News blogging in cross-cultural contexts

a report on the struggle for voice

James E. Katz

Chih-Hui Lai

pp. 95-107

in: Political culture of web 2.0 in Asia, Knowledge, Technology & Policy 22 (2), 2009.

Abstract

To assess some of the ways that blogs appear to be affecting news reporting and consumption as well as some giving a sense as to their implications for social stability, this paper presents a preliminary analysis of views and comments by bloggers in Asian countries. Data on this topic was gathered by e-mail interviews of Asian bloggers as well as by collecting writings and data from relevant websites. Analysis suggests that, in many societies in Asia and elsewhere, bloggers have become an important source of news outside of but also alongside of traditional mainstream media. A trend is observed that information and communication technologies are reconfiguring the traditional balance between the creators and consumers of news and the journalistic reporting profession. Internet blogs and mobile phones, among other technologies, have made new information and perspectives available concerning local events; they have also added important and often oppositional interpretations of the significance and meaning of those events. Thus, on both professional and economic grounds, the New Media are reducing the relative prominence of traditional news outlets as well as stature of professional journalists.