If the public are to be the best judge of news quality, then the public will get the standard of news they demand.

By Devadas Krishnadas

More people these days seem to get their news, or at least supplement their news, from sources which are non-institutional such as blogs and ‘netizen’ news sites. Today’s bloggers and self-appointed ‘netizen journalists’ enjoy a sufficient following that the government has felt it justified to extend the Media Development Authority’s regulatory ambit to cover online news providers. This move led to a furore about control of the Internet. Was the brouhaha misguided? Is there a place for traditional news providers?

[quipbox float="right" boxcolor="000000" boxhead="Why we stay plugged in"]"The comfort that we are still ‘plugged in’ provides the sensation of being part of a larger enterprise of humanity."[/quipbox]

Let us first agree that we do need news. News is information and we rely on information to make sense of changes happening around us. To be sure, news covers a wide spectrum ranging from celebrity gossip to events in great power relations. In so doing, it provides us – listeners, readers, watchers and tweeters – with fodder for our minds. That relentless feed of data points reassures us that we are part of a community, the comfort that we are still ‘plugged in’ and provides sensation of being part of a larger enterprise of humanity.

Does that mean that news has no standard? No baseline to discriminate between good and poor quality of news cover?

Credibility, Comprehension and Community

News providers need to do three things well. These things are related and hierarchical. When news providers do a good job we are all beneficiaries.

The first and most significant task is to provide credible information. News services need to provide timely, authenticated, factual and accurate information. Those who claim to provide the news must meet a high standard on all these dimensions to be considered legitimate.

Second, news providers need to make an attempt at providing comprehension. This means putting information into context, inter-relating multiple variables to sense making meaning and providing analytical richness through commentary and critique. A news service can only provide a framework for comprehension if it has already laid a strong foundation of information.

Third, and especially important in the digital age, is the need to provide for interaction. News providers should supply the opportunity for their audience to engage the news. Such participation can range from clicking ‘like’ to providing comments, being interviewed or writing letters. If the news provider has done the jobs of providing quality information and comprehension then the quality of interaction should be better than if they had not.

[quipbox float="right" boxcolor="000000" boxhead="Telling good from poor"]"What we should be regulating is not the Internet per se. We should be concerned about how to ensure that poor news providers do not crowd out good ones and that in the first instance, there is a way to tell good from poor."[/quipbox]

What we should be regulating is not the Internet per se. We should be concerned about how to ensure that poor news providers do not crowd out good ones and that in the first instance, there is a way to tell good from poor. Doing so is in the public interest.

Here is the problem with the approach taken by the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP). It won’t work.

First, the Internet is too plural. Too nuanced and too fast evolving to be effectively policed.

Second, in a State characterised by one-party rule it is impossible for the government to be entirely objective in all matters.

Third, even if the government could be conscious of its biases, it is a whole other matter to take at face value any claim that it would be self-restraining.

Fourth, a dependency on the government to regulate the information space characterised as news is coequal to the thesis that the State is the protector not only of people’s interest but of the information space itself. This is an archaic notion but one which is consistent amongst regimes which have prefaced their continuity of power on the control of information.

So if State regulation is neither practical nor necessarily desirable, but the intention is sound, what recourse is left? This would be the recourse of an informed, involved and mature public readership. It has been suggested that the term ‘internet literacy’ adequately describes the meaning of this recourse. It does not. The success of this model is not conditioned by literacy nor is it limited to the limitless Internet.

Interested, Informed & Involved

Fundamentally, it is about a triangulation of three vectors.

First, the public must take an interest in the world around it. Interested enough to read and discuss intelligently the complex issues which concern it. Only then can a public make discerning judgements about what constitutes good journalism. In short, it requires that the public get informed and get involved in the issues.

Second, it requires a high level of professionalism amongst those who style themselves journalists – whether in print or online. All who do so must accept that news is a professional activity and they should conduct themselves as professionals. The concern of a professional is foremost to ensure the integrity of their chosen practice and not be misdirected into moral relativism of finger pointing who is and who is not meeting the standard.

[quipbox float="right" boxcolor="000000" boxhead="The public choice"]"If the public are to be the best judge of news quality, then the public will get the standard of news they demand."[/quipbox]

Third, it requires a political structure where the State is placed higher than the government of the day. This is to ensure that the political government is itself limited and restrained by an authority higher than itself. A constitutional arrangement which conceptually formalises this and in practice, a manifestation through a true separation of powers would be necessary steps in this direction. For now, to be taken at its word that the regulatory changes are well intentioned the PAP must balance regulation with reward in terms of recognising good news providers – in print and online – as legitimate and accord their representatives with the professional privileges due to journalists.

It is about time that the PAP accepts that the Internet is here to stay. It is also about time those who style themselves journalists, whatever their affiliation or mode, live up to the seriousness nature of being purveyors of news. If the public are to be the best judge of news quality, then the public will get the standard of news they demand.