By now everyone should have heard about the new MDA regulations for online websites, and even the blind see it is a scam to legally take down sites and censor the news the government doesn't like. This is probably the 'N'th article on the subject, so I'll try to keep it to stuff that is not yet discussed by other people.
Who let THIS guy in?
I would like to begin by saying, screw "Yakult" Ibrahim. Here's a fine example of a braindead nunchuck who wants what people read online to be "the same as what they read from the mainstream media".
Finished puking yet? Good, because now I have to ask WHY?!
Hey, if I wanted to read about how the job market is doing great (it's not), people's lives are getting better (they aren't), and this is all because of a great big circlejerk on part of the government, I'll read the national newspapers. Then I can have a few good laughs and, it's into the trash it goes! Otherwise, if I want an opinion which is not on the government payroll, I'll read someone else. Then I'll do this thing that the government doesn't like; it's called THINKING, and make up my own mind on what seems right. Of course, the ride doesn't stop there. The genius goes on the state that "since the mainstream media is subjected to rules", "why shouldn't online sites (be subjected to rules too)".
Well, that sounds logical.
Until you think about it for half a second, and you realize it's complete bullocks. I find it incredible nobody pointed out right there and then that the mainstream media is being bankrolled by the political elite, is tremendously biased towards the government, and internet reports tend to be individual citizens and groups not affiliated with said government, are not going to toe the government line, and should be free to say whatever the hell they want. Especially not with interference or fear of said government. Unlike the pussified press in this country, people on the internet actually have the cojones to point out bullocks when they see it.
No Need For Tedious Whys And Hows
He might as well have come down and said "Hey guys, we don't like these anti-government sites you have there. So we're going to shut them all down! Shut it all down! Oh, and that's a nice popular site you have there, it would be a pity if something happened to it. Annnd, it's gone. Say goodbye to your fifty grand of monies too. You want to talk about Singapore? Tough luck." At least then he would have been honest.
That's another thing I am thankful to the internet for. You won't see anyone pointing out the real motives of these new regulations in the lamestream media. And even if they did, it would be in the letters section, and it would be neutered, neutralized, reduced, limited, muted, downplayed so much that in the end it more closely reassembles a crippled baby flushed down a toilet than the original letter. Only then is it fit for publication. Then it will seem that said sender doesn't like the regulations, but feels it is "needed". All in the name of being "fair and balanced".
Screwing Yahoo
Now, when I started writing this, one of the first articles to appear on the subject was on Ravi Philemon's blog^1, which mentioned that only ten websites would be covered initially; a list which is obviously going to expand in the coming days. Now, what is interesting about it is that of the ten websites, nine are government affiliated, belonging to the SPH and Mediacorp. So basically it seems that they are regulating themselves for now. So maybe this whole fear about government taking down The Real Singapore is just pointless fearmongering.
Haha. You wish. ^2
Now the only website that is not directly under the control of the government, and will be forced to abide by the new regulations, is Yahoo Singapore News. I don't read Yahoo Singapore News, so I have no idea if they are in fact government shills in disguise or not. What I do know is that my initial thoughts were: Yahoo? Why screw Yahoo? Don't you have more important people to go after like Temasek Review Emeritus? Or The Online Citizen? What did Yahoo do to piss off the government?
Since the lamestream media won't answer my questions, I decided to ask Yahoo Search instead. And it turns out that Yahoo did piss off the government, or more specifically, SPH, two years ago. Turns out that SPH accused Yahoo of plagiarism, and through legal trickery or what not, Yahoo filed a counter-suit. ^3 Then withdrew the countersuit and are implied to have settled. ^4. Notice the dates on these articles, the first one was written in December of 2011, and the other was made in August 2012.
Of course, being the inquisitive bastard I am, I decided to try and read the court proceedings for myself at the high court webpage. Unfortunately the case in question, S 831/2011, was not available for viewing. ^5 What is more interesting is that there appear to be even more recent developments on the case that neither Google nor Yahoo provided in their searches. The latest update apparently happened on 22nd May 2013 according to the high court's search engine.
Huh.
How come nobody has said anything about this? Does it have anything to do with the new regulations that are going to be in place for Yahoo? What will happen to Yahoo Singapore if it doesn't want to be regulated? What will happen to other sites that report on Singapore news and don't want to be regulated? Will Yahoo become a government regulated shill site? Probably not, but it does seem rather strange nobody has said anything about Yahoo settling, or even pointed out that SPH has a beef against Yahoo.
Shut It Down! Shut It All Down!
Back to the regularly scheduled program. And I say program just to make fun of the MDA's definition of news programs.^6 They think that any programme (whether or not the programme is presenter-based and whether or not the programme is provided by a third party) containing any news, intelligence, report of occurrence, or any matter of public interest, about any social, economic, political, cultural, artistic, sporting, scientific, or any other aspect of Singapore in any language (whether paid or free and whether at regular intervals or otherwise) but does not include any programme produced by or on behalf of the government... is news.
That's bullocks.
Try saying all that in one breath.. Why don't you just cut to the chase and say EVERYTHING is news. Yes, EVERYTHING! You include Singapore in the title and it's a friggin' Singapore news article, and it belongs to the government, and we have the right to shut you down. You probably can't even report on a fact like Singapore's birth rate is abysmally low without it contravening the new regulations one way or another. In effect, the government is saying if you even dare to utter something about Singapore, without the government's magic seal of approval, we will make sure you suffer. And suffer you will.
Facebook Never Was Safe
What is very enlightening about the actual amendments is that this point is not covered in the news:
(2) For the purposes of reckoning access and content under
sub-paragraph (1)(a) and (b) ––
(a) where a computer on-line service is provided by a website with a domain and one or more sub-domains, all sub-domains shall be regarded as part of the domain of the web site; and
(b) where a computer on-line service is provided by a web site in or from Singapore (referred to in this sub-paragraph as the original web site) which is duplicated on or transferred to one or more other web sites in or from Singapore (referred to in this sub-paragraph as the mirrored web site), all mirrored web sites shall be regarded as part of the original website.
So in fact, Facebook and Youtube fall under the first part of this law too. Does Facebook get 50k hits from Singapore in a month? You bet your ass it does. Does it have "news articles" written by Singaporeans and published by Singaporeans? Hell yes. Does it cater to the Singapore market? Why don't you skip the yadayadayada and shut it all down. Doesn't matter if guy posting news articles only gets about ten views and even less likes a month. So long as you are under the Facebook banner, you are screwed. So much for justice.
I'm quite interested to see if Facebook will grovel before the Singapore government and heed this obviously unjust and unfair law, or will it turn around and flip the middle finger to them. Knowing that Facebook provides information to the FBI on a regular basis without a warrant, I'm not keeping my hopes up.
What's more dangerous is the second part of the amendment. What the flocking featherface is this nonsense? The very act of sharing, SHARING an article from a popular website is now punishable by law. And by extension, even if you don't meet the arbitrary standards of 50k hits set by the jackals, you are in violation of the law. So even little guys get punished now. That's ridiculous. Talk about government overreach. Not only are you not allowed to say anything, you can't say that someone else said something, and if you have to say something it better be a licensed source. What's next? You can't "like" unofficial media sources and need to "like" the sanitized garbage that the mainstream media spits out on a daily basis?
Socialist Scumbags
The people should be completely outraged at this. They should be getting angry like this ^7 guy here. You can't just be disappointed or sad over this. No! You little twats! The government is enacting laws that punishes just about anyone who doesn't quote the national rag as a source. Not only are these people arrogant enough to think that they are always right, they are now legally entitled to propagating their nonsense as truth as well. You need a license just to talk about current affairs in this country now, and only government controlled publications are given licenses. They want a monopoly on facts and now they want regulations to create a monopoly on opinion as well. Does this not strike anyone as being rather insane?
I say let the people think for themselves what is right and wrong. I call it the free market of ideas. In the free market of ideas, bullocks is instantly called out on and thrown out of the room. So what remains are the ideas that people find good and acceptable in general. And if for some reason stupidity sneaks past majority of the people, you can be assured that there will be asshats like me who will keep pointing out "this is friggin' stupid, this is friggin' stupid, this is friggin' stupid!"
Samuel
Junior TRS editor
Source:
^1 http://www.raviphilemon.net/2013/05/mdas-new-licensing-framework-may-be.html
^2 It is stated in the Business Time's (SPH) take on this by a professor that it could extend to TOC or TRE
^3 http://thediplomat.com/asean-beat/2011/12/30/singapore-press-vs-yahoo/
^4 http://sg.news.yahoo.com/yahoo--reaches-settlement-on-counterclaim-against-sph.html
^5 http://app.supremecourt.gov.sg/data/registrarHearing/10_22052013.pdf
^6 http://www.mda.gov.sg/NewsAndEvents/PressRelease/2013/Pages/28052013.aspx
^7 http://therealsingapore.com/content/fk-you-pap-censoring-my-online-media