The Straits Times Blogs - Jeremy Au

The world of Apec security

2008-11-24T11:02:00Z

Jeremy Au Yong explains the real meaning of 'tight security'.

In Lima

THE RUSSIANS cut queue, heated words were exchanged, and suddenly dozens of cameras were turned on and raised into the air.

On Sunday at the International Media Centre in Lima, perhaps the best documented shoving match in the world broke out. It happened among a handful of photographers and cameramen jostling for the limited spots allocated to cover an Apec event. It happened with a few hundred of their peers from around the world standing inches away.

The fisticuffs, which took place on the last day of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation Summit, capped a week when the security lock-down on Lima provided many moments of frayed nerves, amusement and confusion.

One source of all three was the “pool’’ arrangements. With thousands of media and only limited slots available, only a selected number of journalists were allowed in to the events. How to get into the group wasn’t entirely clear. The prescribed way was to send in a form ahead of time and hope.

But those who went to the trouble would occasionally find that those who simply showed up at the last minute also got in, with the added advantage of not having to wear a bib that made them look like a purple potato sack.

Sometimes, skin colour helped too.

If you were Chinese and pretended you knew what you were doing, you had a good chance of getting into the venue for Chinese President Hu Jintao’s address. No such wiggle room for the keynote address by US President George Bush though.

Journalists had to walk through two metal detectors and had their equipment checked out by a sniffer dog first before they were allowed anywhere near. It meant having to gather at 6.45am for a 9.30am speech.

The metal detectors that journalists had to go through every morning were another source of amusement. These were so sensitive that they were set off at the slightest provocation – whether it was a smart chip in a passport, the silver foil in a packet of Fisherman’s Friend mints or sturdy bra straps.

What to wear in Singapore

2008-11-24T06:42:00Z

Jeremy Au Yong suggests potential national costumes for Apec leaders.

ECONOMIC crisis aside, one of the main talking points on the last day of the Apec Summit was simply: What would they be wearing?

Ever since then-US President Bill Clinton started the practice of having matching outfits in Seattle in 1993, the group photo on the last day of the summit has become something of a fashion show.

They wore elaborate batik shirts in Indonesia, elegant silk tunics known as 'ao dai' in Vietnam, traditional silk overcoats in Korea and last year, in Sydney, they put on rugged raincoats.

On Sunday in Lima, the choice proved to be a little anti-climatic. The leaders came out dressed in dull brown ponchos, known as challs. Perhaps Singapore can do better. Now that the Apec Summit is heading here, we also have to start worrying about what they are going to wear.

The costumes are meant to identify the country, but what would that be in a nation without a proper national dress? The safe, somewhat boring option would be to put them in shirts with orchids on them. But surely we can think of something else.

What if we put US president Barack Obama look good in a sarong? Or perhaps get Phillipine’s Gloria Arroyo to put on the Singapore Girl uniform? Or maybe South Korea’s Lee Myung-bak could put on a male version of the Merlion costume our recent Miss Universe contestant wore?

Another thing to think about is that the costume should be easy to put on over what they are already wearing. Otherwise, everyone has to go and change into it. One suggestion thrown up was to simply to have a tasteful corsage of orchids pinned on each one, almost like a 3-D orchid shirt.

I support this idea. It would be quite stylish, easy to put on and still identify Singapore. More importantly, with tough times ahead, it’ll be quite cheap.

Bloggers 13

2008-09-03T14:42:00Z

Jeremy Au assesses a press conference held by a group of Singapore bloggers.

THEY call themselves The Bloggers 13 but their statement carried the signatures of only 10 of them.

As explained by the bloggers today, one member of the group, media academic Cherian George, excused himself as his wife was involved in the consultation paper to which they were responding.

Another blogger, Mohan Gopalan, didn’t get to sign off on the joint statement in time because it was done too quickly.

In fact, such was the swiftness of the whole process, the three representatives of the group Mr Ng- E-Jay, Mr Alex Au and Mr Choo Zheng Xi, could not remember offhand who the third missing signatory was.

But perhaps what's more interesting is the process by which the 10 had produced the joint statement, doping it in less than 24 hours.

Every one of them had a say in the statement.

Each gave their comments on a draft they all had access to, putting in paragraphs of their views or editing each other's contributions, right up till a couple of hours before their press conference.

Throughout the process, they never met face-to-face or so much as made a conference call.

In responding to the consultation paper from the Advisory Council on the Impact of New Media on Society (Aims), the bloggers group adopted – aptly – a new media approach.

Using technology that allows multiple people to edit the same document online, all 10 collaborated on one single document.

A draft was posted online at 4pm yesterday and the bloggers gave their input until noon today, when Mr Au, who runs www.yawningbread.org, put a stop to it.

He said: “At about noon, I had to call someone to ask him to stop making amendments because we need to start printing.”

The press conference, in one of the rooms of the NUS Law faculty, was set for 2.30pm.

Added Mr Au: “This is really an example of the kind of technology we are actually talking about. The manner in which we collaborate. That’s how fast we work and that’s what the technology means.”

In fact, the whirlwind process meant that one blogger, Mr Mohan Gopalan, did not manage to sign off on the document in time.

But why the hurry?

Aims has set aside six to eight weeks for consultation and the first week is not even over.

Law undergraduate Choo, explained later: “We didn’t want to miss the newspoint”.

Essentially, they wanted to strike while interest in the consultation paper was still high.

It’s plain that these are new media advocates who understand the rule of timeliness - a classic “must” in traditional media and all the more important in the 24/7 online world.

Read Jeremy Au's full account in The Straits Times tomorrow.