WIREDElections can make a blog a vital piece of a country's conversation with itself and others, writes Danny O'Brien
ELECTIONS ANYWHERE make the news; in fact, they're rather perfect as ways of parcelling the news. Limited in time, but dramatic in effect, they're easy for the world's press to describe and summarise.
Even countries whose internal politics rarely make it to the front pages get a chance at election time. Zimbabwe's struggles gets headline status on cnn.com. Kenya's recent post-election troubles continue to influence the global impression of that country. And of course, Ireland's own Lisbon referendum was heard about around the world.
I've spent the last few days in Budapest, attending the Global Voices conference. Global Voices started four years ago as a non-profit initiative, seeking to increase coverage of countries that were as often as not left uncovered by the mainstream media by connecting the bloggers in these countries with others across the world.
The unlikely goals have been more than achieved. The Global Voices website now summarises dozens of blog entries every day, from Macedonia to Madagascar. When a journalist needs to find someone on the ground in a far-off country, the chances are they'll contact GV to speak to a local blogger.
Even better though, is the community between these citizen journalists. Here in Budapest, I've met writers from Japan, Thailand, Egypt and Pakistan; online writers who have been imprisoned, threatened or beaten for their blogs; ex-pats and natives whose websites are so disruptive to their government's control on the media that they are banned or filtered away in their own country.
But for every blog that gains its writer a worldwide reputation (or sadly, earns its owner an international campaign to free them from jail), there are hundreds that hide in relative obscurity, quietly documenting the political and not-so-political happenings in their country from the view of an ordinary citizen.
But elections - those brief moments when ordinary citizens actually count - are flashpoints that can make a blog a vital piece of a country's conversation with itself and others.
It's during the electoral period that state restrictions on coverage are toughest. The stress between the blogger's urge to talk, and the institutional fear of irrational influences, makes for an awkward clash of cultures; and often, when traditional media finds itself blocked by law or threats, it's the bloggers who take up that slack.
In Kenya, in an attempt to calm the violence, the interior ministry announced a ban on live broadcasts. The bloggers were quick to question how that would apply to the online world. Was live broadcasting with a five-second delay acceptable? What about the instant "liveblogging" that many bloggers indulge in? Could that be too topical and incendiary for the delicate eyes and ears of the public? In the absence of real investigations by the established media (which were, it seems, too afraid of reprisals by the authorities), it was bloggers who filled in the space.
The same goes for Armenia, where a media blackout after March 1st protests meant that non-professional bloggers became one of the few sources of information. Pro-opposition TV channels like A1+ had been banned from the airwaves since 2002, but it recently won a European Court of Human Rights decision supporting its claim that the government violated its freedom of expression.
Despite its lack of official broadcast frequencies, A1+ continued its work on websites like YouTube. As a result, the Google video-sharing site became so popular that it was blocked by Armenian ISPs during the state of emergency. Other Armenian websites quickly spread information on how to bypass the state censors using programs like Tor (http://www.torproject.org/).
For now, blogs in emerging democracies are either ignored by the government, or easily evade the clumsy controls formed by regulators. But if there's going to be a concerted battle to control the uncontrollable, it'll be during the election season. Even liberal established democracies frequently have controls on the media in place during election time, and with widespread public support too.
In June, in a heavy-handed attempt to apply old laws to new media, Brazilian bloggers were forced to delete banners they'd designed in support of one candidate in Rio de Janeiro's mayoral election. The banners were a declaration of support, rather than a paid endorsement, but Brazilian electoral restrictions nonetheless forbade them.
Similarly, Brazilian local politicians were forbidden from using Orkut, Facebook or other social networking sites to promote themselves.
Even in the United States, which prides itself on its First Amendment protections on free speech, has recently attempted to legislate on what bloggers may or may not do during election time (mainly whether they can secretly take money from politicians). That law failed to make it past legislators, and now that major politicians are seeking funding primarily from partisan online sites, it seems unlikely to reappear soon.
Such grassroots fundraising is rare over here - so far. But what happens when Ireland or other countries feel it necessary to impose "fair reporting" standards on more than just television? There are rumbles that the Lisbon referendum result came from publicity and media that bypassed the mainstream press and TV, which reflected the pro-Lisbon stance of the major parties.
If controlled, will bloggers take it lying down? Will the politicians?
