Indian Bloggers getting recognised from Govt.
Refer to the article in the TOI (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-1112368,curpg-1.cms) titled "Govt opens doors to net journos".
The bottomline is that journalists who have active blogs will now be given access to government offices and conferences. Currently to access them, one needs the mandatory Press Information Bureau (PIB) accreditation (just like you need membership of Bar Council to be a lawyer)..
This throws up some important things to ponder on:
1. Is there an Indian journalist that we know of in the internet world whom world knows of? I consider myself moderately active in the blogosphere and don't know any indian journalist of that stature actively authoring blogs.
2. Definitely govt is hugely progressive on the transparency front. What mechanism would it put in place to hand pick the journalists who are "active" in the blogosphere? Of what i can gather, the indian law would again be defeated in the hands of implementers (read IAS cadre).. The max that will happen is opening up of new avenues bribery by the big newspaper houses of the country to the politicans and their goons (IAS chamchas).
3. How many people are literate and how many of them are going to be accessing internet? of all the people accessing the internet how many would read blogs of an independent journalist?
As a comparison, timesofindia.com has a ranking of 20, 764 on alexa.com while www.washingtonpost.com has a ranking of 276.
In all terms, I must appreciate the Principle Information Officer, Shakuntala Mahawal (as reported in ToI) for taking this initiative forward if not for present then for the future.
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This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
The bottomline is that journalists who have active blogs will now be given access to government offices and conferences. Currently to access them, one needs the mandatory Press Information Bureau (PIB) accreditation (just like you need membership of Bar Council to be a lawyer)..
This throws up some important things to ponder on:
1. Is there an Indian journalist that we know of in the internet world whom world knows of? I consider myself moderately active in the blogosphere and don't know any indian journalist of that stature actively authoring blogs.
2. Definitely govt is hugely progressive on the transparency front. What mechanism would it put in place to hand pick the journalists who are "active" in the blogosphere? Of what i can gather, the indian law would again be defeated in the hands of implementers (read IAS cadre).. The max that will happen is opening up of new avenues bribery by the big newspaper houses of the country to the politicans and their goons (IAS chamchas).
3. How many people are literate and how many of them are going to be accessing internet? of all the people accessing the internet how many would read blogs of an independent journalist?
As a comparison, timesofindia.com has a ranking of 20, 764 on alexa.com while www.washingtonpost.com has a ranking of 276.
In all terms, I must appreciate the Principle Information Officer, Shakuntala Mahawal (as reported in ToI) for taking this initiative forward if not for present then for the future.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
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