Last night, the Centre for Independent Journalism (CIJ) organised a forum on Media Coverage and Bersih 2.0. They did a really good job presenting their research, which covered four mainstream newspapers, and exploring how they covered Bersih – positive, negative and neutral reporting; mention of Bersih’s demands; mention of legislation in relation to Bersih, and so on. The statistics were very revealing. Hopefully CIJ will put up the slides on their website.

There were three panelists responding to this presentation, Pauline Leong, media academic and lecturer at UTAR, Gobind Rudra, an experienced veteran journalist and ex-editor of The Star, and myself – admittedly not a media person but an acute observer nevertheless.

I spoke on the role of social media in Bersih, dividing the presentation into three parts, namely pre-Bersih (the final two weeks leading up to Bersih), during the Bersih rally itself, and finally the post-Bersih period (up to present time). The full forum session will be aired on www.durianfm.com tonight at 8pm. It can also be downloaded in full at the link here.

I shall do a proper write-up of my presentation in a full article later, but basically to sum up, these were the following trends I highlighted below. Big picture: Twitter recorded 33,940 users with 263,228 tweets over the period of between 9th June and 14th August, recorded by those who used the #bersih hashtag. Some trends:

1. Identity and Association: Social media like Facebook and Twitter were used to create common spaces for common faces. With PicBadges on both social networks, supporters were drawn together.

2. Dissemination of Information: Social media was used to disseminate crucial information such as on strategy, hotline numbers to call, telling people what to do in case of emergencies and so on.

3. Advocacy: Social media was used by supporters of Bersih to target local politicians, such as @najibrazak or using Twitter hashtags like #tanyanajib. Foreign media was also reached out to, like CNN, BBC, Al-Jazeera, as well as their individual reporters. Fund-raising was also another function of social media.

4. Themes on Twitter: It also became a ‘fun’ and highly interactive thing to do, in this virtual conversation. Themes like ‘why #bersih’, #tanyanajib and #bersihiseverywhere were used on Twitter. It became a way for Malaysians to express themselves through wit, sarcasm, in defense or demonising Bersih separately, and it also incited highly critical and emotional responses on both sides of the divide.

5. Bersih’s Efforts: Of course, Bersih’s efforts themselves cannot be forgotten. Their original target was to have 50,000 Facebook “likes”, (and a quick check of it recently shows 199,421 likes), and a target of 10,000 Twitter followers on their @bersih2 handle (again, a quick check shows 16,842 followers). Its website www.bersih.org was used as a central repository of news, Tweets and updates.

6. Dialogue and Interaction: Both Facebook and Twitter suddenly became public spaces to dialogue, compete, and interact at a very public level. Malaysians would have had at least ONE friend on either of the two social networks who was sharing videos and opinions on Bersih, which meant they were forced to be part of the conversation, and think about the issues at the very least, if not to take a particular stand on it.

7. International Factor: For the first time, Malaysians living around the world were able to participate actively in contributing to a cause of some sort, where previously they were only able to sit behind the computer screens reading news from Malaysiakini or Malaysian Insider. This time, they had the opportunity to do their own Bersih events in more than 30 cities around the world. The photos and videos shared later would create momentum both on their friends back home, which also spurred excitement in these other locations.

8. Clarifying Conflicting Reports: Post-Bersih, it was difficult for mainstream papers or government agencies to play down the numbers of Bersih attendees, as well as any high-handed police action. Where netizens and citizen journalists had uploaded Youtube videos of the Tung Shin Hospital incident being water cannoned and teargassed on the day itself, the Police said they would release their own video versions of the incident. This was a badly handled case. There were also photos being distributed of the police beating up several individuals. The presence of foreign and online media, and the instantaneous sharing of material online was able to clarify conflicting reports, in a way an indictment on government action.

9. Strengthening of Solidarity: Of course, the soppy tales of #bersihstories post-Bersih itself, where on Twitter there was a record of 2966 users and 11,192 stories. The “Auntie Bersih” picture and story is one many would know by now, and many statements of how “It was the first time I felt Malaysian”.

Other personal observations:

1. Social media made the polarities between online citizens even more striking. So for pro-Bersih folk, it was used to defend Bersih at all costs. For Anti-Bersih folk, it was used to demonise Bersih. And these polar opinions in a sense pushed the fence-sitters into a corner, where the militant supporters and dissidents of Bersih on both sides appeared to take the approach of “if you’re not with us, you’re against us”. A common view online amongst these fence-sitters was that “Bersih has been hijacked by the politicians”, or “Bersih has lost its original focus and objective”, and “Bersih could have been done in a stadium after all”. Facebook and Twitter made these debates visible for the first time, where in the past perhaps opinions would have been shared to only *your* particular group of friends. Online, the plateau and universe of opinions became accessible to all alike.

2. Psychographic profile of Bersih participants. I also wondered whether the social media effect meant that a new grouping of Malaysians were suddenly attuned to the excitement of a public rally. The new urban, middle-class and upper-class folk who came with their iPads, taking photos, dressed in heels and nice clothes, obviously not having been to a rally before. Perhaps less political party members compared to the numerous other street rallies in the past, but fairly representative of the younger and more net-savvy populace.

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