on TV last night, there was a footage of the shooter in a self-filmed video that he sent to NBC. The video showed him ranting about society and its failings and for forcing him into a corner, making his killing spree seem an inevitable ending. The use of the video highlights the Youtube generation we are in nowadays, so much so that filming himself and sending the images to the news centre to be broadcast was probably a most natural thing to do for the shooter, though of course we know that there was nothing natural at all in what was said and done.

I received some comments on yesterday’s posting.

Raincoaster commented that a VT had a pre-existing campus-wide text and email tree for emergencies and didn’t use it once the first shootings happened. “Let’s look at the way the institution could have used new media to prevent an additional 30 deaths, but didn’t.”  Jonny applauded technology for being used to give people a voice to share their grief and worries as many often really just need an easy forum to talk. “If the flip side of this is macabre capitalism then so be it – personally I think it’s a worthwhile trade-off.” 

Thanks for the comments, guys. What do others think? Let’s hear you.

Virginia Tech and New Media

There is no doubt that many have been affected by the shooting tragedy at Virginia Tech. Not another one? Not another student shooting case on campus? Not another case of the tragedy of easy access to firearms? Not another case of a misfit individual in society? These are the questions that will haunt society in the aftermath of one of the worst campus shooting cases in the US.

An interesting development is the role of new media in all this. With the sudden turn of events on campus and with many reeling from shock and confusion, new media has become a way for people to find out about what has been happening.

In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, before there was any news available from traditional channels of information, and instead of using traditional phone lines for fear of jamming them, and because they would be jammed, many students tried to find out if their campus friends were okay and what was happening on campus by logging on to the social networking sites like Facebook, blogs and websites.

People were getting first-hand accounts or recounts in blogs. New media also became a way for people to express their hurts and confusion. Apparently, a recording of the gunshots recorded by a student on his mobile phone has also become available on the Net. Such close-hand ‘reporting’ is not possible in such a situation something that traditional journalists can’t do. In the Straits Times article “Students turn to Net for information”, it was reported that Virginia Tech freshman, Bryce Carter hid in his dorm and “did what anyone his age would do in a time of crisis” – he blogged.

The Virginia Tech webpage has also become a Memoriam site of sorts, allowing people to read about the details of the event and sharing their thoughts and grief through a dedicated memorial link. You can even listen to the podcast and get a transcript of the address made at the memorial service. I think all these links help people to be closer to the situation, and in so doing, perhaps provides a channel for airing their thoughts and emotions. Importantly, there are also crisis hotlines available to provide counselling for those in need.

 It’s indeed a sad day when an individual is so alienated that he turns on society in such a cold and brutal way, and it’s a sad day that following the massacre, threats of copycat killings surfaced in several states in the US. It’ll be a sadder day if there is a backlash against South Koreans (the nationality of the shooter). Already, the South Korean government is warning of possible repercussions.

Many are trying to come to terms with the situation, and there are many who have taken a look at what’s been happening at the Virginia Tech massacre and other similar incidents. Let’s hope that something good will come out of this. Something good must come out of this. 

New Media seems to be playing a pivotal role so far in allowing people to make connections and communicate and seek catharsis of sorts for their grief. If only Cho Seung-Hui, the gunman, would have made use of it earlier.