Unspun

Unspun has always distrusted crowds and conventional wisdom. Always been a maverick and always, hopefully, will be.

It was this distrust, then, that made Unspun first refrain from appending the Bloggers United logo onto this blog.

Jeff Ooi and Rocky, the popular Malaysian bloggers who are now being sued by some executives from the New Straits Times, both have feet of clay. There were times that Unspun thought they had crossed the line and were more interested in venting their spleen rather than to get the information out. But on the whole they have been fairly responsible and deserve to be heard by one and all in Malaysia and elsewhere — primarily because the Malaysian political elite have a stranglehold over the traditional media.

Apart from their right to free speech and expression they actually perform a public service — airing information and opinion that would otherwise not be aired. Information and opinion that have poisoned the Malaysian political and social atmosphere all these years so that what we have leading the country are, as Unspun has said in a previous posting, mere courtiers and court jugglers.

Politicians in Malaysia are appalling in their immaturity and and intellectual grasp of issues and the ways of the world since it became flat. They live in a parallel universe where patronage gets them everything and they have to answer only to their masters. It is a life of denial that the means to production of news and opinion, fomerly an oligarchy has now been democratized. That is why the plaintiffs could not just start blogging or even hire some blogger to fight their image battles with Jeff and Rocky, which they should do if they are smart. That is why they have to resort to the courts, but consider this: even if they win in the court of law they have already and would continue to lose in the court of public opinion.

Speaking of courts… It is a worry whether the Malaysian judges are clued in on how blogs are transforming the way we all communicate with each other. If they are mired in conventional thinking then the would look at it as a classic libel suit. If, however, the judges are savvy to the communications revolution taking place then they would judge the merits of the case on more unconventional considerations. The book Naked Conversations, for instance, makes it clear that what blogs do is to move the paradigm from command-and-control communications to conversation marketing of ideas (and products as well). It would be wise for Jeff, Rocky and their supporters to mount a “education campaign” on how blogs have changed communications aimed at judges.

As someone who has been moving in the field of PR, if Unspun would also counsel that they make PR an integral part of their defense strategy. Read the book In the Court of Public Opinion by James F. Haggerty to get an idea of how to use PR to help win legal cases, even in Malaysia.

But Unspun digresses. While agreeing that the plaintiffs have the right to sue Jeff and Rocky, Unspun agrees with RantingsbyMM:

“The point is, this sort of heavyhanded intimidation is an impediment to democracy because it impedes freedom of speech and limits our people’s access to alternative views about current events.”

While this is to be expected because of the paucity of the plaintiff’s skills of persuasion (see previous posting) it nonetheless cannot be condoned.

Unspun from today is pinning his colors to the mast, or in this case the blog (though I do not know how to get it to the top right hand corner -any one wise in the ways of WordPress please let me know). Unspun, however, is not as brave as the others where the “No Fear” part is concerned. Unspun believes in bloggers being united, but being a cautious and cowardly type not given to bravado, Unspun has fear of the Borg. But this is something Unspun must do in spite of the fear. As a human being who believes in a reasonably free and open society being the best political alternative. As a Malaysian. As a blogger.