CNET Asia blogger Bernice Low (2008) discussed about the function of new media in political campaigns and its impact on Malaysia’s 12th general elections in March 2008. The Internet and Short Messaging Service (SMS) were highlighted to be political tools used for pre-election campaigning and that the opposition parties have invested a lot of finance, time and effort on the Web, specifically through YouTube, blogs, Facebook and websites as compared to the incumbent coalition. Low also argued that inaccessibility of the Web in rural areas did not stop people living there from receiving information.
The Web 2.0 generation -basically the youths and urbanites- is always engaged with the World Wide Web. As for the people aged 50 and above, Low said that the more politically aware young people play a big role in informing the elders about alternative information. A research carried out by Kaid and Postelnicu (2005) on the 2004 U.S elections showed that young voters evaluate political candidates more extensively when they view them online rather than on television and their involvement in political affairs do influence their parents or elders to do the same (Poole et al. 2001). The advantage of interactivity through new media encourages users to be active and provide instant feedback (Jamieson et al. 2006) and this benefited the opposition very much because they receive a lot of direct input from Malaysians themselves, naturally decreasing the gap between the people and the opposition.
The Web 2.0 generation -basically the youths and urbanites- is always engaged with the World Wide Web. As for the people aged 50 and above, Low said that the more politically aware young people play a big role in informing the elders about alternative information. A research carried out by Kaid and Postelnicu (2005) on the 2004 U.S elections showed that young voters evaluate political candidates more extensively when they view them online rather than on television and their involvement in political affairs do influence their parents or elders to do the same (Poole et al. 2001). The advantage of interactivity through new media encourages users to be active and provide instant feedback (Jamieson et al. 2006) and this benefited the opposition very much because they receive a lot of direct input from Malaysians themselves, naturally decreasing the gap between the people and the opposition.
References
1. Jamieson, KH & Campbell, KK 2006, The Interplay of Influence, 6th edn, Thomson Wadsworth, Belmont, Canada.
2. Kaid, LL & Postelnicu, M 2004, ‘Political Advertising in the 2004 Election: Comparison of Traditional Television and Internet Messages’, Political Advertising in the General Campaign, vol. 49, no. 2, viewed 9 November 2008, http://abs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/49/2/265.
3. Low, B 2008, Malaysia's digital revolution--the death knell for The Star, and the rise of the e-news portal?, CNET Asia, viewed 12 November 2008, http://asia.cnet.com/blogs/teteatech/post.htm?id=63002611.
4. Poole, MS & Walther, JB 2001, To Maintain and Enhance a Vigorous, Self-Renewing Democracy, Communication: Ubiquitous, Complex, Consequential, National Communication Association, viewed 23 October 2008, http://www.natcom.org/research/monograph.pdf.
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