Credibility Perceived and Building Credibility

The number of blogs are uncountable nowadays. Even on a similar topic, bloggers tends to provide sorts of information which differ from one another. According to a journal written by Azlin and Mustaffa (n.d.), it is a challenge for people in selecting credibility piece of information. They further explain the difference between an adult and a youth in perceiving the credibility.

Azlin and Mustaffa(n.d.), stated that adult tends to select information where they think it is accurate, reliable, understandable and well written on the topic. Whereas, amongst the youths, they ‘consider whether information is related to the topic and whether it is new, interesting, and convenient, while showing less interest in authority, the readability of the language and recency (cited in Rieh and Hilligoss 2008). These have shown that, the thinking of an adult reader and a youth reader of blogs are rather different.

According to Bueno (2012), there are few ways in building the blog’s credibility. One of the ways is create a thorough “About Us” page. Bloggers must provide their own information at least up to a circumstance of name, email, or facebook account. Reason is because reader would like to know who is the writer and the background of the writer.

Creating a testimonial page is an instant credibility booster especially in a business blog, it is easier to influence the reader to have a ‘yes’ or an ‘agree’ decision as there are real reference provided.

Lastly, blogger can respond to inquiries in timely manner. This is because many bloggers nowadays does not give respond to their readers, so if you are one of the minor one who give respond, you are actually gaining a better credibility.

Reference

Azlin B N & Mustaffa N n.d., ‘Blogosphere: How youth perceived blogs credibility’, Malaysian Journal of Communication, Vol. 28(1) pp.33-54, viewed on 16 September 2012, <http://www.ukm.my/jkom/journal/pdf_files/2012/V28_1_33-54.pdf>.

Bueno R 2012, ‘5 Ways To Build Your Blog’s Credibility & Generate More Leads’, diversesolutions.com, viewed 16 September 2012, <http://www.diversesolutions.com/blogging/build-your-blogs-credibility-2275>.

New Forms of Media Publishing

In this new era where technology dominates the human brain, interaction and communication between the societies has changed drastically. Following the emergence of new media sources such as YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, BlogSpot, and online news sources, the roles of journalism and communication have decreased. In the article “Blogging and the Media Ecosystem” by Naughton (2006), he stated that new media sources contain richer contents as compared to the old media sources. The media sources today are multimodal, which includes texts and visual graphics, video attachments and links to further elaborate on the online articles.

New media sources such as those shown in the print screens below show interesting visual backgrounds. These sources not only have interesting layouts, they also allow for media interaction in the cheapest and fastest way. The media today caters to almost every household with a computer as wireless connections are available free at various locations throughout Malaysia.

Furthermore, readers today need not purchase papers every morning to understand the daily happenings around the world, country or society. Reading online saves not only money but also time as consumers do not need to read through pages that are not within their areas of interest. Also, many online sources provide video clips to provide readers with a clearer image of the actual scenario or a reporter to elaborate or summarise on the issue concerned. Video catches the attention of the readers, available on established websites such as youtube.com, where readers can now also watch channels such as CNN and BBC.

If there is 1 thing that all media sources have in common, it is that they are all available on the internet. The internet provides a richer context on articles, providing more resources within the law and regulatory framework. Today, everyone is given freedom to publish articles, video, news or even blogs online; however, the internet provides a function to restrict contents that do not comply with the regulatory or legal framework.

However, there are drawbacks of using the internet to publish media sources. Some videos, e.g. Namewee singing the national anthem with edited lyrics, which attracted attention of citizens throughout the whole Malaysia. The YouTube video triggered many racial issues within the Malaysian society. Hence, users have to be very careful whilst using the internet to publish media resources. Abuse of the internet can results in unwanted situations.

Reference

Naughton, J 2006, Blogging and the emerging media ecosystem, viewed on 18 September 2012, 

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