Bite My Tongue

This has been a long journey for me personally, and I think an even longer journey for Malaysia. This past year or so has been a tumultuous time for the country, and certainly the media has changed a great deal since Malaysiakini first came on the scene ten years ago, after Anwar Ibrahim was arrested. Now, alternate online media has taken a firm foothold on the Malaysian journalism and transparency scene. Not only new news sites, like Malaysia Today and the more recent Nut Graph, are part of the overall grand scheme, but also bloggers, especially influential blogs, like Rocky’s Bru, and opposition blogs, like those of Lim Kit Siang, Tony Pua, Teresa Kok, and of course, Anwar Ibrahim himself, have joined the blogging leagues. In fact, alternate information on the Internet has become so much a part of the news scene that former premier, the good doctor, has his own blog at Che Det.

As for me, as I said, my journey has been long. I’ve always wanted to be a writer. Initially, I was a writer with the Education Quarterly magazine in the early 2000s. Those were good times, and I learnt a lot about writing, sub-editing and journalism when I was there. Towards the last few years while I was there, I began to freelance as well, writing for the English V Mag, then on to Rodale’s Men’s Health and then Off The Edge.

In 2006, to learn more about the publishing industry, I moved on to LexisNexis Malaysia. There I understood book publishing better, and the production processes too. For personal reasons, I had to begin flexi-working, so I left and began freelancing full time in late 2006. A short training session at CCHrevealed to me some advances in XML.

Along the way, I began writing on and off for Zero Degrees, which was really enjoyable. I began to be a little choosier in terms of who I worked with, for many reasons (email me to find out more!). I also was recommended to the Sun for its freespace column. I chose to write on labour matters. Initially, the digital version of the column was available here. Now, I’ve moved everything over to wordpress, and re-titled it “Put To Task“.

The long journey for me?

Well, I have always wanted to be a writer, as I said. But it’s not always been easy. I was dreaming of writing books, which I have actually done (and I don’t plan to stop). But money has always proved to be a problem. Working with difficult people ((or non-paying people) has also been trying (or challenging, if you want to be politically correct). And I always saw myself as a writer, not a journalist.

courtesy of Richard Scott

Yet, I do comment. I do research. I bring news to people. All these, from what I understand, is journalism. I might have never gone through formal journalism education, and I might be seen to some as a ‘citizen journalist’, but still a journalist, with a civic duty and an interest in transparency and media law.

So what is this blog for?

• This blog is for me to muse, as this meandering post reflects.
• This blog is for to organise my thoughts, see above.
• This blog is for me to update myself (and anyone else interested) on my writing and ‘journalistic’ career (ahem!).
• This blog is most of all to discuss how the Malaysian media, both online and in print, has been forced to bite its tongue.

One departing note:

This blog will only be updated as-and-when. My Put To Task blog and contribution towards Global Voices Advocacy should take precedence (aside from daytime jobs, of course).