Internet and Journalism

Journalism is the profession of reporting, photographing or editing news stories for the media. Due to the rise of the internet, journalists have been losing their monopoly on news, either locally or internationally. With social networking sites like Twitter, Youtube and Facebook, news can now be reported by mere citizens such as you and I, as long as they own any sort of internet access. This phenomenon is known as citizen journalism, which is getting increasingly prevalent in this time and age.

Why has citizen journalism become so popular?

Firstly, news from citizen journalism are often objective without much bias. As most citizens are not working for any organisation, or receiving any pay for their work, their news are more believable than news from mainstream media, which sometimes have to practice self-censorship in order to be able to make a profit, or to conform to certain rules imposed by the government. Especially in war-torn countries, citizen journalists could report on the real carnage caused by war.

Secondly, news from citizen journalism are posted quickly and almost instantaneously; one often do not need to wait for up to a day for an article to be released by a citizen journalist. The spread of such news are further aided by websites such as Twitter.

Due to such circumstances, it is inevitable that many journalists have lost their jobs. However, is citizen journalism to be feared by mainstream news? In order to cope with such a development, many news site has created a place just for citizens to post their articles. For example, in Singapore, the Straits Times has created a website called "STOMP", where people can sign in and upload photos and write articles about what they have seen happen around the country.

Instead of overthrowing mainstream media, citizen journalism will complement mainstream news, and even aid them by being reliable sources of information. Just like how the internet has not taken over more traditional media such as newspapers and magazines, mainstream news will be here to stay, and might even publish more accurate and ethical journalism as a result.

Internet and Politics: Apathy amongst teens and young adults

It is often said that young adults and teens are generally apathetic towards politics. Truly, most of us cannot be bothered about the ongoings of our local politics (speaking from personal experience, being a young adult now). In order to understand why this is so, allow me to briefly talk about politics, and political power. Some people have more political power than others, and it is important to see how this affects the mindset of many young adults and teens.

To summarize, politics are the activities and social relations involving authority or power of government and organizations. Political powers come from three sources: legitimate power (the power given to an individual by a recognised authority to enforce standards of behaviour), referent power (the power bestowed upon individuals by virtue of accomplishment or attitude), and expert power (the power that comes from education or experience).

This is a model of an individual's political power, and his concerns. As one can see, the individual's circle of concern is much bigger than his or her circle of influence, meaning that the individual is unable to involve himself in every aspect of his concern. For example, a poor man living in a small countryside could be concerned about the plight of a Burmese's poor living condition, but could not do anything about it because he could not influence many people to do something about it.

Naturally, this model applies to young adults and teens as well:

1. Their circle of influence is too small as compared to their circle of concern, leaving many teens and young adults feeling cynical and inadequate. A young adult could feel strongly for an political issue, either local or overseas, but his or her lack of power (or perceived lack of power) to act on it, to help improve the situation, can make him or her feel drained. Instead, he or she might choose to remain apathetic, since there is "no point to worrying and thinking about it".
2. Their circle of concern is too small. Young adults and teens could be simply unaware of political issues happening around, due to lack of emphasis placed in political awareness in the country, or that they are just brought up to "mind their own business". Sometimes, the local media frames political news as trivial, and that everything in the country is "perfectly fine". Inaccessibility of alternate news sources contributes to this idea that nothing else needs to be done to help improve the situation.
3. Culture: Some young adults and teens can be brought up to respect authority. This is especially prevalent in Asian countries, where they are told not to question authority, perhaps due to a culture of fear (i.e.: if you tell on the government, you and your family will be in trouble), or just plain respect for people in power, such as teachers, policemen and politicians.
4. Some young adults and teens are simply bored by the going ons of the political world, seeing politics as something that is "boring", or not essential to their general wellbeing.

Apathy might not seem like such a good thing, for more often than not, politics have always affected all our lives in one way or another. In some places, lack of political awareness is often promoted indirectly, by the ruling government, so that citizens would not be able to think critically about their environment they live in. This is a dangerous situation to be in. Harnessing the power of the Internet, almost everyone would have a certain measure of power, and increase their circle of concern from greater awareness, and increase their circle of influence as well.

Multimedia

Multimedia is a computer-based interactive communications process that incorporates text, graphics, sound, animation, and video. Its interactivity is a key feature of multimedia, in which the user determines what content is delivered, when and how it is delivered. Instead of me rambling on what I think multimedia is like, I'll give an example of a marketing communication, namely how the song, "We Are the World 25 for Haiti", is to be marketed.

This is a cover of a song that Lionel Richie and the late Michael Jackson wrote together about 25 years ago, and proceeds from this song will go to helping Haiti out during their time of distress. People can purchase the songs from iTunes at $1.99, and on Youtube, viewers are encouraged to post a video response to this song, singing the chorus. On top of this, other videos related to this making of the single are shown next to the video. A website is also set up so that people can find out more about the song, how else they can help Haiti during this terrible disaster, join the mailing list, and help spread the world about the song online through social networking sites such as Facebook.

Such a marketing promotion is very engaging, as it involves the audience. The viewers can also choose to see what videos they want to watch, at their own convenience, and even leave behind feedback via the Youtube comments.

Internet Security

I would like to take the time to thank those who has been religiously following my blog. Thank you, Mr Choy...you're probably the only one.

I admit, my posts have been less than fascinating, but please bear with me as I go through this post about internet security, with more thoughts of my own.

I've admittedly been rather intrigued about internet security for some time. There are so many things plaguing the internet - computer viruses, worms, trojan, spyware...people has even tried to steal other people's identities through phishing. Yes, stealing others' identities! The horror.

What's the difference between all those horrible things? Let me attempt to enlighten you, my gentle reader(s):

1) Computer virus: It is a piece of programming code that is secretly introduced into a system in order to corrupt it, or to destroy data. It is able to generate copies of itself, and therefore, spread throughout the computer system. It is very destructive. It spreads by attaching itself to a normal programme file, and will only be executed or propagated when the user takes action.

2) Computer worm: Worms are self-propagating computer viruses. It can replicate itself over a a computer network and usually performs malicious actions, such as using up the computer's resources and shutting the system down. Their impact is very similar to comptuer viruses. They can transmit themselves through a network by exploiting security loopholes, as opposed to viruses which needs a "host".

3) Trojan: It is a destructive programme that masquerades as a benign application. Although it cannot replicate itself, it is just as destructive. One of the most insidious types of Trojan is a programme that claims to rid your computer of viruses, but instead introduces more viruses onto your computer.

4) Phishing: A form of internet fraud that aims to steal valuable information such as credit cards, social security numbers, user IDs, passwords....and many others. It can come in a form of a fake website that tricks you into keying in important information.

Thankfully, just like in real life, there are always the "good guys" to combat the "bad guys" - in this case, the "good guys" are the anti-virus programmes - but be careful, some anti-virus programmes can be a Trojan, so remember to choose only reputable ones to protect your computer!

Sadly, that's not all. Equally vicious cybercriminals, such as hackers, can attempt to hack into your computer. Hacking is known as the unauthorized use, or attempts to circumvent or bypass the security mechanisms of an information system or network. One such method to gain access to your information, is the use of spyware. Spyware is a software that tracks your actions and/or your internet use. It can capture what you type, including passwords, and send it to the spyware creator.

Therefore, investing in the security of your computer really goes a long way. Why save a bit of money, when you can easily protect your computer (and possibly your life!) with reputable anti-virus programmes, such as AVAST!, Norton anti-virus, and Kaspersky? If you are not sure if a certain anti-virus programme is truly reliable, or is just another Trojan created by a malicious cybercriminal, simply do a search online. It is as simple as that.