Blogs By Big Shot Ex-News Editors & Ex-Journalists.
Lemme hand it to you straight down from the top; you wanna be careful with blogs by people who used to be a hotshot journalist or news editor in mainstream media. Listen to my advice, mate. You've gotta take what they write with a bit of salt, pepper, ketchup, chili sauce, Tabasco sauce, and maybe a dash of lemon juice before you wash it down with the strongest drink you can take without burning your lungs. They wrote great stuff for the government when they were on the payroll and the government loved them enough to recognize their talent with awards and stuff war heroes can only dream of. Now that they are out of the fold to join the blog sphere to sing the Blues in G minor, they write about things that you only talk about among your friends from the opposition party at a mamak stall in hush hush because you don't want to end up in jail for talking about the government behind their backs. And I bet your index finger that the government have a way of finding you out with their extensive SB networks. These guys don't sleep, they work around the clock to keep this fine country safe year in year out so that the tourists coming in for the VMY 2007 can have a good time, smiling from end to end, going around the country snapping pictures as if digital cameras are going out of style.
We've got a senior news editor who runs a blog to complain about everything that the government do or don't do. I used to read his weekly column when he was on the payroll and I taught he'd made senator in no time since he played to the tune of the day dragging Anwar Ibrahim's name through the mud pit. He's singing a different kinda blues now, and he's got nothing nice to say about his ex-master to whom he used to worship now that he got his senses hit by a runaway train head on. Oh well, money can do things to people and I am no exception except that's not how I make my money. I make my money with the smell of diesel, dust, crude oil, sweat and the threat of petroleum fire swallowing me whole into a charcoal.
And now we've got a couple of high-profile journalists coming in to join the blog sphere. It's nice to be able to finally connect with people I otherwise have no way of getting through since they are a different breed of high-class folks who mix around with the movers and the shakers of the society.
It's gonna be a good year for blogging. And I'm excited since there's so much to learn from these professionals that it's like walking right into a writing class and it's free.
posted by Bergen at
4:12 PM
6 Comments:
there are always two sides of a coin. and many sides of a story.
the ex journos are not entirely wrong, neither are their *ex-masters* entirely right.
it is the readers who are often misleaded into thinking what they think they read.
ex-media-guy
because with internet, there are no gatekeepers. the former media people are finally free to write what they want to write, the things they feel strongly about.
you wouldn't know the number of stories that got spiked and never see print because the contents and message do not go down well with the gatekeepers. and it is very frustrating for a journalist to have their stories spiked.
Rather an interesting scenario with partisan newspapers and journalists who must support their masters' idealogy. If you've talked the talk and walked the walk a particular way for two decades, how then do you gain credibility in the eyes of the public as a source to be trusted? I see your point, Bergen.
so let all the minds talking .....
p/s what about blogs by ordinary people? like .. you know, those mommies with kids blabbering the joy (& pain) of running after their rugrats while still trying to earn a little bit of money yet still desirous of maintaining parental sanity? Those are lessons in life too, y'know. V important. Haha. Just that, maybe not as high profile & glam. A precious part of a whole nonetheless.
Dr Nurul: That's an accurate way of putting it.
Ex-Media Guy: It's pretty hard to tell the truth out there. Maybe we've been fed with lies for too long that we can no longer swallow the truth.
ABOVLB: The gatekeepers. That's the game you've gotta play.
OLFTGM: So the world's a stage afterall. We put on a mask, or play the part or a role we've chosen to play. And when the curtain falls, we're back to being ourselves again but people look at us as the guy we acted in the play. And we try hard to convince that that was only a play but we played the role so well that people are finding it hard to believe us. It's a tight situation.
Ibu: I'm working on it.
Very straightforward you have on this mate. Thats what I noticed too but like Dr Nurul put it sekali air bah sekali pasir berubah.
I think only people who are inclined to the oppositions don't change much.
Anyway its time to read what they had in mind now rather than what they had to write previously.Might be therapeutic to them too.
And, its free tuition for you and me mate.
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