Power of the people

The sponsors, the government, all these authorities are controlling the mainstream media, leading to a lack of variety of opinions and view points. The Web 2.0 has restored the public's voice, and we are free to express our thoughts. What is even more powerful is the fact that anyone from anywhere can see it. "Sharing" online has the ability to bring people together. It creates the power over the authorities, and reveals the facts that was formerly hidden from public eyes.

 When I saw the clips of the peaceful protestors being maced, I couldn't help but notice the disgust on the faces of the students in our class. The police, who are supposed to 'protect' us, becoming the people who 'attack' us. It's unbelievable, it's horrifying, it's plain wrong. What scares me most, is that without the videos on youtube or the independent media, we would never have known about the facts. If we were naive and believed everything on the mainstream media, we would have never known.

 A while back, there was a riot in London, and it made me wonder whether the media was showing us everything. According to my friends in London, the riots were pretty much what it looked like on television, but if they got there information through the British news, then there is a possibility that the mainstream media were hiding something, which made it seem as though the riots were just meaningless attacks. I'm no expert and haven't done any research on what happened, but the thought of someone causing such a huge riot for no reason seems strange.

In my media class today, we were given an article and told to find parts of it that we thought was odd or seemed to be hiding something. My group found about 10 in one short article. The professor from that course wrote an article on how Minamata city was trying to hide their past of the illness minamatabyou, and sent it to the local paper there. As can be predicted, the article was not published. The mainstream media dislike any critical views, and won't post anything that would reveal their negative points. If the internet was not as developed as today, no one would ever find out about the issues that the mainstream media do not pick up. No one would have a chance to share their thoughts. Thanks to the internet, even little people with no power what so ever can post blogs and help make a difference.