Gutter level cyber warfare
By Lee Wee Tak
The internet has a brief and interesting history in Malaysian politics. Prior to 12th GE, the BN administration dismissed it as not creditable, irrelevant and of insignificance. An ex-minister famously dismissed bloggers as "consist of 70% unemployed women".
The nasty surprise in GE-12 has caused the BN camp to re-evaluate the role that bloggers have on Malaysian politics.
Immediately after the GE, some coverage was given to bloggers and some were even engaged by the until then skeptical and dismissive BN officials.
I am an avid political blog reader and commentator since 2004. I can feel the following transformation stages:
1) before GE-12, opposition leaders and anti-establishment bloggers are the predominant users. most of the posts written then, albeit with political agenda, are generally well supported by logical arguments; but
2) after GE-12, some BN leaders started to use blogs themselves. Ali Rustam, however, had so many negative comments that he had to declare his blog site "got hacked" and had to close it down. I also notice a lot more emotion andthe level of unsubstantiated sensationalisation has risen tremendously.
Poison letter, meanwhile, is a age old weapon used by irresponsible cowards to discredit some one. The "50 dalil" series is the classic example.
Read more at: http://wangsamajuformalaysia.blogspot.com/2009/08/gutter-level-cyber-warfare.html
