TOC was invited to participate in Channel NewsAsia’s Talking Point to discuss the topic ‘policing the internet’. The programme intended to discuss Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts’ addendum to the President’s Address in Parliament highlighting the challenges of a new media landscape. The addendum says some content creators resort to lies and misinformation while operating under a cloak of anonymity; and hence a code of responsible conduct is needed. ‘But should we, could we, police the new media?’, they wanted to discuss. MP for Tampines GRC, Baey Yam Keng and NTU Professor Ang Peng Hwa were the other panelists.
Watch the discussion HERE.
@ Proposal to miw
i suggest some for your consideration:
1. implement COE system for internet, everyone who wishes to use the internet can bid for a [Certificate of entitlement for usage of internet] in an open biding system.
2. increase all carpark fees, $50/hour. solved all parking shortage problems.
3. implement ERP for human beings(aka every human being carry a taxi meter), make every person carry an unremovable [Human Movement Pricing] device.
the Gantry starts at entrance of everyone’s house, the moment a person leaves the house it starts to “beeb” and deduct money according to distance traveled and places visited,
normal pavement charge $2 per 1 meter traveled, neighborhood park charge $8 per 1 meter traveled, orchard road charge $25 per meter traveled, if u walk into ION orchard, “beeb” $80 gone at the entrance, inside is flat rate $90 per 1 meter traveled.
solved all overcrowding problems.
@ iworkhardsometimes
With your fantasy proposals, it will be your Foreign Trash “friends” who can’t afford to live here even for one day. The only inhabitants left will be dogs, cats and ants.
And yes, all the over-crowding here will be resolved.
@ Ang Lan Chio
“Before social media became a world phenomenon, the westerners also did not need it to have transparency.”
FICTION.
Freedom of Information laws were legislated in many countries – both developed and developing.
In Australia, it was legislated in 1982. Were you born then or did you heard of internet then?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_information_legislation
@ Devagi
The obvious flaw in your troll is that the monkeys-in-white in dictatorship regimes will perversely interpret black as white and white as black when truth and falsity in any social economic discourse in cyberspace is shades of opinion and very few things are either rigidly black or white.
Please save your fiction of deception for another forum. Tsk.
When the Committee for Review of the Ministerial Salaries at long last come out with their salary revisions, how do we the citizenry show our reaction to it, when the PAP has closed down TOC and other avenues of speech?
Whether the President’s son escaped NS, how do we know?
When a Council member of MUIS is also a Shari’ah lawyer in private practice, enabling him to commit conflict of interest serially, how do we know?
If the AG, prosecution, judges, Courts and the legal system makes war on the populace,by bankruptcy, incarceration, death sentence, how do we know?
If the Government has made a pact with China to make Singapore a province of it, or have decided to sell out Singapore to the highest bidder by freely conferring citizenship to their nationals, how do we know?
The fact is, the Straits Times and the broadcast media are controlled by the Government and maybe even owned by the Government. Do we expect to hear such bad news from these organs of speech?
NO.
For 50 years we could not know. Now we are awakened by the Internet to knowledge. And the ugly head of Power is now working to shut it down.
The modus operandi of the big brother is to make use of a common theme where they instinctively know people will not be able to refute and then abuse it to suit their agenda.
In this case they will try to fool everyone into believing that they are out to solve cyber crime but their real ulterior motive is to control political web sites. Huh. Sure I can never back up such accusation, that is why it is working all the time and will work again. However if you trace back on their past doing you will unlikely to miss the tell tale sign and agree with me on this count.
How many times have we been fooled and should we continue to trust them unreservedly? They even got the cheek to tell us that the intend to raise GST is to help the poor. Which is again using a common theme where people will agree to help the poor in order to raise revenue for their coffer.
@busybody, stopping cybercrime is not an easy thing. Even the CIA is trying to stop cybercrime. The list of cybercrime is endless: child- sex procuring sites , bomb making instructions, deviant Islam, commercial fraud, music piracy etc. If the PAP Government is able to stop even one of these, they will receive the Turing Prize ( which is the equivalent of the Noble Price for computer scientists).
To make it simple, all the PAP would do is to take down TOC and sites like it. Even to take down a site is not within the technical capacity of this Government. The Govt will use the Rule of Law to clam down on sites which talk bad about it. The great worry is that the owners of TOC may be bribed with offers they cannot resist and divulge our email addresses to the ISD.
@doppelganger – The more pressing issue like national internet security, cyber hacking and the possibility of sabotage by terrorist etc has not being fully addressed, they start looking into micro issue like cyber crime. It comes soon after the GE and presidential election, surely you can get the hint. Sniffing the internet is detrimental to their divide and control operation, they must act now. Doing all these who do you think they are trying to fool?
Of course it is the 60% of Singaporean who unreservedly trust and believe in them. In the process the 40% will lose its voice for good. Sigh….
Wakeup Singaporeans lah!
Oldman don’t call you guys Daft for no reasons.
Still want to continue and be branded as “Daft” ???
Me ?, No way !
Nevr trust Baeuy !
“Still water runs deep”
This guy is even Deeper than deep !
Oxygen
Thats what i meant, the west some how have a culture where its people naturally would ask pertinent questions. But it seems clear sporeans sort of perversely self-censor. Even though we recieved western academic education, modernised, 1st world.
Would i be debunked if i say sg is the only 1st world where politically the typical citizen is also not like 3rd world? See, 3rd world thailand n phillipines citizens have democracy in their dna.
Sg ppl is like : Kia Si, Kia Kong , Kia Tia, Kia CB (cho boh)
Simply scholarstically superior ideas you have.
Kudos!
If not for the pro foreigner environment, some of your ideas would long ago have been used by their schoolars . See, foreigners are not having sg dna we have inherited. They wont take such harsh thingies. They would leave if environmt not up to their expectation n then sg would cry n cry for them to stay.
So, we r lucky to have foreigners here. Left with 100% sporeens, jia lat liao.
Regrets
Jia Liao Bee chuan jin
I believe strongly you are reading this.
So, here’s what i have to say to you on policing the internet.
Come up a simple law that constraints every citizen to be able to use internet only if go through a hardware provided by the authorities. Through this device, every thing they do on the computer and over the net will be recorded in a 5billion terrabyte super storage facility.
The evidences will be kept for 50 years.
So, from the Policing officer’s comfort of his chair, he can see everyone’s identity clearly at the click of a mouse.
Like this, there is no need to police the internet.
Self-Censoring is the way of the 21st century. the west should learn from the fantastic singapore.
Why are we so unique?
We have the SG DNA.
Hip Hop Hurray!
Its with us till we die.
Only the next next generation can have the possibility to change the dna.
Its called EVOLUTION.
To me, everyone dead or alive born in SG belong to the 1st Generation DNA of singapore.
The next Generation is yet to arrive.
I copyright my idea presented on TOC at this instant.
And they are still scratchig their heads wondering why the super duper rich like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs (when he was alive) etc won’t migrate to Singapore, the best city to live & best city to do business.
All these talks and feedback sessions on the TV are just a WASTE of TIME and perhaps a PR exercises.
These talks are conducted within such a short period of time where guests and the public have near to zero opportunity to talk let alone feedback.
If they are serious in tackling issues, the talk should be at least 1 to 2 hours and perhaps a few sessions.
As of now, don’t waste your time and electricity. You get nothing from them but perhaps few token questions and answers and don’t forget the ADVERTISEMENTS !
PURE WASTE OF TIME ! ! !
@ Rama Muthu Gangasammy
” Thats what i meant, the west some how have a culture where its people naturally would ask pertinent questions. But it seems clear sporeans sort of perversely self-censor. Even though we recieved western academic education, modernised, 1st world.”
Excellent thoughts. A lot of Singaporean mindset are imprisoned by fear, propaganda put out by vested corrupt interest, sheer myopia and even naive self-censorship. People forget that their views of the real world from inside the prison bar looking out is DISTORTED from the views of those outside imprisoning them inside and looking in.
Politicians lie habitually – the bigger the power and money implication – the bigger the lies. They fear internet which Julian Assange once told a New Yorker magazine.. Why???
It is like chess…”Chess is very austere in that you don’t have many rules, there is no randomness and the problem is very hard.”
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/11/02/world/europe/assange-profile/index.html?hpt=hp_c2
I agree with that. Politicians thrive on “muddling through” their subjects with sequence of lies, and deception, spread it out so they can distort perception of realities if they cannot distort realities outright with one blatant lie…like Saddam Hussien’s alleged WMD…read my lips, no new taxes.
The late Mao Tse Tung told his CCCP this.
“The masses’ eyes are discerning. We would like to share it with all those taking public hearings as cosmetic”
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2009-12/25/content_9228239.htm
So you talk sweet to peasantries but once you get back to your office of power, DO THE OPPOSITE!
That is why POLITICAL LONGEVITY is very dangerous. You give politicians an unlimited bandwidth of time, opportunity and scope of different myraids of different lies concealing prior lies and deception. The end result is if you look at longevity of protracted dictatorship, it looks “good” at the beginning but in the end it was money, power grab, corruption, and dynastic politics or corynism, and nepotism or all of the above and the country in an absolute mess. The West never allow Presidents and PMs more than 2-terms of elected office. You know why.
And even within that 2-terms, the compression of political longevity “forced” kissing babies politicians to invent more lies, each piling on the other such that once left office, all the rotten skeletons fell out of the cupboard.
TO PROTECT THEM FROM EXPOSURE, POLITICIANS WILL OPPRESS INTERNET because if you allow randomness, it is very hard to conceal lies and deception. The world out there of cyberspace has too many of the very intelligent, well-informed, incorruptible likes of Julian Assanges who wants to put truths, humanity interest and society above the vested corrupt interests of monkey politicians.
Anyone surprised?
@ Rama Muthu Gangasammy
When politicians habitually and persistently preach virtues, it is very dangerous and IT IS THE OPPOSITE IN CONDUCT AND OUTCOME like Mao’s true colour.
Let me show you the proof. Mao spoke eloquently and gospelly of caring for “proletariat”, right???
Take a vacation to China. Why are public buildings (except those that are needing of public access like immigration etc) always under security guards and inaccessible of visits by foreigners ( even non-military/defence establishments)?
Very simple, you can never see physically handicapped people working inside. THEY ARE ALL THROWN INTO THE RUBBISH DUMPS AND FORGOTTEN HUMANITY.
If you visit their university campuses – plenty in big cities – you can never find handicap-friendly toilet facilities or stairway UNLIKE THOSE YOU SEE IN THE WEST. Why?
Just stand outside the gates of Chinese universities campuses and watch and entry/exits of human pedestrains in and out – YOU CAN BET YOUR LIFE YOU WON’T SEE ANY PHYSICALLY HANDICAP PERSON WALK IN OR OUT.
My suspicion is that they barred handicap youth from accessing tertiary education. But how they know the would-be student is physically handicap? From their school records!
WELCOME TO CHINA’S PROLETARIAT REVOLUTION AND THE VIRTUES OF DICTATORSHIPS of who they really care for.
PEASANTRY OR POLITICAL DICTATORSHIP ALWAYS PREVAIL? Was Mao not an emperor cannot be offended of hard truths?
I travelled and I observes.
No Government can police the Internet per se, not even the Superpower, the US. Mr Baey must be naive or he is pulling wool over our eyes when he put out the suggestion that the Government of Singapore will police the Internet. What the Singapore Government will do is to use more police power and more Rule of Law to police the citizenry. This means a heavier use of the ISA and compliant judges to slam down on those who access the Internet. This is one of the reasons why this Government will not disband its mafia brotherhood, the ISD.
Another way the Government will affect the Internet is to bribe the owners of TOC for instance. Make them great men with million dollar pay and you may see that social media will become traps for the unwary. The owners of websites which previously air the views of the citizenry under confidentiality will become informants to the Government. Once they let out your email address, you’re a goner.
So ‘policing the Internet’ is a misnomer. it is actually policing the people more thoroughly.It is up to us the citizenry whether we will succumb to more oppression. The Govt is also weighing whether we would succumb. Their think-tanks in academia are busy plotting the scenario of the breaking point for more and more oppression.
The Minister Yaacob Ibrahim exhibits a lot of cunning when he irrationally connect death and mayhem as the ingredients of the Internet. The Internet is the mother of the Arab Spring, which liberates and promises to liberate millions of people from long ruling despots. In Singapore it thwarts the ambition of the also long ruling PAP to milk the people through bogus reasons for million dollar ministerial salaries.
Burma, NKorea & China are notorious for policing, controlling and blocking sites whenever and forever.
Why police unless you have vile secrets to hide and wants to show the world what a pitiful dictator you are.
The only transparency we have here is how vile and hypocritical this sham democracy is always trying to convince everyone how NOT vile and hypocritical a dictatorship it is. Shameless!
Last time, great policies that work, that were formulated decade or more ago, were not fully consultative.
If u want control internet just go ahead lah. Its not like the majority would vote against you?
While true there is only 40% wanting to change the gonmt, these are minority and democracy rules that minority LOSES. they have to LL endure until they have each made an effort to swing over as few as 1 vote.
My idea to control internet is to ban broadband, wifi and 3g, collapse ISP into 1 stat board controlled isp where login is by nric or singpass only for citizens n pr. Becos of intensive severe heavy reliance on foreigners for survival n gdp, these will be allowed anonymity.
This will secure a landslide majority so that the drop in popularity wil not continue for a reciord 4th term in succesion.