WE also had our share of using technology such as short message service (SMS) o
r text messaging to organize a mass protest against then President Joseph Estra
da. But imagine if blogging was widely available at the time. We would have see
n Filipinos liveblogging about it.
In China where political bloggers are censored, the recent mass protest in Xiam
en against the p
lanned construction of a toxic chemical pl
ant dangerously close to the city core on June 1 was seen as a landmark move f
or Chinaâs leading independent bloggerâs collective Bullog, Global Voices wrote
.
Excerpt:
With a media blackout on news of the demonstration, the time, locat ion and target turnout of one million people were spread almost exclusively by SMS, bbs posting s and on blogs. The government was able to stop the SMS from spreading for seve ral days and nearly all bbs webmasters and blog service providers were swift to delete any related discussion, leaving Bullog members free to go on to pos t several in-depth posts this past week looking at various angles of the situat ion, including one of of the key public figures lobbying against the PX plant, Southern Metropolis Daily columnist and Xiamen resident Lian Yue. Several other Bullogers took it a step further by attending the demonstration i n person, leaving one at home to post their SMS live updates straight onto Bull og, giving it a national exclusive as to what was happening minute-by-minute do wn on the ground which, by the afternoon of the 1st, had attracted enough reade rs that Bullogâs host server was left unable to keep up. With Bullog inaccessib le, the live SMScast was temporarily moved here, from where many of t he below discussions mixed in with the live reporting were taken.
