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حسن الأشرف ـ الرباط
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حسن الأشرف ـ الرباط
By Laura Smith-Spark BBC News, Washington |
With a year to go before the 2008 US presidential elections, young Americans are poised to mark their growing engagement in politics with an ambitious online news site.
The creators of Scoop08.com, which launches on 4 November, say it will be the first to harness the power of students across the US to follow the campaign.
"We noticed there was a void when it came to national, grassroots, student journalism that really could have an impact on issues of importance," said co-founder Alexander Heffner, 17.
Whether the venture sky-rockets or fizzles, its very existence reflects a social shift that candidates and major parties ignore at their peril.
Namely, America's young voters, traditionally seen as apathetic, are becoming more active voters - and there are more and more of them.
'More involved'
People aged 18-29 will make up 25% of the electorate in 2008, according to the University of Maryland's Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (Circle), up from 21% in 2006.
They may account for a full third of the electorate by 2015, Circle predicts, although not all will register to vote. For a long time, campaigns have ignored the youth vote - but in 2004 they started to take notice
Rock the Vote
Added to this, in the 2004 presidential and 2006 mid-term elections, participation among those aged under 25 - though still lower than that of older voters - rose faster than in the population as a whole.
Put into numbers, this meant 4.3m more under-30 voters turned out in 2004 than in 2000, while 1.6m more under-30s voted in 2006 than in 2002, says Rock the Vote, a non-partisan organisation that aims to educate and mobilise young voters.
Kat Barr, Rock the Vote's director of research and education, says it appears to be a continuing trend.
"We have seen through polling, through volunteerism rates, all kinds of indicators... that 18- to 29-year-olds are far more involved in politics than their older brothers and sisters," she said.
"For a long time, campaigns have ignored the youth vote - but in 2004 they started to take notice and in 2006 we did see some campaigns target youth votes."
Rock the Vote's research suggests that the increased youth vote played into the results in several tight races in 2006, including Democratic senate gains in Montana and Virginia.
Those results flag up another reason why neither party can afford to ignore the youth vote: its apparent shift to the left.
A Pew Research Survey in 2006 found that 58% of young voters identified themselves as Democrats and 36% as Republicans.
A survey of the same demographic in 1991 found that 55% of young voters saw themselves as Republican.
Networking
So what are the issues motivating this newly energised young generation?
Rock the Vote polling and focus groups put the Iraq war as young voters' number one concern, followed by economic issues such as the cost of college and healthcare.
Next - and this is where differences can be seen with older age groups, says Ms Barr - come concerns about the environment, global warming and immigration.
Thomas Patterson, of the John F Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, says the Iraq war played a big part in stirring up the youth vote in 2004 - and could do so again if the Bush administration decides to "stay the course" in Iraq.
Young voters have also warmed to changes in the presidential debate format, with 77% saying they preferred to see questions put by members of the public, as happened in July's video-based YouTube debate, compared to 57% of those aged 65 and older.
Developments such as the use of social networking sites, including Facebook and MySpace, in campaigning have also been embraced by younger voters.
'Moment in history'
These innovations are in the armoury of Scoop08 as it prepares to compete with the mainstream media, said Mr Heffner and co-founder Andrew Mangino, a 20-year-old Yale student.
They plan to use video clips, blogs and podcasts on the site, as well as more conventional reports, to draw in a younger audience.
"There is an increasingly politically engaged generation that is able to network online and to work professionally, academically and socially in this venue," said Mr Heffner.
Among the beats to be awarded to its 300-plus stable of reporters are "rhetoric" - where presidential candidates' campaign speeches will be unpicked - "democracy" and "ethics".
The site also intends to shed light on under-reported issues and the less-known presidential candidates, drawing on its geographically, ethnically and socially diverse team to do so.
Of course, the whole enterprise relies on the commitment of student reporters and editors who will be working for nothing, supported by an advisory board that includes established journalists and former presidential candidate Gary Hart.
Will the young volunteers' energy last through the year to polling day on 4 November 2008?
Mr Mangino is optimistic. "Everyone is just so committed to this," he said. "They will increasingly devote their time just because it is that moment in history where it is possible."الأردن يبدأ مراقبة المواقع الإخبارية الإلكترونية |
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وقال نبيل المومني مساعد مدير عام دائرة المطبوعات والنشر"كدائرة مطبوعات في ظل القانون يحق لي متابعة مضمون هذه المواقع".
وأضاف أن ديوان التشريع في رئاسة الوزراء أعطى تفسيرا للقانون يشمل فيه المواقع الإلكترونية، ولذا فان ما ينطبق على الصحف ينطبق على كل وسيلة نشر أخرى.
يذكر أن الأردن شهد في الآونة الأخيرة انتشارا للمواقع الإخبارية الإلكترونية.
ووفقا لقانون المطبوعات الذي أقرت تعديلاته في مايو/أيار الماضي فإنه يحق لأي جهة معنوية أو فردية مقاضاة الصحف أمام المحاكم النظامية، كما يحق لدائرة المطبوعات والنشر ملاحقة الصحف التي تنشر مواد مخالفة مثل إهانة الأديان أو المس بالوحدة الوطنية أو القدح والذم.
ويلغي قانون المطبوعات الجديد إيقاف الصحفيين على ذمة التحقيق وهو ما حقق أحد مطالب نقابة الصحفيين، التي كانت تطمح أيضا لنص صريح يلغي الحبس وفق القوانين الأخرى ومنها قانون العقوبات.
Generally politicians are good communicators, but only a select few have found themselves ideally suited to the dominant media of their age.
Churchill's voice resonated for the radio, while John F. Kennedy looked great on the box and famously won the presidency after his opponent, Richard Nixon, appeared unkempt and shifty during a pre-vote TV debate in the US.
So which politicians are storming the barricades in the information revolution?
There is little doubt that the internet is becoming part of the political furniture.
CNN and YouTube recently teamed up to hold a debate for America's upcoming primaries and France has shown that just as with democracy itself, the country is also a political trailblazer on the web.
These technologies help and don't help politicians
France has recently had a spate of national elections for the presidency and the national assembly. The internet became an important factor in the campaign.
Loic Le Meur is France's most famous blogger. He was recruited by Nikolas Sarkozy to advise on blogging, YouTube and Second Life, and how to exploit these technologies to get elected.
"These technologies help and don't help politicians," explained Mr Le Meur. "They give them an opportunity to express themselves directly without the filter of the press.
"I am not commenting on that filter, but at least he could directly express his views. And I have to say that a lot of the French press were against him and you could tell. But at least, like it or not, it was his voice".
Modern image
You can see why politicians like going online. The internet lets politicians button-hole the public and talk to them without awkward questions from journalists.
But not everyone is convinced our politicians are talking into wobbly web-cams just to put across their positions.
Image is everything in politics, and the last thing today's leaders want to be labelled is as "a pen and paper person".
"At the present time I think that it is mostly [about] showing that you are a modern politician," said Thierry Vedel of Sciences Po, the prestigious school of political science in Paris.
"Since you are a modern politician you are trying to use all of the modern tools of communication, including the net, but also different political and marketing techniques."
But where digital technology might be changing things is in making everyone a potential reporter.
These days if a politician swears under their breath or mutters an off-colour aside there is bound to be someone there eagerly recording unguarded comments not just for posterity, but for broadcast.
"Video everywhere means more transparency, more authenticity," said Mr Le Meur. "They have to be like they are and not as they wish they would be, which is very, very different.
"They have to behave like they behave normally. There is always someone with a phone, a camera, recording it or blogging it. And I think it is very good news because it means they can't lie."
Online activism
Where the internet is probably having most impact is in the way people are organising themselves.
MySociety.org is a British website that helps people to take joint action in a variety of ways.
On FixMyStreet.com people report anything from a dumped fridge to a missing manhole cover. Sister sites are designed to make our political representatives actually represent us.
"One of the questions about that is whether we are going to see a new kind of activism, something which is lighter compared to the old activism meaning people getting engaged in politics just for a short period, on a very specific issue, and then in some way getting retired when they don't like what's going on," said Mr Vedel.
The jury is still out on whether the internet is really swinging the campaign.
While it can definitely raise the profile of fringe candidates, it is still the mainstream media that most politicians are looking to win over.
![]() Abgebloggt: In Deutschland bleiben Weblogs hinter ihrem Potenzial zurück. Foto: iStockPhoto | ![]() |
Eine junge Frau ruft bei ihrem Friseur an und fragt, ob die Räume des Haarschneiders mit W-LAN ausgestattet seien. Die Friseurin am anderen Ende der Leitung ist überfordert. Nein, sagt sie, wir verwenden Schwarzkopf, kein W-LAN. Ende der Geschichte. Finden Sie weder interessant noch lustig? Deutschlands bekanntestem Mainstream-Weblog, Spreeblick, war diese Anekdote einer Berliner Bloggerin eine Verlinkung an prominenter Stelle wert.
Gewiss, das ist nur ein Beispiel. Aber eines das zeigt, wo Weblogs einzuordnen sind. Knapp 100 der chronologisch geführten Netz-Tagebüchern prägen in Deutschland das Bild von Weblogs - eines der bekanntesten davon ist Spreeblick. Rund 100 000 weitere Weblogs sind bestenfalls öffentlich einsehbare und dennoch private geführte Tagebücher, denen jede gesellschaftliche Relevanz fehlt.
Keine Relevanz
Innerhalb eines geschlossenen Zirkels über Außenstehende zu lachen, ist natürlich nicht unbedingt schlimm. Wenn man allerdings vorhat, diesen abgeschlossenen Zirkel zu vergrößern, ist es nicht besonders klug.
Und doch ist Vergrößerung das erklärtes Ziel der deutschen Blog-Szene: Man will eine Alternative zu den etablierten Medien werden. Großes Vorbild sind dabei die USA, wo Blogs in den letzten sieben, acht Jahren zu einem nicht zu unterschätzenden Faktor der öffentlichen Meinungsbildung geworden sind.
Schon vor zwei Jahren hat dort das renommierte Finanzmagazin Fortune acht Blogger "die man nicht ignorieren kann" im Blatt vorgestellt. "Citizen Journalism" (Bürgerjournalismus) heißt das Stichwort, das auch in Deutschland zum Lieblingsvokabular selbsternannter Online-Visionäre gehört.
Dabei wird hierzulande gerne übersehen, dass die Ausgangssituation in Deutschland eine grundlegend andere ist als in den Vereinigten Staaten. Die Medienlandschaften unterscheiden sich stark.
"Öffentlicher Rundfunk spielt in den USA eine wesentlich geringere Rolle als in Deutschland", erklärt Jan Schmidt, bloggender Kommunikationswissenschaftler der Universität Bamberg. Die typische Zielgruppe von Blogs - gebildet und medienkritisch - habe daher in den USA einen größeren Bedarf an unabhängigen Medien.
Keine Initialereignisse
Der Präsidentschaftswahlkampf 2004 und die amerikanische Intervention im Irak verstärkten das Bedürfnis der amerikanischen Bevölkerung nach neuen Informationsquellen. Ausgerechnet zu einem Zeitpunkt, da die technischen Voraussetzungen für Blogs in den USA ein Niveau erreicht hatten, das es auch wenig versierten Nutzern einfach machte, online zu publizieren.
In Deutschland, so Schmidts Resumee, habe es weder vergleichbare Initialereignisse gegeben, noch sei das Bedürfnis nach alternativen Informationsmöglichkeiten so hoch wie in den Vereinigten Staaten.
Hinzu kommt, dass sich der Teil der deutsche Bloggerszene, der überhaupt wahrgenommen wird - intern spricht man stolz von "Blogosphäre" - in dauerhaftem Clinch befindet. Jeder Schritt auf dem langen Weg der Professionalisierung wird kritisch beäugt.
Als der Betreiber des Weblogs Spreeblick, Johnny Haeusler, mit anderen Netzaktivisten die Plattform "adical" zum Vertrieb von Werbung auf Blogs gründete, musste er sich teilweise wüste Kritik aus den eigenen Reihen gefallen lassen.
Haeuslers Fehler: Ausgerechnet der wegen Kollaboration mit den chinesischen Behörden harsch kritisierte Konzern Yahoo war einer der ersten Vermarktungspartner von adical. Ein Fauxpas in der mehrheitlich werbe- und konsumkritischen Szene der Weblogs.
"Andere Spielregeln"
Die "anderen Spielregeln", die laut adical in Blogs gelten und die man Unternehmen nahe bringen möchte, hatte man also selber nicht verstanden. Der andauernden Selbstzerfleischung liegt etwas Trauriges inne, denn Weblogs haben großes Potential. Zahlreiche Nischen warten auf hochwertige Inhalte.
Das literarische Blog 500beine des NRW-Literaturpreis-Gewinners Andreas Glumm, das medienkritische Bildblog des FAZ-Journalisten Stefan Niggemeier und seines Kollegen Christoph Schultheis zeigen genauso wie das Promi-Blog Viply, dass sich konsequente Beschränkung auf ein Thema lohnt.
Deutsche Leser wollen spezialisierte Angebote zu ihren Lieblingsthemen anstatt eines weiteren Versuches, klassische Zeitungen zu imitieren. Aus der Gesamtheit dieser Spezial-Blogs könnte sich nicht zuletzt durch technische Verbindungsmöglichkeiten eine Gesamtheit der Blogs formen - und da wäre sie dann, die viel beschworene Gegenöffentlichkeit.
Bis es soweit ist, gilt das Fazit des Kommunikationswissenschaftlers Schmidt. Der umschreibt die Misere höflich. Die Öffentlichkeit von Weblogs bestünde in ihrer technischen Zugänglichkeit für jedermann. Keinesfalls aber besteht sie in ihrer gesellschaftlichen Relevanz.