Explore, Innovate & Communicate: Dec 16, 2010

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Is media the fourth estate or they are romanticizing by reflecting the ‘Delusions of Grandeur?’ Those who control media control minds. Media regulation in India is currently at a crossroads. Exciting transformations have been occurring in the manner in which media and entertainment is accessed and consumed. Traditionally, television, print and radio were the primary sources of information and entertainment dissemination. Increasingly, new technologies, particularly the Internet and mobile telephony, transform the media landscape. Information and communications technologies (ICTs) not only change how people and organizations access information, communicate and perform their daily operations, but they also provide India with a powerful tool to advance and achieve its societal goals – in areas as broad as economic reform, education and environmental preservation. However, the potential of the media is dependent on having a policy environment that allows for the technology to be used and developed for beneficial purposes while limiting potential abuses.

Regulation? Self-Regulation? Co-regulation? Communication and regulation is difficult marriage. Crux lies in the fact that who regulates, how much and what? If we held the laws of capitalism to be true then the competition between media industry should benefit the consumers and audiences. But if we look back in retrospect the journey of Indian media, print and largely electronic media has not lived upto this presumption. India has witnessed a transformative transition from one public broadcasting channel in 1991 to more than 600 channels in 2010, 100 out of those being news channels. This is the age of trivialization, sensationalization, masquerading of news content and also of political, economic pornography.

India being a great success story of democracy is being witnessing different dimensions of democratization one after other. When regulation is required? When there is something excess than the required. It may indicate towards crossing the certain ethical, legal, societal value boundaries. There is no such thing like common value. Everyone has his/her own interpretation of the common value/type of civil society/societal norms about the decency.

Legal scholars and veterans in media say that regulation is not only about saying ‘No’. But going beyond that it is about creating the possibilities about engaging the media houses in preventing, stopping and arriving at the consensus about the feasible mechanisms about penalizing the unlawful activities. There should be an formal/informal arrangement to incite/inspire the broadcasters so as to convey crude things in soft manner. Much of the part of the regulation is not about rules. Rather it is about the understanding the concerns of the law enforcement agencies and taking steps to address those concerns. So, there must be sufficient incentive to improve upon the current work.

Result of self regulation will be lasting one. Voltaire has shown the way in the respect of how one should behave? He says that, “I disagree with what you have to say but will fight to the death to protect your right to say it." In other words, everyone thinks alike but none thinks much. Freedom of speech is not expressly provided; it has to be exercised with the responsibility and restraint. Even though there are sufficient restrictions to exercise this right, one has to look that in context of right to life and also in the light of larger duty towards society. One cannot exist without each other.

What are the possibilities in which self-regulation could work. Compared to OffComm, FCC we have no regulation in India and situation is fastly turning into lousy one. Rights and duties both are self regulated. As one senior news editor from reputed news channel put it, “Work of editor, anchor or production unit chief is like foot soldier. They have no time to think about the issues about law and ethics. So one should greatly admire and appreciate amount of pressure under which people work and still able to influence the outcome of the pending investigations, lax implementation of the provisions for law and order. 26/11 coverage and Ayodhya verdict telecast were great success stories as far as self-regulation is concerned. In that respect it remains to be seen that whether Indian media has evolved or not. But observers agree that during the President Obama visit different questions were asked and variety of significant issues were raised.

All over the world, the debates about freedom of the speech and inter-alia in India, has been influenced by First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America. It says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Ultimately government cannot wash hands off its responsibility about regulation. It has to take into consideration rights of different vulnerable groups in the society like women, children, minorities, Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Disabled Persons by ensuring their representation at the regulatory body; either self-regulatory or body which will enforce regulations from government side. Any type of regulatory mechanism will be really fruitful and transparent when they could lead by examples and complete the required job of monitoring, reporting, verification, litigation and punishment within certain time frame.

Industry leaders believe or claim that consumer is the king and they eventually decide the content. But many disagree. Because there is no formal mechanism by which audience can influence by way of interacting or feedback so as to determine the fate of the planning of the production either entertainment or news. This is all the outcome of market research results being incorporated into the real time content creation. It is true that today in India, every citizen on average spends three hours a day for watching TV telecast. TV is engaging the society of today in unique manner which no medium has engaged previously. Because of TV values systems are changing. Girls have been exposed to modern environment, opportunities, education. Children are having variety of knowledge and entertainment sources. Housewives are being held hostage by cultural soap operas. Youths are being bombarded with the pornography.

Sociologists which in a funny way say that, “Ours is a discipline which is not of immediate use. But we need such schools of thoughts which may be of long term use by envisioning and analyzing the processes and actors in the media sector.” In the times of Paid News and Telephone Leaks controversy, today credibility is biggest issue in regulation of media. It should be admitted that there are limits to the argument of saying that “We can regulate for ourselves.” Whatever we sow, we reap likewise. These are the times when social media are looking to overtake the traditional media and even electronic media in shaping the opinion. Journalist Daniel Pearl`s murder, proliferation of Danish cartoons on the internet and mobile filming and spreading of Saddam Husain’s hanging are best examples of how social media could overcome the electronic media which is increasingly being cited as the member of the club of the traditional media along with the print and the radio.

Place of media in India has special significance considering the diversity of the demography and diversity of the media. We are debating the question about possible mechanism to nurture ‘Culture of Compliance’ Vs developing ‘Culture of Responsibility.’ The relations between news content producers, commercial content producers, advertisers, marketing companies definitely influence the quality of coverage and analysis of the media.

Why censorship is significant? In the country like India with vast disparities and diversity, educational, cultural and economic divide; censorship is directly related to state of the human development index India is struggling to attain upto a mark. There is no doubt that Indian media and corporate specialize the flaunting the rules. There is no will or wish to sustain sense of responsibility. There seems to be candid benchmarks of double standards. Very few media houses have their own standards of self regulation like MINT Business Newspaper has. It is not surprising that the habits of drinking, smoking and then driving is not easy to go even after public law and threats of enforcements. So, it seems difficult to believe that media houses will follow the regulatory principles.

Search engines, social media, mobile transactions in texts and call are increasingly helping national governments to address the user behavior and also to implement the Open Government Policies of the government of the land. Investment in the Public Information Infrastructure is the key element to bridge the conversation between the ruling class and the people who are ruled. From ideas to policy is the way forward. People have various grievances. Emergency of right to information emerged as a greatest weapon for addressing the grievances of the citizens in the efficient manner. Today information is not limited to one boundary or sovereign country. It is crossing boundaries within a matter of seconds. So tracking this journey of information holds the key to solve many vexing issues for the civil society, investigative agencies, governments, courts, media planners and for everyone. Internet Freedom, Censorship in China, Wiki-leaks Controversy, Telephone tapping controversy in India are some of the examples of how information is being used/leaked/regulated/sanctioned for official/unofficial purposes.

International governance of the internet is being talked about in more vigorous manner like never before. An enforcement of multilateral negotiations is the key to the solution. Will social media be taken into account while formulating the communication policy or it is the traditional media and other media platforms really hold the key to influence the thinking of the policymakers? New traits of policy-making are being envisioned. Sunshine Policy, Public Diplomacy, stand about whistle-blowing, Wiki-leaks, embedded journalists and likewise cases, and so many other issues really dominating the discussion.

So we have to understand the issues of porous boundaries between technology and medium, private and public, ethics and policy, business and social, being serious and fun. This is the age of hyper-transparency. New roles of government are being imagined. Some of them have already been operationalised to some extent in some countries. KM enabled Govt, E-Govt, Agile Govt. In the first stage of this transformation giving public necessary information was necessary and felt sufficient. In the second phase of the information revolution, inviting public comment for the feedback felt significant for improvement of the services. In the third phase, real time consultation and conversation has been considered important for the larger process aiming at particular results and goals.

So, how governments could do screening of these messages. Firstly they can filter, rate, tag then profiling, then remixing, modifying, then composing original applications, then creating opportunities of collaboration, then upgrading towards mobile & web platform and finally online and offline consultation. There are different content formats through which these all processes are operated. Blogs, Feeds, Wikis, Social Networks, Tagging, Content Sharing, KM Methods, Collaborative Content etc. These all processes must be executed considering the behavioral patterns of the Lurkers, Predators, Spammers, Trawlers, Thought leaders, Advisors, Fixers. Connectivity, Content, Community, Culture, Cooperation, Capacity, Commerce, Capital are new buzz-terms of the new frame of relationship between media and society.

RTI has, upto a great extent, contributed to the realization of freedom of information leading to reforms, grievance redressal and strengthening of democracy. RTI exposes clandestine deals, arbitrary decisions, manipulations, embezzlement. RTI has greatly minimized the negative repercussions of the Official Secrets Act 1923. Apart from efficacy of Law arrived due to social movements and political initiative always lagged behind the state of the art technology. In a way, technology always outstrips Law. So response has to be real time. It is well recognized fact that technology creates openness and awareness. Even though there are journalists privileges. So the conflict is between need of regulation and privacy. In the age of callousness, carelessness and foolishness this conflict is getting even murkier and murkier. If you believe the nation`s policies are being designed in the bedrooms, is it right to enter the bedrooms? Increasingly, many people are saying that you should.

What is national security? What is boundary line between public life and private life? What is the discretion of the journalists for using fair/unfair means in investigation? What is definition of corruption? Tehelka was classic example where there was corruption, issue of national security, a sting operation, a use of money, a use of women for luring politicians, character assassination through the expose of recordings. Defending the rights of the journalists was the big issue at that point of time and no media organization came to the rescue or help of journalists of Tehelka to help or to issue a personal bond.

Australia, UK, USA, Germany, Spain are the leading countries where there are established functional media regulatory bodies with certain amount of teeth, legal privilege to take action against ill intentioned media broadcasting, printing or airing of the content. Today India stands on the verge enacting amendments in its Copyright Act so as to sound familiar with Digital Millennium Copyrights Act. In a more assertive fashion ICT media/content/technology is being viewed, deployed and planned for different purposes of Disaster Management, Human Rights Protection, Health care, Transparency, Education, Environment, Social Inclusion, Access to Capital, Cultural Preservation and for all Millennium Development Goals.

Issue of Public Broadcasting remains critical. Few years before it was Public Broadcaster who was getting flak. These days it is private broadcasters which are being criticized and being held to the account. Indian government is not allocating enough money for Prasarbharati. Government is expecting Prasarbharati to raise some money by themselves without realizing that Prasarbharati has very few skills, professional approach, competitive agenda and incentive driven quest of excellence. So, ultimately it ends up imitating the commercial private media. So, apart from prevalent political interference, Public Broadcaster is lacking in quality of the content also. It has to redefine its position and significance of its role in the realm of the media cosmos. So, it remains to be seen whether spectrum of Independence will have a last laugh, or Hunter of regulation or Fountain of Freedom of Expression or Roller of Profit making market? Let us see.