*the validity of the term “local blogosphere” is still under debate at point of entry
Sometime ago TPJC’s blog asked whether Singapore’s blogosphere was screwed up due to the lack of intellectual content and most readers seem to be only interested in sexual related topics, highly controversial articles and exaggerated artists scandals. The article also suggested that local bloggers played a part in the trend as they had sensationalized their entries in bid to generate high volume of visitors for earning advertising revenue.
I find parts of their argument rather weak and especially the examples they cited are not accurate as it seems to be.
Are Singapore’s Readers really that shallow?
The first inaccuracy was that they cited half of the top ten popular entries on Ping.sg, a community Meta blog for Singapore bloggers, were either sex-related content or entries with striking titles and the entries which were voted by readers proved that they were more interested with sexual related topics, highly controversial articles and exaggerated artists scandals.
Though Ping.sg was supposed to be a community Meta blog for Singapore bloggers, they forget that there are other nationals’ bloggers, like Malaysia and Hong Kong, who have registered with Ping.sg to promote their blogs too. Some of them might have posted the exaggerated content too, not necessary Singaporeans’ bloggers.
Secondly, as pointed out above, readers of Ping.sg can be of other nationals too. It is not accurate anymore to use it as a gage to prove that Singapore’s readers are attracted to shallow content only.
For all we know, there might be a high percentage of Singaporeans readers reading blog articles on topics such as science and technology, but the figures are not made known to us.
On Xia Xue being representative of Singapore blogosphere…
*Shake head…
Firstly, the question was posted to the writer’s “not so internet savvy friends” on local blogosphere and I agreed that Xia Xue’s name would definitely be brought up. However, to go on to add that she is representative of the local blogosphere is just… not accurate as well. I mean have you all forgotten the doyen himself – Mr Brown? The ranking on Technorati and Sgblogs showed that he still has the most visited Singaporean blog. Thus, why would Xia Xue who is many spots below him as being representative of local blogosphere? I don’t recall reading other local blogs of having these many curses and swearing words...
Only Blogs which write about science and technology are reputable…
They inferred Singapore’s blogs lacked of intellectual content and only considered blogs with factual content such as science and technology as reputable and intellectual. I totally disagree with this point of view. In my opinion, most blogs provided alternate point of views on certain issues, there is no right or wrong with one’s point of view and there could be philosophy in simple relations of one’s experience. Then, we also have some people who shared their daily life happenings with others like how one celebrated certain festivals, traditional and street food that is unique to a country are part of culture writing. It certainly does not mean that they are not science or technology related topic, thus they are any less intellectual or reputable.
They have also inaccurately labeled blogs such as TechCrunch, Telegraph and WiredScience as successful because they manage to garner a huge readership base. Those blogs are successful because their content is credible and convincing and huge readership base comes after that.
Also, TechCrunch, Telegraph and Wired Science are not exactly written by amature bloggers. Wired Science has editors and numerous contributors and TechCrunch is managed by two professional bloggers etc and they could almost be categorized as commercial blog. It is therefore not fair to compare them with local blogs which are usually managed by one person. Not forgetting that in America, it is possible for one to earning a living from writing, but one cannot really do so in Singapore.
My view on local blogosphere
Contrary to what they have stated, I believed there are many interesting blogs with good content waiting for readers to discover them. In my opinion, Singapore’s Blogosphere isn’t screwed up, neither are the readers. It is just that the vastness of the blogosphere has yet to be explored and what we are seeing now is the barely scratched surface…
TBC...
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