SPH Editor Looking A Bit Silly Again

Are bloggers journalists? Leslie Fong, an SPH editor, had this to say:

“No! Emphatically not! Whether in writing news stories or features, properly trained journalists check and double-check their facts, set these in context, work in relevant background information, insist on objectivity and balance, organise their material so their account flows smoothly and logically, and use temperate language unless there is a powerful reason to resort to strong words. Even in offering views, they ensure that the opinions expressed are based on fact, failing which, as any libel lawyer would tell you, what they write cannot be defended as fair comment.

Bloggers, on the other hand, just sound off as they please. They are not bound by professional standards and ethics, and are responsible to no one but themselves. So you read them at your own risk, or peril. Newspaper editors who give bloggers space, or even prominence, in their pages, in the hope that this will attract younger readers, are doing damage to their calling.”

Meanwhile, hot off the international press, we have this from AFP:

Yangon bloggers outsmart Myanmar censors
Agence France-Presse
Posted date: September 25, 2007

BANGKOK -- Savvy young bloggers in Myanmar are breaking through the military junta's tight Internet controls to post photos and videos of swelling anti-government protests, experts said Tuesday.

The government blocks almost every website that carries news or information about the Southeast Asian country, and even bars access to web-based email.

But an army of young techies in Yangon works around the clock to circumvent the censors, posting pictures and videos on blogs almost as soon as the protests happen.

Many of these images have been picked up by mainstream news organizations, because bloggers have managed to capture images that no one else can get.

When Myanmar's detained democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi stepped outside her home in Yangon to greet marching monks and supporters on Saturday, the only pictures of the landmark moment were posted on blogs.

....... These bloggers are mainly young university students in Yangon who have made it their mission to post messages and pictures since the anti-junta rallies broke out there on August 19, he said.

..... No foreign journalist has obtained a visa to enter Myanmar, under military since 1962, since the start of the anti-junta rallies, rights groups said.

Sounds like the whole world is depending on Yangon bloggers for news of what's happening in Myanmar. Who has time to think about Leslie Fong? He's just one of those dinosaurs left behind by the Internet age. Leslie's cocksureness is certainly amusing though. I like this part of his quote:

"Newspaper editors who give bloggers space, or even prominence, in their pages, in the hope that this will attract younger readers, are doing damage to their calling."

It implies that bloggers in general are just very excited and over-eager and just dying to have some space & publicity in a newspaper. Actually, when the Straits Times first launched STOMP and I was invited to join them and go for a photoshoot, my immediate reaction was "Gawd, no."

Maybe one day ... when they have improved themselves. Currently, Singapore's ranking for press freedom (147th out of 167 countries) is just too embarrassingly low.