the(new)mediaslut

… Sabrina Ong of the Princessa blog.

Two and a half pages of coverage on MyPaper.

Wonder if any bloggers can beat that!

Check out http://mypaper.com.sg/ for the story.

It is very interesting what you say against bloggers in the past can come back to haunt you in cyberspace.

The Star wrote,

Umno Youth deputy chief Khairy Jamaluddin, who is contesting the Rembau parliamentary seat, has joined many other general election candidates in the political fray by entering cyberspace to reach out to voters.

Cool, a young Malaysian politician finally sees the value and credibility of the blog-o-sphere.

Wait a minute, wasn’t this Malaysian politician. the son-in-law of current Malaysia Prime Minster Abdullah Badawi, once described bloggers as primates?

maverickysm.blogspot.com reminds us that it was this Khairy who once described Malaysian bloggers as “monkeys”.

Monkey see, monkey do?

(Image from blog.simplyjean.com)

Suspected JI terrorist leader, Mas Selamat, made a “toilet break” last Wednesday. Minister for Home Affairs, Mr Wong Kan Seng, apologised for the escape but a Singapore blogger highlighted the coffee talk shop about why they arn’t so forgiving of the Home Team leader’s honest mistake.

The minister’s two million dollar salary per annum seems to be the greatest source of discontent.

Popular blogger. Mr Wang of mrwangsaysso.blogspot.com wrote,

It is a very disappointing day for me, to realise how inept and useless the Singapore government has become. To think that we pay the world’s highest ministerial salaries to our political leaders. Wong Kan Seng is paid two million dollars per year and he cannot even keep an arrested man under proper lock and key. A terrorist has escaped, for goodness sakes.

I think Wong Kan Seng should resign. Terrorism knows no borders, and Wong Kan Seng’s mistake potentially endangers the lives of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people - not just in Singapore, but in other countries as well. All over the world, elected politicians have been pressed to resign, for much less serious matters.

Mr Wang continued to describe that the greater escape artist might have been Mr Wong. Mr Brown shares the same sentiment while Mr Bean is still on a holiday.

Wrote another popular Singapore blogger, Mr Brown,

Anyway, Singaporeans need not worry we will lose any million-dollar senior talents like ministers, in the light of this debacle. They won’t be asked to resign or even take a pay cut. We are not like those free-wheeling and chaotic governments from Western democracies that make their leaders accountable for every little thing.

Sorry is the hardest word to say and a newly formed blog, Nobody Writes, crucified Mr Wong Kan Seng’s facial expression when he apologised for the escape.

Nobody wrote,

My question to you, Mr. Minister: Why are you smiling when you were relating the ’someone suspicious on the roof’ incident?

Personally, this is a matter of grave concern and there is nothing to laugh about. What message is the Minister trying to bring across? Its not a joke, mind you!

There’s a video link on the above blog and some bloggers are even starting to say that the sorry was scripted.

The two million dollar minister must be hoping right now that there is a million dollar man out there who can capture the escaped suspected JI terrorist soon even as Singapore enters the 7 days mark of his escape.

You may heard the term from print to screen where books are turned into movies and it seems journalists from Singapore’s mainstream media are looking at social media for their source of the story.

It is, therefore, even more important for the brand protectors, like the PR and the corporate comms, to constantly be aware of the going ons of the social media scene.

It all started with postings on two SPH forums at omy.sg and asiaone.com about how the forum member won her case against Nokia to refund her the full amount of a Nokia phone which she bought stopped working after a few days.

Unable to get the mobile phone repair, the forum member asked for a refund and got it through Singapore’s Small Claims Tribunal.

However, when the forum member called Nokia to check on the refund, Nokia office replied they did not receive any notice from the Small Claims Tribunal.

So what did the forum member do?

She got the courts to call in the Repo Man.

Wrote XiaoYun at OMY.sg on Feb 18 2008,

I then applied for WSS (Writ of Seizure and Sale) the next day. An appointment date was scheduled on 11 Feb 2008.

I accompany the bailiff officer to Nokia HQ. Nokia was then given two options by the bailiff officer. One was to make settlement and the other one was let the bailiff officer to sticker their movable assets.

They finally woke up and agree to make payment. By then, they got to pay $1,018.43 instead of $778.

The forum post ended in Singapore’s popular blog aggregation site, Tomorrow.sg on Feb 22, 2008.

The Straits Times posted a teaser on its online site today to highlight that the Nokia incident will hit the pages of the print papers on Feb 25, 2008, with the headline “Nokia forced to cough up more than $1,000 over faulty phone“.

Wrote Alfred Siew of The Straits Times,

EARLIER this month, Ms Tan Geok Hoon marched into Nokia’s office, brandishing court documents and threatening to seize the assests of the cell-phone giant.

A bailiff stood at the side of the 43-year-old sales manager, ready to reposess the company’s things.

Ms Tan was enforcing a small claims court decision that ordered the world’s largest cellphone maker to pay her $778 for a faulty cellphone she bought last year.

The moment, which Ms Tan recalled recently, marked the culmination of a seven- month David-versus-Goliath battle.

The story of one woman’s fight against a mighty firm made its rounds in several online forums last week, casting the spotlight on how the world’s top phone maker handled unhappy customers.

This shows that the mainstream media are reading forums and blogs for a story source and I believed this isn’t the first time that it has happened.

However, I went through Nokia.com.sg Press Center and failed to find any official respond to the incident.

Neither could I find any Nokia response in the forums.

The question here for Nokia is that while the company promotes its mobile phones as a blogging tool, what type of respond mechanism does the company have when it comes to addressing the social media scene?

Or do they wait for it to be blown up in the mainstream media before they respond to them?