Chilling effect? Even retirees blog!
Both Rocky and I told Agencie France Presse (AFP) that we view the defamation suits taken against us with a positive perspective.
We believe there will be more blogs sprouting as a result of our legal suits because it takes merely three minutes to start a blog. That said, we also hasten to remind the budding bloggers to strive to be responsible bloggers.
Retiree-bloggers with powerful English
But what surprised me is that, not only the young, well educated generation takes to blogging like ducks taking it to water, even retirees who command the powerful good old English -- ingredients for articulate communicators -- have started blogging.
Significantly, they are none other than former government servants!
Two good examples are Bernard Khoo ( Zorro Unmasked - zorro-zorro-unmasked.blogspot.com ), and Rajahram Ramalingam ( Rajahram's Journal - http://rajahram.blogspot.com ).
They both started blogging this month, after hearing of our defamation suits.
Bernard, who accompanied Rocky and I to both our hearings recently, is an avid reader and a former teacher. He quit abruptly from the government service to join the corporate sector. He started his blog last night.
Bernard, 67, is a well-known sharp commenter in the blogosphere, including Screenshots, who goes by the handle/nick: Zorro. Hence his blog titled "Zorro Unmasked", which is about "Revealing anything swept under the carpet and unmasking the sweepers".
So get prepared for his large "Z", not to put you to sleep, but to blaze you with three quick cuts.
Rajahram is also a former teacher in government schools. He emailed to tell me that he retired as the principal of a large, modern secondary school in Selangor, a position given to him in the final three years of his 33-year career.
He intends to use his blog to gauge public opinion on "matters that matter the common man". He believes public opinion is an indispensable barometer of any democratic society, which can only be assessed if there is free speech and expression.
Old blog horses, but galloping young
Talk of retirees who blog, I should mention a few old horses who still gallop in the ranggi way. I may miss some names, but the ones I know at close range are Kuda Ranggi, Pak Idrus, and PokKu.
Someone retired but whom I have yet to meet is Major (Rtd) D.Swami of the Seventh Rangers (Mechanised). He blogs at 7rangers.blogspot.com.
Kuda Ranggi is Syed Imran ( kudaranggi.blogspot.com). Born an Arab-Malaysian in Penang, he feels he is someone more Malay than Arab. His grandfather migrated from Makkah to the Malay World while his mother's forefathers migrated from Hadhramaut, Yemen. Syed is a former Bernama journalist (1971-1998) and before he retired, he was former press secretary to Minister in PM's Department.
So, he is someone who knows the media and the system rather well. And his motto says: "Freedom to blog is the right to publish information and opinions without government control!
I really appreciate that Syed afforded his precious time to accompany us to the court on both hearings.
Pak Idrus, 67 and whose real name is Idrus Abu Bakar, is a retired senior officer attached to the then Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports, specialising in social engineering. He has been blogging on "In Passing - Malaysian ( idrus.blogspot.com ) since December 2003. He blogs about simple life and good old rustic Malay Culture, and those ulam-inspired Malay cuisines, homecooked-style. I very much share his penchant for the good old Malay numbers. His current tune, as you launch his blog, is Semalam di Malaysia (mine is the version by Indonesian band D'Llyod that Sam sang).
Pokku is how we passionately him, Tengku Mohd Ali Bustaman, who has been blogging since August 2004. His blog is called Di Bawah rang Ikang Kering ( bustamann.blogspot.com ), so that gives away his Terengganu traits.
Pokku reveals little about himself except that he is a retired retainer, what it means. What impresses me is that this man has spun off some chips of the old blog (pardon the pun) among his children: Tengku Amirah ( Tgsherilamirah - www.xanga.com/tgsherilamirah ), Tengku Adlina ( Tulisje - tulisje.blogspot.com ), Tengku Elisa ( Elisa Taufik - elisataufik.efx2.com ), Tengku Elida ( Mokciknab - mokciknab.blogspot.com ), and the younger ones, Firhad & Nina ( Rotidua - rotidua.efx2.com ).
Among the chips of the old blog, I used to work Tengku Elida and appeared several of her TV shows. Recently, she co-opted me into barrister-blogger Nizam Bashir's Poetic Justice -- 50 Posts to Independence project.
Have you defrosted from the chilling effect now?
Comments
after following these events i am wondering what is the real impact of blogs in malaysia? what is the percentage of internet penetration in malaysia? of this figure, how many users regularly rely on online alternative media for news? what language are these malaysian blogs written in? this would affect the ethnic composition of blog readers.
it has been suggested that the majority of malaysians who frequent 'political blogs' are urban dwelling, tertiary educated upper middle class. if so, it is a small fraction of the population right now.
Posted by: hinzelmann![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 08:58 AM
wow..everywhere people worry about the elders cannot catch up with the technology. Here, we have them leading the rest. Keep it up!
Should we thanx the skewed mainstream media for such positive development?
Or, we should thanx our very not-knowing-what-to-do gahmen?
Posted by: hasilox![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 09:32 AM
My kids blogged first and I started blogging initially for them.
There other "old fogeys" like Pak Adib, Clark Gable of Pulau Duyong.
Thanks for the mention Jeff.
Posted by: Pok Ku![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 01:07 PM
that's nothing....there's a 70+ year-old English guy on Youtube who basically video blogs his thoughts...
think I saw it on CNN...
Posted by: aput83![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 01:32 PM
yeah congrats to the 2 new bloggers, bernard and rajah. bernard aka zorro i know vaguely as he used to comment in my blog. hope to see both of them blogging as passionately as jeff!
regarding the 'old blog horses' pokku (whom i had met) is the one i admire most! he has good writing skills filled with humour too.
Posted by: lucia![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 01:38 PM
waaaaa.... so many bloggers exposing themselves at wisma denmark....
it's very encouraging to see you guys' pics. maybe on one of these coming days, i'll surface myself and to hell with being shot at....
Posted by: IImran![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 04:46 PM
Does blogging bring any impact to the society?
YES, if the readers(you & me) are taking actions after they logoff from the sites. For example, they can at least explain the real situation of country to their family members and ask them to use their brains more thoroughly when they vote next time.
Posted by: Steve![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 05:09 PM
jeff and rocky, you both are inspirations with this case. hopefully to bring more people to blog truths and things Malaysians should know, question, and more importantly - think about. the more credible people like the ones you mention start to blog, i pray the malaysian blogsphere will get a better more solid reputation than the superficial one the younger generation bloggers have created.
Posted by: midnite lily![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 05:38 PM
To all bloggers,
All I will say it BIOMF!!!
If you do not know what it means, its an acroynm for "Bring It On MOXXXX FUXXXXX!"
To those who are following these blogs closely, please say a word or two so to show them that our support and that we have a strong following!
Posted by: jonwon![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 05:53 PM
Jeff, thanks for the intro. Will try to make a difference to ensure that predators to blogsphere dont invade our fragile space.Have no fear, we are the Band of Bloggers.
Posted by: zorro![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 07:48 PM
About that chilling effect... I'm trying to create a greater awareness among my younger generation by emphasizing my Fears hoping they'll do their part when the next election comes along.
Posted by: LC Teh![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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January 31, 2007 10:26 PM
We are not short of bloggers. Please read the blog from Jeffrey Goh a boy from Malaysia who has started blogging at the age of 10. He has written some interesting stories and you would need to be a Maple Story Fan to understand his thoughts. Perhaps we may have a JK Rowling in our midst.
Go to his blog at http://jeffreygohwx.blogspot.com/
Please post some words of encouragement for him at his blogspot.
Posted by: Gozie![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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February 1, 2007 01:48 AM
yes, i was very very pleased to see Zorro unmasked. Z!
follow thru on hinzelmann's observation, he may be right in that only a very small segment of society frequent "political blogs" (which I rather call socially conscious blogs, heh!), but so were newspapers when they started print ages ago. Throughout history, many local newspapers were either banned or their journalists captured/threatened by the powers of the day. Why? For questioning and raising issues for the people.
Because of the underlying threat to the powers of the day posed by newspapers, Governments everywhere tries their very best to rein in their own presses. Ditto to Malaysia, re NSTP, The Star, Utusan. I seriously doubt the owners i.e. political parties own these newspapers for profits sakes ;)
To me, blogging as a relatively new medium is actually going back to the founding days of journalism, i.e. to provide socially conscious writings of the day. We may not have the reach of photographers and journalists to run after news events, but blogging definitely has the ability to become "columns" and "editorials".
So Viva La Bloggers! :P
Posted by: Buaya69![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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February 2, 2007 08:34 AM