Social media a formidable foe for mainstream English media?

                        

"It has been my considered view that December 6, 1992, would not have happened in the age of 24-hour news television. Through the forest of microphones and broadcast vans that would have swarmed the disputed site in Ayodhya, it would have been impossible for either the Uttar Pradesh government or the Centre to deny knowledge of what was happening on ground zero.” These were his assertion Oct 08^th 2010 in an article  “A half-way house” by Mr.Rajdeep Sardesai.

The man is at it once again.  “News we can use”   it would be fitting finale to 2010 by writing rejoinder to this bigoted soul. He has sinned beyond our wildest imagination. There is no better way to describe the author than in the word of Sigmund Freud. “Illusions commend themselves to us because they save us pain and allow us to enjoy pleasure instead. We must therefore accept it without complaint when they sometimes collide with a bit of reality against which they are dashed to pieces.”

Rajdeep Sardesai is singularly responsible for the vilest reportage about Mr. Narendra Modi for the past 8years. He has frozen the state of Gujarat in a time period from which the state is yet to emerge on CNNIBN. It would be most interesting to inspect the percentage of positive versus negative reporting on this channel for the period 2002 to 2010. No we would not be surprised at all it will only confirm what we know.

This editor in chief is guilty of manufacturing fake tweets to influence viewers, he is derelict in initiating action against his deputy who had the audacity to hurt the sentiments of millions of Indians with her irreverent tweet about Lord Ram being a “Divine Encroacher” or labeling all those who disagreed with her view point as “Internet Hindus” going to obnoxious extent to state that RSS was training people how to tweet in Nagpur and Jhandawalan.

At a news seminar in Ahmedabad two weeks ago, I was asked by a member of a rather irate audience: “Do you people in the media think you are god?” I hastened to emphasise my mortality, but realised that I had little chance. “At one level, the news consumer expects the media to solve the multiple problems of a nation: from banishing corruption, ending terrorism, to even clearing the garbage in the neighbourhood.”

Nothing could be further from truth than the assertions that Rajdeep Sardesai is making. The contempt for the viewer is all too obvious. This is precisely the mindset that we do not want and are opposing. Media personnel have built illusions around themselves; the discerning viewers saw through all this and switched off these channels long before Radia Tapes happened, confirmation of what we suspected is all that was needed for the public outrage to surface. 

Media has a role and that is to present the news as it unfolds sans editorial comments and slant in favour of a political party. Social media has made and is making their life difficult, people are extra vigilant, there are individuals who despite not wanting to watch this and another channel do so, to detect the lies and fabricated interactive feedback to further expose these manipulators and scamsters on the loose.  

China promotes and takes great pride in the growth of the Internet in the country, under its careful monitoring. But its over 450 million surfers mean something more than Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg choosing to vacation in Beijing and visiting its Web company Baidu; it also means an online image, a blog post, a message on one of its Twitter clones, can create chinks in China’s great firewall. “Comment is free.”

China is wary of netizens and social media, mainstream English media would do itself a great service not to challenge us. For we are the Watch Dogs, who will chase away the pet poodles and Lap Dogs from our amidst.

Let me conclude this with yet another quote from Sigmund Freud  “He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret. If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.”

Must read blog SandeepWeb:  New post on blog about Indian Liberals. || Classic the template for liberals after Rajdeep's tweet.

Latest update on the subject.

What he could see evolving though, was a new objectivity. Objectivity, he then pointed out, had always been an idea important for the news. For him it was once designed to deliver journalism that people can trust. But in the new media age transparency is what delivers trust. He stressed that news today still has to be accurate and fair, but it is as important for the readers, listeners and viewers to see how the news is produced, where the information comes from, and how it works. The emergence of news is as important, as the delivering of the news itself.Here's a read on that Journos can dig head in sand. .

I welcome a debate and discussion on this…As always, please keep your tone civil, your language polite…no sweeping generalisations please and no personal abuse.  Thank you.