Commentary: Internet exposure shifts balance of power
Updated: 2008-02-27 19:27
Government officials have admitted that what they don't know about the new technology device is far more than they do, and their awareness of its development has fallen behind ordinary citizens.
Zhu Zejun, party head of Zengceng City in south China's Guangdong Province, told Xinhua that the city government has only recently taken the Internet as a platform to collect public opinions.
"Every social crisis can be reflected through public voices on the Internet. However, not many officials are familiar with the use of the Internet," said Zhu, who has recently invited a number of Internet experts from Beijing to give seminars in Zengcheng, in an effort to imbue civil servants with the latest development trend of the Internet technology.
Not only government officials, but also traditional media are under pressure to follow what is hot on the Internet, and in the latest photo case, to be checked by inquiring and persistent netizens.
Days after an award-winning photo of Tibetan antelope was exposed by netizens to be a fake, five Chinese leading media outlets including this Xinhua News Agency and the China News Service announced they had terminated contracts with the photographer Liu Weiqiang, and erased all of his works from database.
State media China Central Television (CCTV) sent out a public letter of apology claiming its responsibility in sponsoring the misjudged event.
While acclaim for the Internet's efficiency in voicing opinions against social injustice, netizens hope for a self-disciplined and civilized Internet environment, and the promulgation of laws on journalism and privacy to better regulate the Internet world.
China's Internet governance practised mainly by governments and governmental organizations has been quite strict. However, the recent incident over the obscene photos shows the lack of enough legal support to curb pornography from mass spreading on the Internet, and weak law-enforcement power to punish people instigating others to break the law, cheaters and slanders who use the Internet as their tool.
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