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The Layalina Review

VOL. V NO. 6, February 27-March 12, 2009

Net Generation Pushes Arab Media Boundaries

Media coverage of the Gaza conflict is evidence of a new media paradigm based on a “participate in, be there” model, writes Matteo Berlucchi in New Europe. Livestation.com and its partner broadcaster Al-Jazeera English most successfully took advantage of this new media shift.

According to Berlucchi, Livestation realized that “here was a new audience consuming news in a new way and demanding a say in how that news was analyzed and presented.” Interactive web tools such as discussion forums gave viewers a “be there now” experience, and offered broadcasters a “fresh and vibrant source of fresh perspectives.”

This new broadcasting model may be a response to the challenges posed by new media and the blogosphere. On Informed Comment Juan Cole predicts that “the newspaper as a form of print publication may be on its last legs.” As a result, “lots of new models will likely emerge, since there certainly is a market for news.”

Sarah Alzouman, reporting for the Kuwait Times, also views the “immediacy and accessibility of media in our information age” as a challenge to traditional media. Speaking at the University of Kuwait, George Washington University professor Adel Iskandar noted, “If you have access to a computer, a DSL connection, and a camera, you are essentially a production center.”

For Iskandar, this has tilted the power away from traditional media, since users of media content are no longer “simply consumers…now they are in a position to produce content to create novel material and disseminate it widely.”

The information age challenges traditional media forms by “dismantling the profitability of old business models,” and also serves to “level the global playing field…[thereby] creating a historic opportunity for Middle East media companies,” writes Keach Hagey at The National.

Edward Borgerding, chief executive of Abu Dhabi Media Company (ADMC), argues that the shift "means that the game is reset and everybody is equal; the guys in Europe are equal, the guys in Tokyo are equal, the guys in Los Angeles and New York are equal and the guys in the Middle East are equal…Because the new business models haven’t been created yet, we can create them here.”

Borgerding notes that the Middle East’s lack of an entrenched media industry makes the region more open to new directions. In the UAE specifically, access to capital and a talented skills base are further advantages.

However, Borgerding warns of low online and broadband penetration in the region, an issue also raised by Taylor Luck in The Jordan Times. Luck focuses on Jordan, using the 2009 Jordan Media Survey to demonstrate an increasing number of Jordanians who rely on news websites.

The survey showed 16.6% of Jordanians, or 45.9% of total web users, had visited a news website in the last 30 days, with 66.5% choosing Al-Jazeera as their preferred destination. Survey respondents frequently cited the timeliness and credibility of internet sites as reasons to go online for news.

Daoud Kuttab of Ammannet argues that news websites “provide a public space for dialogue not found in the political sphere or traditional media outlets,” and the interactive nature of the sites “has given a voice to previously 'silent citizens.'”

Moreover, the technological revolution may be even more pronounced in the Arab world because of certain demographic factors, according to Xpress. Over 50% of the population in Yemen, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco and Egypt is under 25 years old, and can be characterized as being part of the “net generation.”

The latest edition of the Arab Media Outlook Report explains, “[the] unique demographic profile of the region presents exciting opportunities for online media owners, content developers, operators and all parties along the media value chain.”

Writing for The Daily Star, Esraa al-Shafei also comments on the power of the internet and its effect on the region’s youth, terming it “one of the most liberating forces in the Middle East.” Shafei notes that “many young people across the Middle East are using the internet to build powerful indigenously self-created digital communities.”

However, some worry about the impact of new media content on Arabic language and literature. Boie Conrad Dublin at the Arab Times interviewed Adel Iskandar about the rise of citizen journalism in which Iskandar argues that the fact that anyone can produce content has led to a “violation and vulgarization of the textual form,” due to the incessant use of “profane language.”

Meanwhile, at the Emirates Airline International Festival of Literature (EAIFL), prominent Arab writers debated the “internet’s role in ‘polluting’ the Arabic language and making it more superficial,” reports Abbas Al-Lawati at Gulf News.

Assyrian Iraqi writer Samuel Shimon argues that although the internet has impacted Arabic language, it has also given Arabic literature a geographical reach that was previously impossible. “Now an Arabic writer in Abu Dhabi can have an audience from Casablanca to Australia…We can actually call it Arabic literature now because it can finally reach all parts of the Arab world.”

At New Europe, Alexandros Koronakis concludes that the dramatic shift in the media landscape has left traditional media “in a panic,” in which “traffic in now becoming more important than mission statements,” due to falling advertising revenue. Koronakis warns that established brands like CNN risk losing their reputation with headlines such as “How to get Michelle Obama’s toned arms.”

For Koronakis, the “haphazard” response of old media to the exponential rise of new online media forms is evidence of the impact of new media.

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