QotW9: what is citizen journalism?

"We all must recognize that the rules for newsmakers, not just journalists, have changed, thanks to everyone’s ability to make the news" (Gillmor, 2004). This statement seems to be supported by Straits Times Online Mobile Print (STOMP), an interactive portal owned by the Singapore Press Holdings. STOMP allows interaction in three forms, namely print, online and mobile ("About Us", 2006). Regular people like you and I can contribute to news to STOMP by SMSing or emailing them. As a response to this week's question, I attempt to analyze if STOMP is an ideal form of citizen journalism for Singapore.

First of all, let's see what is citizen journalism. In Wikipedia, citizen journalism is defined as is the act of citizens "playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information". It is also known as “participatory journalism" ("Citizen Journalism", 2007). STOMP certainly fits this definition of citizen journalism, since Singaporeans do play an active role as "journalists of STOMP". Then again, Wikipedia further explains that "the intent of this participation is to provide independent, reliable, accurate, wide-ranging and relevant information that a democracy requires". STOMP may allow citizens to participate in publishing the content, however the fact that content is moderated before it can be published does not really constitutes to independent information. "Citizens are interested in participating and contributing to subjects that traditional news outlets ignore or do not often cover" (Bowman & Willis, 2005). Therefore, in this sense, citizens may still be disappointed when some news are not eligible or chosen to be published on STOMP.

Yet, it is impossible to have an online interactive portal with unmoderated content. Content can end up being inaccurate and misleading. This may sound contradicting, but an online portal is not unlike a personal blog in the sense where the owner of the blog is responsible for all the content published. In this case, STOMP is responsible for the content published on its portal. As the characteristics of citizen journalism and STOMP are established here, I believe that STOMP may not be ideal yet but it is closest to the ideal form of a mainstream and collaborative citizen journalism we can get in Singapore now.

However, STOMP has still some of room for improvement. In fact, if I have the power, the first change I will make to STOMP is to change the layout of the website. In my opinion, the layout of the website can be improved to be less cluttered and more clean cut with less animated pictures. This is especially crucial for the index page, where visitors first determine the comfort level of surfing the website. When I first saw the website, it also didn't seem like an online news portal to me. Frankly speaking, at first glance, it looks like a website with filled with animated advertisements and banners.

The idea of STOMP is great, as it provides an avenue for freelance journalist wannabes. Nevertheless, I feel that the layout of the website is less than appealing. It may be just me, but I believe that the aesthetics of a website can make or break it. Never mind how mind blowing the content of the website may be, a less than perfect layout may not bring back visitors. With that being said, as one of the pioneer interactive news portal in Singapore, STOMP shows great potential. STOMP must listen to its contributors and viewers for making improvements to the website and in time to come, it can reach greater heights in both Singapore and the virtual world.

(Source: CartoonStock.co.uk)

References

About Us. (2006). In STOMP. Retrieved March 30, 2007, from http://www.stomp.com.sg/about/about.html

Bowman, S. & Willis, C. (2005). Neiman Reports: The Future is Here, But Do News Media Companies See It? Retrieved March 31, 2007, from http://www.hypergene.net/blog/weblog.php?id=P327

Citizen journalism. (2007, March 28). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved March 31, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Citizen_journalism&oldid=118429022

Gillmor, D. (2004). We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People. Retrieved March 30, 2007, from http://download.nowis.com/index.cfm?phile=WeTheMedia.html&tipe=text/html#chap3

QotW8: when blogs and politics come together

Adopted blog's information at a glance:

1. Blog’s Title and URL: Singabloodypore @ http://singabloodypore.rsfblog.org/
2. Blogger’s Name (or Pseudonym): Blog owner is Steven McDermott from the UK, a one-time resident in Singapore. The pseudonym he uses is soci. Other contributors to the blog include Clyde, Xenoboysg, Eng Chuan, Charles,Mister K, Locky2K, Elia Diodati, Pantalaimon, Chemgen, AmicaCuriae, Yuen.
3. Blogger’s Occupation (politician or citizen blogger): Blog owner is a research student. For the other contributors, I am assuming that most of them are citizen bloggers, according to their blogger profiles and blogs.
4. Blog’s Date of Birth (look for the first post): 3rd July 2003
5. Technorati Rank: 156,018 (84 links from 28 blogs)

This blog contains entries by a group of bloggers on political and social issues in mainly Singapore, and sometimes South East Asia. Many of the posts contain anti-government sentiments. They also frequently questions and openly opposes and criticizes to the decisions made by the government and the People Action's Party (PAP). For example, one of their latest posts featured an article calling for a protest to ANU's Honorary Doctorate for MM Lee Kuan Yew (Soci, 2007). Despite the controversial content of the blog, the number of comments left on the blog are not overwhelming.


In response to the question this week, that is, if blogs allow for greater democracy in Singapore, I would say yes, but to a limited extent. Here are the reasons why.

• Some local political blogs represent views of ordinary citizens, not PAP politicians or politicians from the opposition parties. These views are invaluable, because they can reflect the opinions of you and I and people around us, who may be too afraid to speak up. These blogs encourage us to read their views, and share our thoughts with them. Being part of an Internet community, like a community blog, is metaphoric of being in a party, where someone needs to start a conversation. In this case, these political blogs discusses these issues, that are considered relatively sensitive in Singapore. There may not be many comments, but at least these posts pose an alternative point of view to many readers.
  

• Like how Thornton (2002) puts it, "the role of traditional media (television, magazines and newspapers) in modern democracy is increasingly problematic, and serious questions have arisen about its capacity as a site for political criticism or rational debate". In our local context, our traditional media has always been questioned with the democracy issues. I remembered following the media coverage of 2006 Parliamentary Elections last year. Although there were news and footage shown on television on opposition parties, they were significantly limited compared to the PAP's. In the past, we could rely on these forms of traditional media to obtain information. Now, with the Internet, we can obtain more information and even discuss about them.

So, why is it that blogs only allow greater democracy in Singapore to a limited extent?

• The reason is because there are ways to control the Internet as well. For instance, last May, Senior Minister of State for Information, Communications and the Arts Balaji Sadasivan announced a ban on “explicitly political” podcasting and vodcasting during the General Election period (Giam, 2006). As Giam (2006) reasoned, this was to counter the availability of podcasts and vodcasts provided on Singapore Democratic Party's (SDP) website. In the end, SDP had no choice but to comply with the new regulation.

• In addition, "a post-election survey by the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) revealed that only 33 per cent of Singaporeans — mostly young adults — said that the Internet was important to shaping their voting decisions" (Giam, 2006). If the result is accurate, this evidently shows that although the nature of the Internet allows of the promotion of democracy, it is not to an astonishing extent.

Therefore, I believe that blogs do increase exposure to democracy in Singapore, but not to a huge extent. At least not yet.

References

Giam, G. (2006, December 31). Review - The politics of Singapore’s new media in 2006. Retrieved March 24, 2007, from
http://theonlinecitizen.com/2006/12/31/review-the-politics-of-singapores-new-media-in-2006/

McDermott, S. (2007, March 23). Snap Action! Protest ANU’s Honorary Doctorate for Lee Kuan Yew. Singabloodypore. Retrieved March 24, 2007, from http://singabloodypore.rsfblog.org/archive/2007/03/23/snap-action-protest-anu-s-honorary-doctorate-for-lee-kwan-ye.html

Thornton, A. (2002, October). Does Internet Create Democracy? Retrieved on March 24, 2007, from http://www.zip.com.au/~athornto/

QotW7: so what are u doing now?

According to Dictionary.com,

twit·ter

–verb (used without object)

1. to utter a succession of small, tremulous sounds, as a bird.
2. to talk lightly and rapidly, esp. of trivial matters; chatter.
3. to titter; giggle.
4. to tremble with excitement or the like; be in a flutter.

The second explanation could be the best fit for Twitter, a website COM125 students were asked to join as part of our blog assignment this week. When I first attempted to use Twitter, it felt like I was tagging on a giant tag-board, except that it'd appear on my "followers" page instead on just one tag-board. Also, I can see my "friends' tags" on my main page. Well, it is certainly more convenient than a tag-board!




The question is whether Twitter is considered as an online community. Technically, I believe it can be considered an online community. First of all, it can be updated using the web and secondly, it consists of a group of people communicating with one another. Additionally, Twitter calls itself "a community of friends and strangers from around the world sending updates about moments in their lives" ("Twitter FAQ", 2006). But, is it really one? Let's explore other factors to find out.

In my opinion, Twitter has features that are commonly seen by other social networking sites. Yet it has its own unique features. Here's a small list I've made up based on my knowledge on online social networking sites after slicing Twitter up.



Common features

• Signing up for an account is entirely free of charge (like most online social networking websites)
  
• Allowing you to use either your real name or a pseudonym (like almost any online community)
  
• Uploading an image as an avatar to represent you and customizing your own profile (like online forums)
  
• Adding other users as friends to your social circle (like MySpace)
  
• Sending private messages to friends (like Friendster)
  
• Receiving updates from users you choose (like RSS feeds)
• Using your mobile phone or IM to post updates (like moblogging)
• Having privacy control over it, for instance, showing updates only to friends (like LiveJournal)
  

Unique features

• Posting anything you want in 140 words or less (like a tag-board but a tag-board isn't really an online community)
  
• Selecting messages as "favorites" (like marking some e-mails as important but e-mail isn't really considered an online community either)
  

As we can see, there are many common features shared by Twitter and other popular online communities. Is it now safe to conclude that Twitter is indeed an online community? Probably, but let's examine more to be sure.

"Experientially, community within cyberspace emphasizes a community of interests, usually bounded by the topic under discussion, that can lead to a communal spirit and apparent social bonding." (Fernback & Thompson, 1995). Do Twitter users have common interests? Not necessarily. However, don't forget that users of MySpace and Friendster may not have common interests or character too and yet they are still frequently considered as online communities (Chaffin, 2004).

Fernback & Thompson (1995) also proposed another definition of online communities, referring to them as "social relationships forged in cyberspace through repeated contact within a specified boundary or place (e.g., a conference or chat line) that is symbolically delineated by topic of interest." Someone who uses Twitter will regularly post and check back on the website. This is where the "repeated contact within a specified boundary or place" comes into play.

Like what Wellman & Gulia (1996) mentioned, virtual communities provide possibilities for reversing the trend to less contact with community members because it is so easy to connect on-line with large numbers of people. Twitter allows you to do that. Twitter is an online community since the trends of communities are dynamic (Fernback & Thompson, 1995). In the past, perhaps only forums were commonly known as an online community. Then Facebook and blogs appeared and became online communities in their own right. And, there was the wildly successful Youtube. Maybe given time, Twitter might gain more popularity and be known one as the new generation of online communities. Who knows?

References

Chaffin, L. (2004). The Online Community Phenomena Sites like MySpace and Friendster make up the cyberfriend scene. Rampway Online. Retrieved March 16, 2007, from http://www.rampway.org/article.php?id=310

Fernback, J. & Thompson, B. (1995). Virtual Communities: Abort, Retry, Failure? Retrieved March 16, 2007, from http://www.rheingold.com/texts/techpolitix/VCcivil.html

Twitter. (2006). Twitter FAQ. Retrieved March 16, 2007, from http://help.twitter.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=26

Twitter. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Retrieved March 16, 2007, from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/twitter

Wellman, B. & Gulia, M. (1996). Net Surfers Don’t Ride Alone. Retrieved March 16, 2007, from http://www.acm.org/~ccp/references/wellman/wellman.html
title=Reputation_management&diff=113442073&oldid=111797891

QotW6: Hi, may I eavesdrop?

The definition of privacy invasion may differ for every individual. For me, I may consider the websites with tracking cookies a huge intrusion to my online privacy. For some, it may not be a big deal at all (Schwartz, 2001). Now, what about offline privacy?

How do people negotiate their privacy in public where everyone can see and hear one another? When you take public transport, be it the bus or MRT, or even the taxi, there is always someone near you. So when you talk on the mobile phone, chances are, the people near you can hear your conversations. How do you communicate effectively and yet, negotiate your privacy at the same time? Possibly via text messaging. At least for me, I realized that is very often the reason why I SMS. Be it in the bus or MRT filled with people, I tend to be more comfortable texting than calling when I need to discuss personal matters. Maybe it's because I'm a very private person by nature. Or it could be the bad experience I had with one over-enthusiastic taxi driver.

I remembered being in a cab, discussing with a friend about the grades I've gotten that semester, lamenting that it was horrible and that I must buck up the next semester. Upon hanging up, the taxi uncle started a conversation by mentioning that youngsters in Singapore tend to take the opportunities to study for granted (which I agree). That was fine, but he went on further to ask me about my academic background. That includes the secondary school and JC I went to, the university I'm in now, my "O" level and "A" level results, whether my parents paid for my education now and the like. Then he asked me why didn't I do well this semester. And that I should try not to disappoint my parents. Not wanting to rude, I answered his questions, albeit in a vague manner. I don't recall being really mad, but what I do recall is being glad when I finally reached my destination. I realized that a taxi may not be the best place for private phone conversations. "One way of understanding privacy is not whether we choose to expose personal information in public - we all do at different times and places - but the ease with which we can return to being private" (Rosen, 2004). I was having difficulties returning "to being private" in the taxi.


I understand that it could be that he was merely just trying to strike a conversation but ended up striking the wrong chord. Or it could be due to an emotional personal experience of his. But something else struck me. It is one of the reasons why text messaging works. Text messaging can give you the privacy telephone conversations cannot. Of course, on the other hand, we see people talking loudly on their mobile phones in public as well. Some complain. Some boast. Some divulge personal incidents. Others, I guess, are probably just loud by nature. Rosen (2004) explains this well. "Today, by contrast, intimacy and trust are increasingly obtained not by shared experiences or fixed social status but by self-revelation: people try to prove their trustworthiness by revealing details of their personal lives to prove that they have nothing to hide before a crowd whose gaze is turned increasingly on all the individuals that compose it"

According to a survey by the Ponemon Institute, only seven percent of Americans said that they will change any behaviors in an effort to preserve their privacy (Sullivan, 2006). I speculate that the percentage will be much higher if a similar survey was conducted in Singapore. I may be wrong, but I'm certain I belong to the seven percent.

(Cartoon by Chris Slane, http://cagle.msnbc.com/news/PrivacyCartoons2/main.asp)

References

Rosen, J. (2004, July 19). The Naked Crowd. Retrieved March 9, 2007, from http://www.spiked-online.com/Printable/0000000CA5FF.htm

Schwartz, J. (2001, September 4). Giving the Web a Memory Cost Its Users Privacy. NYTimes.com. Retrieved March 10, 2007, from http://www.law.upenn.edu/fac/pwagner/law619/f2001/week12/nytimes_cookies_series.pdf

Sullivan, B. (2006, October 17). Privacy Lost: Does anybody care?. MSNBC Interactive. Retrieved March 10, 2007, from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15221095/print/1/displaymode/1098/