Category Archive for: social media

komentaryo

Protest culture VS troll discourse

When otherwise intelligent individuals become trolls, putting down the protests that have been happening from Luneta to the People Power Monument, Manila to Quezon City, and across the county, I tell anyone who asks me about these put-downs: well, we must be doing something right, yeah?

Because imagine the amount of time these people waste. They have to look for photos that will prove what they want to say about a rally they did not attend. They cull from the hundreds of photos of the rally, the ones that will prove what they want to say: these kids know not what they’re doing, Mocha apologizes. Duterte devotees are suddenly dependent on mainstream media which they’ve lambasted all this time, using it as source for who was at the rally, and what happened there.

Imagine the identity crisis these trolls go through: shifting from being pro-Duterte to being pro-Marcos and back, wondering how exactly those who are pro-Duterte could be anti-Duterte-alliance-with-the-Marcoses, and just unable to grapple with the fact that the discourse of pro- and anti- does not capture at all what is a more complex task of learning and engagement, within and outside these protests (more…)

komentaryo

From misinformation to confusion: Dysfunctional communications

Probably the worst thing about the Presidential Communications Office (PCO) as run by Secretary Martin Andanar is that it has dared ask Congress for a bigger 2017 budget.

This, despite the fact that it has no communications plan, no strategy for information dissemination, and on a most basic level, does not even have one working, credible, well-developed official government website, four months in.

Instead it’s working off three different Facebook pages – all of which do not cost a single cent – which are all generally devoid of the important information we need about government. Why should we spend more on this office that does nothing but make things worse: through its silences, and even given its articulations.

It might be said that all those who criticize government are temperamental brats. And yes, I’m taking that out of context. (more…)

komentaryo

Is silence Andanar’s communications strategy?

Four months in and it is clear that there is nothing in Presidential Communications Office (PCO) Secretary Martin Andanar’s plan that is about (1) protecting, defending, helping out President Duterte given his daring, controversial proclamations, and (2) informing the public with important, critical, historical data when it is urgently needed.

A major problem is that Andanar believes government does not need an official one-stop portal of a website. He couldn’t be more wrong.

Because no matter what he believes about Facebook, no matter the number of Duterte devotees who like posts on social media, FB accounts cannot take the place of an official Philippine government website that the public can depend on for official government news, responses, and data. Social media is, and has always been, for information dissemination and community engagement. (more…)

komentaryo

Media, gov’t comms, #LawinPH

One of the questions that dominated the discourse pre-Typhoon Lawin was: what the heck is government doing?

The truth was, we weren’t hearing much about what was being done, who was doing what, and whether government was prepared at all. It didn’t help that too many members of the President’s Cabinet –including the heads of communications – were with him in China, and so there was absolutely no sense at all that there was anyone in control of delivering information about the typhoon, one that was said to be akin to Typhoon Yolanda of 2013.

Here’s the thing: when you come from an Aquino government that had three communications offices, having no functioning communications office for President Duterte is nothing but a liability.

For the public and the government itself.  (more…)

komentaryo

Brutal: the police and the President’s public

Early this month, I had wondered about the missing apology from Duterte supporters given the uncalled for, unfair, and absolute harassment of media workers in relation to the President’s failed ironic claim to the analogy between him and Hitler. It seemed important to point out that there was a need to rein the President’s supporters in, especially when the President himself apologizes when he makes a mistake.

That is extraordinary because we came from a previous government that refused to apologize for anything at all.

It is ruined by the fact though that too many of the President’s followers seem to think they can make no mistakes, and that always going in for the kill — looking at biases, dismissing criticism, questioning allegiances — helps the president and this government at all. Often it only reveals that too many of them who scream at the top of their lungs, behaving badly, thinking they’re defending the President, actually end up becoming his liability, too.

(more…)