Journalists and bloggers compare notes at Adham Center’s global “lessons learned” gathering
The often dangerous relationship between writers and governments , the use of technology to evade censorship, and the blurry line between online journalists, bloggers and new media activists. These and many more topics were tackled at a two-day global “lessons learned” online summit convened by the Kamal Adham Center for Journalism Training and Research at The American University in Cairo.
The gathering, funded USAID, brought together participants from 14 countries as far-flung as Columbia, Belarus and Indonesia to meet with their counterparts from Egypt and across the region. “The goal was to give Arab online journalists and bloggers the opportunity to learn from the experiences of others from countries that have gone through, or are in the midst of, the transition to media independence,” said Lawrence Pintak, director of AUC’s Adham Center.
Exiled Iranian blogger Fred Petrossian told the group that because his countrymen “have no access” to independent traditional media, “blogging is the only way.” But many Iranians write anonymously and face the challenge of making a living. “You need money, but you can’t go commercial and you can’t receive money from foreign entities,” he said. The description resonated with many of the Arabs at the gathering. Taha Baazoui of the Tunisian online publication Kalima, which has repeatedly been the target of government security services, said mainstream journalists in that country are “public clerks” who produce “fabrications. “Only Tunisians in exile can speak up,” he said.
The challenges outlined by participants were many. Where internet penetration in Egypt is low, Malawi bloggers face the complication of frequent power cuts, Syrian writers struggle with the fact that “nothing is forbidden, but nothing is permitted and redlines must be guessed at,” and the surge of internet’s popularity in South Korea means the government is now requiring real name registration to monitor usage.
Participants also learned about various techniques for avoiding censorship and evading internet firewalls that block access to sites. Exiled Yemeni journalist Walid Al Saqaf presented a “tunneling software” program, https://alkasir.com/download, that helps websites avoid being blocked by authorities, but that sparked a debate about the potential misuse of data gathered by such software.
The difference between bloggers, online journalists and media activists was one topic that emphasized the differences in perspective among those attending the gathering.
The Egyptian blogger known as Sandmonkey said blogs were made necessary by the poor state of the Arab mainstream media. “What we have to do unfortunately is do your job for you,” he said, addressing himself to the journalists in the room. “We’re not trained journalists, we’re not from institutions, but we do it from our pockets. We’re not waiting for someone to give us funding, we’re doing it from our homes. And frankly I think this should be commended,” he said.
Syrian journalist Mouson Morshed saw the role of bloggers quite differently. “From my personal point of view, I believe their main concern is to promote themselves,” she said. “How can the reader distinguish between a blogger who tells the truth and the blogger who is simply interested in self-promotion? Tanzanian blogger Ndesanjo Macha said “citizen journalism” involved “the idea of reporting news but at the same time as a citizen doing something to change your society. “The goal was to change the existing situation, to create new circumstances.”
“When you read a blog you know you are reading an opinion and you need to take it as a grain of salt,” said Columbian blogger Juliana Rincon. “As a blogger you have a very strong voice or opinion,” added Sylwia Korsak of Poland. To American blogger Eduwardo Avila, “blogging and journalism are complementary.” Egyptian Mustapha Nagar agreed. “Blogs are instantaneous and spontaneous and journalism has depth and professionalism.”
Many Arab participants agreed that pressure from bloggers helps to improve the quality of Arab journalism and the availability of information. But Egyptian blogger-turned-journalist Miral Brinjy of ONTV said blogging and journalism “each has a different objective” and thus there should be no effort to “try to professionalize blogging.”
In response, moderator Yosri Fouda, al-Jazeera’s chief investigative correspondent, asked whether bloggers should be organized into some form of union or federation. A show of hands reflected a wide gap between the Arab participants and those from elsewhere in the world, who generally felt the independent nature of bloggers meant organization was counter-intuitive. But many of the Arabs agreed with Hamdi Bokari who said that Arab bloggers and online journalists “are living in isolated islands” and need the support, encouragement and political protect that comes with an international organization.
But while some in the group were talking about issues of censorship, government pressure and financial woes, others were already living in what they called Web 3.0. That difference was probably best summed upin a comment by UK-based Brazilian writer Paula Goes in a Twitter posting during the blogger vs. journalist debate: “Blogging is so last year, to do citizen journalism quickly you need to be twitter.”