Tag Archives: media crisis

komentaryo

Ressa, Amnesty International, Duterte, words

I am the last person to even defend (or care for that matter) about Maria Ressa and Rappler. I still don’t think that is a credible website, I still question the kind of work that it does, and I still never read it, and rarely link to it (unless they’re the only ones who carry a story).

But at a time of d/misinformation and troll discourse, especially given a consistently discredited media, it’s important to see a misstep for what it is, especially from government officials who are skewing what should be a pretty straight-up, clear-cut, important discussion that needs to be had about why Amnesty International Netherlands included President Duterte in a video of leaders who are taking away our freedoms.

This was an opportunity to discuss the bases of the inclusion. Instead it became about the blame game, with mainstream media as the favorite punching bag.
(more…)

komentaryo

#Andanar’s learning curve, social media user accreditation, #PCOO’s downward spiral

It seems the learning curve is steep for Martin Andanar — and everyone else on the Duterte communications team. A year in, and this week’s mistakes and mishaps can only be symptoms of the bigger crisis that is Presidential and government communications. We are also reminded (yet again!) that we are wasting public funds on the salaries of officials who have no idea what they’re doing.

After a year, instead of actually evolving in his knowledge of social media, Andanar is still stuck on his simpleton assessment of what social media is about. He’s still working with the nonsense of counting followers like it matters. Department Order 15, which seeks to accredit “social media practitioners” to cover PCOO and Presidential events even asserts that social media is where “the citizenry” might be “engaged” in order to “enrich the quality of discourse.”

Was Andanar in the Philippines the past year? At what point did partisan social media (that is, pro-Duterte and pro-Dilawan) “enrich the quality of discourse”?

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komentaryo

Writing, criticism, hope

In the five years that I’ve been doing this column, and the nine years of writing independently full-time, the most fulfilling parts of it have been about being able to talk to students who wonder about writing. Often the questions revolve around notions of fear, which automatically go to the presumption of courage: that it is brave to write about things that others wouldn’t write about, or to have a contrary opinion from what dominates the discourse.

Yet it would be delusional to imagine that sitting in front of a computer, in the safety of my own home (or my middle-class spaces), writing about issues that to me are important, is bravery defined. In the provinces, broadcast and community journalists are being killed, activists are being illegally detained and threatened, communities being militarized.

To be trolled or threatened on social media is nothing compared to that. (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…)