Self-Regulating the Media Industry and its Impact on Players and Audience

Describe about the Media Law and Ethic for Impact on the Industry.

The process of self regulating the media industry basically is meant to be the way of controlling and guiding of mass media by the Government and regulatory bodies in UK. Based on the various laws, rules and regulations, the process of media self regulation could have different types of goals or objectives that were needed to be achieved. It could be used in various cases like while encouraging competition within the business environment and also act as an effective and useful media marketing activity for establishing the common standards of technology. It could be a signal for providing commitment for the interest of public. There are numerous media sectors like free-to-air broadcast television, the Internet, advertising, news, all of which combine to form the media industry as a whole (Haufler, 2013). The main focus of self regulating process had been the radio or television, press, satellite, distribution technology, use of mobile phones as well as implementation of information technology for the use of internet in an effective manner. The Media Development Authority of Singapore Act was mainly developed in order to identify the various kinds of functions of the Media Development Authority and also provide services related to license for allowing media services in an effective manner at Singapore. A number of guidelines and regulatory standards were also established so as to provide media services through television, internet and social media as well (Kunkel et al, 2010). The self regulation process also helped to make various recommendations to the Government based on various matters connected to the media services along with provision of media services in order to facilitate the interests and preferences of individuals. This had been mainly done for creating a positive impact on the media industry, thereby allowing for maintenance of better standards and quality management of the media services all over Singapore (Héritier & Eckert, 2008). According to the Act of Broadcasting, the public service broadcast programming had been encouraged and make sure that the various forms of media like internet, advertisements and free-to-air broadcast on televisions, newspapers, etc. were utilized properly.  Not only had the audiences been benefited with their needs and requirements fulfilled, but also the industry players had been affected in a positive way as well. The Media Development Authority or MDA also adopted a self regulatory mechanism which had further enabled the media industry to self regulate and maintain fair market share within the competitive business environment too. Due to this, the customers or general public were provided with a wide range of quality services and their interests and preferences had also been safeguarded (Kunkel et al, 2010). Therefore, this is how the process of self-regulating the media industry had managed to create a positive impact on both the players of the media industry as well as the audience.

Within the free democratic world, the media services had always been termed as a major form of self regulatory process for the Government of Singapore. The media services provided had helped in monitoring the progress and status of the Government and regulatory bodies and also ensure sharing and exchange of information, data and ideas so as to promote freedom of expression in an effective manner too. Though the media industry was able to bring a lot of positivity for the general public of Singapore, still there were few issues which made it against the self regulation of the media industry (Puppis, 2007). The Sedition Act was enabled to cover all the various speeches or written conducts regarding the media services provided that were related to various forms of trouble making abilities. Thus mainly made people show their dissatisfaction against the Government of Singapore, which made it hated by many people of Singapore as well. There were many individuals who used to print or publish seditious or trouble making issues through the advertising and promotional events, internet and free-to-air broadcast television, as a result they were termed as guilty and sources of treason or disloyalty according to the section 4 of Seditious Act (Omarova, 2011). This prevented many newspapers to allegedly public matters that were termed as seditious activities. One such example of this kind of activity was the publishing of materials related to anti Muslim and anti Malay activities, that lead to various sort of discrimination and violence too.  A blogger was also charged for the comments related to racism on web sites, which also was referred to illegal activities that grabbed the attention of many people and also made them show their anger and hatred towards the Government of Singapore (Sharma et al, 2010). All these matters that were published and were broadcasted free to air on televisions basically generated a sense or feeling among people to create violence and disobey the law or lawful orders as well. This further more resulted in various sort of discrimination and prejudice to the public and national interest of people of Singapore. The Film Act was established to promote the political party films, which resulted in harming the beliefs of other political parties, thus resulted in creating conflicts among people too (Storey et al, 2005).

Examining Arguments for and Against Self-Regulation of the Media Industry

Analyses whether a self-regulatory model works for the industry (PURPLE)

With the enabling of freedom of media in Singapore, one of the most effective model of self regulatory mechanism for the media industry could be the Mill’s Liberal Media model or theory. The arguments both for and against had been done on the media industry in the previous sections and according to those, it had been found that the self regulatory theory or model had various features and characteristics along with a number of assumptions that had been made. The assumptions showed that all human beings are rational, so in case of any faults by them, they were needed to be corrected. Their opinions and responses would be termed as valuable and in case those are problematic, then a certain amount or portion of valuable truth of people would be stolen (Wilde, 2009). The opinions of people when silenced might be the actual truth, though sometimes it could falsify the information as well. The various information and data related to truth must be discussed properly, and then promoted through television and newspaper; otherwise it might create a negative impact as well as create some kind of prejudice and conflicts among people as well. The model of Mill’s Liberal Media also consisted of freedom of media and expression, which ensured protecting the freedom too (Brown, 2005). The journalists had played a vital role to present the voice of general public while the censorship had been done so as to prevent truth to expose. The media could act as a self regulatory body that would keep regular check on the Government and further take help of Internet and televisions so as to discuss about certain matters and ensure freedom of expression to people as well (Haufler, 2013).

Few examples were considered during the analysis of this self regulation process by the media industry comprising of the free to air broadcasting on televisions, advertising activities and also utilization of internet. One such example was the case when two bloggers posted offensive comments on the internet web sites related to the anti Muslim and anti Malay materials. This resulted in accusing many people and also discriminate them based on their race, origin or ethnicity (Héritier & Eckert, 2008). Due to this, there could be various situations when the people might get affected and create racial conflicts and violence as well. There were also other media services where sexual materials were broadcasted on television, which gave rise of child pornography and other illegal activities. Another example was the applying of sedition charges against Leslie Chew, who was a political cartoonist and used promote politically nuanced comics on the Face book pages. This resulted in offensive activities and also promoted feelings of hostility and bad image about the political parties among the minds of public (Dal Zotto & Van Kranenburg, 2008). The person who was allegedly confirmed as guilty for these kinds of activities stated that his works were fictional and had no relevance with the actual political matters or public events, was later dropped from the sedition charges. Other examples included for the analysis of this research topic could be the blogger who posted racist comments on his personal blog (Kunkel et al, 2010). Due to this, he was charged according to the Sedition Act of Singapore. Later, it was clearly confirmed that there was no need to educate the children about the multi racialism in Singapore. The Government also decided to review the legislations and codes of practices related to the media services and how these activities of people had created a negative impact. Afterwards, he was fined with $5,000 and stayed in jail up to three years imprisonment (Puppis, 2007).

References

Brown, G. (2005). The rough and rosy road: Sites of contestation in Malaysia’s shackled media industry. Pacific Affairs, 78(1), 39-56.

Dal Zotto, C., & Van Kranenburg, H. (Eds.). (2008). Management and innovation in the media industry. Edward Elgar Publishing.

Haufler, V. (2013). A public role for the private sector: Industry self-regulation in a global economy. Carnegie Endowment.

Héritier, A., & Eckert, S. (2008). New modes of governance in the shadow of hierarchy: self-regulation by industry in Europe. Journal of Public Policy,28(01), 113-138.

Kunkel, D., McKinley, C., & Wright, P. (2010). The impact of industry self-regulation on the nutritional quality of foods advertised on television to children. Children Now.

Kunkel, D., McKinley, C., & Wright, P. (2010). The impact of industry self-regulation on the nutritional quality of foods advertised on television to children. Children Now.

Omarova, S. T. (2011). Wall Street as Community of Fate: Toward Financial Industry Self-Regulation. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 159(2), 411-492.

Puppis, M. (2007). Media governance as a horizontal extension of media regulation: The importance of self-and co-regulation. COMMUNICATIONS-SANKT AUGUSTIN THEN BERLIN-, 32(3), 330.

Puppis, M. (2010). Media governance: A new concept for the analysis of media policy and regulation. Communication, Culture & Critique, 3(2), 134-149.

Sharma, L. L., Teret, S. P., & Brownell, K. D. (2010). The food industry and self-regulation: standards to promote success and to avoid public health failures. American Journal of Public Health, 100(2), 240-246.

Storey, J., Salaman, G., & Platman, K. (2005). Living with enterprise in an enterprise economy: Freelance and contract workers in the media. Human Relations, 58(8), 1033-1054.

Wilde, P. (2009). Self-regulation and the response to concerns about food and beverage marketing to children in the United States. Nutrition reviews,67(3), 155-166.