A Very Long Report on Why Govt and Bloggers Get Along Like Cats & Dogs

Be forewarned, this is a very long report not for the faint hearted – it recounts why bloggers like to hammer our government. We advise you not to read this as this will alter your blogging experience in ways and means which we cannot be held accountable for.

This segment proposes to forward a chronological account to describe how did we get here? Along with questions as to what are the formative milestones encountered during the journey? Causal factors which were deemed operable to all the actors in and outside blogosphere will also be discussed.

In each segment of this report, “breaks” and “milestones” will be identified to account for the following phenomenon.

-What accounts for the “cognitive dissonance” between netizens and government?

-Why is there a prevalent culture of skepticism, cynicism and disbelief of anything government?

These specific breaks and milestones will be referred to as “V” for practical planning notation purposes.

The working assumption is based on the operating logic: if one doesn’t even know the past, then it’s impossible to build up an accurate picture of the relationship that defines netizens and government to move forward sensibly.

Neither would it be possible to accurately scale the extent of these differing views to effectively craft a workable solutions to close the gap.

2.2 How did the “we against them” mentality develop?

It would appear the divide between bloggers and government is unique and particular to suggest it warrants a special case examination.

We don’t believe that assumption to be true.

This prompts us to consider whether the root causes accounting for the divide between the blogging community and government may even display traditional factor conditions i.e organizational pathology which is characteristically seen in traditional clashes between management and unions, class wars and normative competitive scenarios.

Three main stages have been identified, charted, differentiated to be socially and politically relevant in accouting for this divide.

2.2.a The Advent of the Internet

During the advent of the internet, government initially decided wisely or naively that though a novel invention – blogging amounts to nothing more than a disingenuous way of circulating information. The relative impact of these online discussion, in being able to shape the landscape of collective consciousness was adjudged to be relatively low or minimal.

The nexus between online social media and its potential to be profiled into a wonder weapon as seen recently in the Malaysian GE was still not widely perceived as a real and present danger during this period.

The relative importance government ascribed to this new phenomenon in shaping the collective consciousness was generally adjudged to be negligible.

Hence no attempts where made to either project or interdict to engage the online community.

We consider this to be a very serious omission and for the planning purposes, this has been identified as the first “break” referred to as V1.

2.2.b – Stage 1: The cult of sniperism

In Stage 1, the preferred strategy of government appears to be one of restating the adage at every turn and opportunity – content is king – a corollary of that implies while the MSM should be treated as an all weather reliable purveyor of the truth; conversely, the internet remains a feral and dangerous domain where lies and disinformation proliferate.

It should be treated as circumspect with a healthy dose of suspicion. It’s even conceivable during these initial stages, a la mission civilisatrice was launched to educate the public on the perils of the net. Though no official confirmation exist todate to establish this as a fact.

Even at this relative stage of infancy, many bloggers had begun to challenge the mantra by forwarding the idea “quantity (though amateurish) was a form of quality.” or “blogging was an equivalent of reportage.”

Since government strategy implicitly relies on the economic assumption people will always gravitate towards quality. It was not uncommon for the MSM to reinforce this belief through repetition and reinforcement drives to drive home the point, MSM is salvation; the internet is perdation.

This single track strategy deployed by the MSM is responsible for the first break in “reality” between bloggers and government (note MSM and government for the purposes of this report is treated as synonymous entities).

[special note to planners: in your planning at a strategic level. You will need to augment his misalignment in the MSM first! Pls do not proceed to recommend strategies to augment the internet UNLESS this is first and foremost in your TOR action priority list - treat this as an AN for V1]

One of the main flaws of this strategy lies in the paradox when the importance of something has to be regularly proclaimed. Disbelief is often the by product – to exacerbate the divide many of these attempts by MSM to restate the “truth” leveraged directly on direct and open criticism of blogging content.

It’s conceivable this may have precipitated a sort of arms race which spawned the cult of sniperism. The terms is apt, as a sniper’s job is to deliver discriminatory, highly accurate rifle fire against enemy targets that cannot be engaged successfully by the regular infantry men because of constraints of range, size, location, terrain etc.

During stage 1 melee’s between bloggers and MSM, a game developed where a distinctive pathology began to emerge to account for how blogger’s could successfully produce a win result against the juggernaut MSM – bloggers began to cultivate the oblique eye – where they would challenge the veracity of the MSM as the sole purveyor of the truth.

At this stage, the primary weapon of the blogger was counter reportage of the observable kind and nature.

This style often involved a mix of barbed repartees and comic relief reminiscent of the adage that was frequently used against Pravda,

During this period, the MSM often provided an endless supply of canon fodder for bloggers to perfect their skill of arms.

Since the former would slavishly follow the official pronouncements of the party apparatchiks, they could also never contradict the clearly-stated pronouncements.

This refusal to acknowledge fallibility became the bull’s eye of the blogging community. By this time many of the incentives which is required to perpetuate a game began to be fleshed out in earnest; not only were bloggers who highlighted discrepancies in the MSM feted with readership, but they were even venerated very much like ace fighter pilots and their style, parlance and attitude widely emulated by netizens.

A defining watershed that further solidified this polarized pathology was further exacerbated during the Mr Brown vs MiCa saga.

While stage 1 describes the conditions precedent which made possible the whole hypothesis of the arms race – stage 2 attempts to provide a discursive account of how the competitive game between bloggers and govt was perpetuated.

In stage 2 interactions. The blogging community seems to have successfully crafted a unitary identity complete with its own set of historiographies and reward based system, where it able to successfully hold its own narrative against the MSM’s version of reality.

There is also evidence to suggest in stage 2. The cult of sniperism has reached a point of obselence and new skills of arms were required to extend beyond merely distanced nit picking.

This new capability was made possible for two main reasons:

- Firstly, the protective enclosure offered by the MSM, which the govt has traditionally relied on as it’s first defensive line is was by this period so completely overrun by the cult of sniperism; it neither had the means to effectively mythologize and perpetuate the culture of veneration to reliably sustain the image of the political hegemony any longer.

In the eyes of blogging community at least the MSM no longer had an semblance of credibility.

- Secondly, an unitary culture was beginning to take shape in blogosphere. The exact nature of this culture or where it came from remains imprecise even at the time of writing, but we believe in all likelihood, it would have resembled very much the grand narratives of emancipation and enlightenment: which once questioned the official line – that independence is to be wished for them so long as it is the kind of independence we (govt) approve of. Only in Singapore, net parlance suggest, it is closer to: I dowan lah, go and die lah!

What appears to have precipitated the arms race to renewed heights of sophistication at this stage appears to [following the Mr Brown vs MiCa saga] be the apperance of aggregating sites.

Aggregators are virtual hubs responsible for harvesting salient reads commonly produced in blogosphere – apart from serving as meet points to allow bloggers to chat and exchange critical information.

They are also social platforms which allow for the tacit shaping of a shared identity and common values.

The pathology which aggregation sites solicits from its users is very similar to primitive irrigation societies; here since traffic or water is a shared resource; there is a high level of cooperatism; a series of gates needs to be manage to ensure everyone gets the optimal quantity of water.

In the same way, aggregators accomplish this balancing task by channeling readers to different nodes in blogosphere – they modulate not only patterns of behavior between bloggers, but more importantly funnel people into common public squares.

Thereby inadvertently setting the rhetorical cadence since what they may aggregate will essentially be marketed as the culture of blogosphere.

This is evidenced when one examines net reading patterns during stage 2 period where it is not unusual for each aggregating sites to have their respective loyal readership.

It is also worth noting during this period net speech or parlance begun to proliferate. Prior to the Mr Brown vs MiCa saga, net speech such as the “States Times” – “Shit Times” – “147th” did not exist see (E-bot Diagram 1 - vid run @ 34).

The manner in which they proliferated and taken root in the manner they did is suggestive that aggregating sites may have played a crucial role in the supply chain of information.

This operational feature of aggregators should always be borne in mind by planners. YOU NEED TO FACTOR THEM INTO YOUR ASSUMPTIONS!

This prompts us to consider at stage 2, whether bloggers have begun to not only to network extensively by exchanging critical information so as to extend their skill of arms – but have they even begun to synthesize new information?

One notable example of this is the sharing of information such as how to blog without getting in trouble with the law? Or how to post undetected by using proxy servers?

But the creation of new words is suggestive, bloggers may have also by this stage begun to fashion their own “truths” to account for their diseparate version of “reality.”

While we have found no inconvertible evidence suggesting a centrally organized force accounts for this phenomenon – in Stage 2 we did register bloggers may have also migrated to a higher plane shedding their prototypal skill of arms – the cult of sniperism.

Again this escalation of skill of arms is consistent with Richardson models of how an arms race should pan out under a given set of circumstances.

In Stage 2 not only have the actors begun to draw their battle lines, their identities are unitary and homogeneous unlike stage 1. Their positions diametrically opposed to the establishment view.

And there is ample reference to suggest conclusively by this intermediate stage in the game; bloggers have even begun to fashion their own parallel universe by ”breaking away” from the narrative advanced by the government.

Bloggers may have also begun the first protocol task of ritualizing and stylizing their class politics to perpetuate the rewards and penalty system of anti establishment blogging – this accounts for the pathos of the period, that is usually described as a parallel universe.

Skepticism and cynicism by this stage had become not only synonomous with blogging culture but also a badge of honor.

A derivative of the parallel universe syndrome is the pathology that we have today come to regard as the widespread skepticism and cynicism which we usually associate with the blogging community – internet parlance during Stage 2 supports the contention what we consider as entrenched cynicism may have calcified during this tumultuous period.

To facilitate the planning function, 2 observations have been noted to be operable during this period designated as V3.

• bloggers have begun to synthesize their own version of the truth in earnest. [note: this is a significant escalation from the basic skill of arms associated with the cult of sniperism - where the game is only played at an entry level of counter reportage i.e “you wrote this, but look I snapped this with my camera phone. What do you have to say huh? ”

• The rules of the game are structured along the lines of anticipatory versus complex systems – where not only does the skill of arms assume an increasingly ritualized and stylized form. But by this stage it is also characterized by a higher level of intellectual content – as premising, analyzing, attribution and referencing becomes almost a de riguer entry requirement – at this level the syntax that describes this level of the gaming experience can be described in the following terms, “you said you are going to do this. Cite you authority and precedent to do so? According to basic principles of human rights, you cannot do it!”

This observation point has been designated super V3.

[Special note for planners: Super V3 has been classified as not only the main fissure point accounting the cognitive dissonance between bloggers and govt. As we shall see in Stage 3, this will be your platform for your assumptive work.]

2.2.c – Current Snapshot of Blogosphere

Stage 3: How does Stage 3 differ from 1 & 2?

In this phase of the game, bloggers are not only content to dogfight with the MSM.

They appear to be even questioning openly and directly the broader aspects of govt policies and initiatives with increasing levels of sophistication.

What differentiates Stage 3 competitive scenarios from Stage 1 & 2 is the high level of interdiction skills demonstrated by some bloggers to not only pre-empt government initiatives, but also to color them with a high level of interpretative gloss as to what policies should rightly be pursue and why?

How are they doing it differently from 1 & 2?

Unlike Stage 1 & 2, Stage 3 is marked by a high level of specialization with major blogs fragmenting to different quadrants in blogosphere.

In some cases, there is a strong symbiotic nexus, where net traffic is two way, but more often, they are much very different neighborhoods enjoying their respective unique demographics and style of readers - we don’t really know what accounts for this balkanization of the competitive platform – there are a few theories.

- Bloggers may be tweaking their material to serve different interest groups along the readership spectrum.

- Readership goes through a natural selection process based on demographics, age and education levels.

- Infighting in the blogging community. Leading to foced and decision based segregation.

Whatever the reasons what is clear is Stage 1dog fighting which used to rely implicitly on taking either potshots or exposing incongruence in what was published by the press is no longer an attractive proposition to pursue.

A few possible reasons account for this:

- The MSM has begun engaging the blogging community.

- The MSM has changed their strategy from the previous strategy of non to constructive engagement.

What are the threats and opportunities in Stage 3?

We are not suggesting Stage 1 type blogs are dead – reading is after all a self selecting exercise. Only most bloggers have migrated upwards in the competitive quadrant.

Neither are we suggesting the level of cynicism and skepticism which typified Stage 1 & 2 blogging psyche has diminished significantly - only it should be recognized the pathology of mistrust that has always characterized the relationship between the govt and netizens is beginning to show signs of stabilizing with bloggers who blog openly at least. An unknown quantity is how does this measure up with the broad based statistical significant anonymous majority?

It has to be disturbing when one considers anonymous posters account for nearly 94.3% of blog related traffic and chatter.

How is the game played at stage 3 – what are the incentives and penalties?

It is conceivable, in Stage 3, there will be more incentives for bloggers assume an even higher level of philosophical coherence in how they may choose to write to come across as more appealing to their readership.

As the game from this point can be expressed in the following terms: “yes, we know you want to do it that way. But have you considered this way?”

However, despite the general positive take of Stage 3 blogging – it should be emphasized under the strongest possible terms – this type of blogging is anticipated to exert more stress on govt’s processes in the long run despite, it’s veneer of civility forwarded through reason discourse – as stage 3 represents the conclusive state of the arms race.

If Stage 1 is the age of the sling, stage 2 is the age of the blunderbuster, stage 3 is the age of the guided precision warhead - it should not come as a surprise to planners therefore to regard this stage with renewed vigor. It should always be remembered e-engagement is a double edged sword.

As at this level of the game, not only are bloggers beginning to leverage on philosophical parallels elsewhere to not only draw comparatives to further question the Singapore official rhetoric of how getting things are done.

But also at Stage 3 bloggers have begun to develop suggested solutions and counter proposals.

This supports our believe, for Stage 3, “good” attributes to remain sustainable; there must be a renewed effort by the govt to e-engage in an effective and productive manner. Get it wrong and you will be in hot soup.

There is a clear and present danger if govt fails to e-engage effectively; then a reversal may possibly even occur where blogging may return to Stage 2 hybrid Stage 1 type blogging.

Concerns & Misc Issues

A challenge posed to govt at Stage 3 blogging is this obviously extends the footprint of bloggers to even cover the domain of govt; previously in Stage 1 & 2, the scope of bloggers was very much limited to the role of commenting on tactical and contempraneous (past tense) issues.

Another pressing issue is how does govt recruit the participation of anonymous bloggers? Failure to do again, may lead to a regressive state or worst still a forced isolationist state?

In Stage 3, the blogging reach is anticipated to increase significantly where the general scope of questions covers not only tactical, but also strategic issues.

What’s notable in Stage 3 is how this is accomplished – by juxtaposing comparative Western models with our own – here the blogging focus will look something like this: why can’t we do it like the French or Americans?

Not only is stage 3 characterized by a high degree of comparative analysis, but there is also indicative signs many of these proposals will embody Western thoughtware.

In this competitive scenario the following questions is set to make up the complexion of blogosphere:

- Why can’t we be more transparent?

- What are the checks and balances?

- Where is the accountability?

- What forms our first principle rights?

- What constitutes our accrued rights?

We do not know what accounts for this sudden shift and congruence towards Western models.

It could well be, bloggers by stage 3 have reached a point of diminishing returns in their capacity to determine equivalence or approximation by simply relying on Stage 2 tools.

To instill their argument further with a higher degree of persuasive content to their readership, they appear to be retro-fitting western concepts into their material.

What we do know is, this is suggestive the arms race may have finally reached a terminal point of maturity and it’s unlikely to develop further beyond this stage.

In Stage 3 encounters, not only will the government’s golden line of incorruptibility, dependability and quality increasing come under closer scrutiny. But against the backdrop of a chorus demanding for greater transparency, accountability and rationality.

A few good example of Stage 3 type encounter is the GST debate where welfarism was injected into the debate ; along with references questioning the wisdom of the free market vs interventionist / S377A and Minister’s pay.

In every case, these debates are increasingly juxtaposed against a world stage with comparatives, extrapolations and superimposition with how other countries may be pursuing these goals.

Here readers should note the crossings over between cultures and different states of minds are distinctive and peculiar to Stage 3 blogging experiences, unlike Stage 1 & 2 where they are notably absent.

Against the backdrop of this renewed Archimedean perspective of making sense of the world, not only will the government narrative be stressed. There is a real and present danger if no effort is made to redress these deficits by deploying effective e-engagement strategies. The position of the govt may even slip further.

Against this new competitive backdrop, the magic wand of pragmatism, as a theory and science is certainly insufficient to withstand the test of critical examination for long.

It is against this fractious social political climate in blogosphere that these proposals have to be crafted under.

[This report has been compiled by the ASDF, the Think Tank of the brotherhood]