Trendy Fraudulent Scams

Many times the media reported a bunch of Nigerian men were raided by law enforcer for scamming people. 

Within the realm of social media, their modus operandi is simple, create a fake account using mostly Caucasian images as profile pictures. If the target is women they would use a man's photo, and if they target victim is a man they would usually use sexy women pictures.

Year after year we hear stories about people falling for scams because they wanted to get wealthy or trying to get life partners. Many times the narrative on how they were fooled for the scams are bewildering, often we asked ourselves why are the victims so gullible that they can't sense any suspicion. 

New Media Isn't Just A Medium (Mcluhanism)

The 'Prophet' of The Media, Marshall McLuhan

We are living in a global village - a term coined by 'the prophet of the media', Herbert Marshall McLuhan 30 years before the world knew what is Internet and what can it does to human civilization. And Mcluhan himself who would have been more than 100 year old if he had live today - didn't have the chance to experience it.   

Global village doesn't only mean that this flat world is where people can share some common values and information. As Mcluhan argued that of major effect of the global village is that it would cause people not minding their own business in the global village. Mcluhan was right when he predicted that a new medium (Internet) is going to become the extension of awareness.

Even so, many people are oblivious on how the media can build, shape, develop and control their perception, idea, and thinking whilst at the same time, subconsciously making media a reliant tool for them in everything that they do.

Back in the 90's, Tun Mahathir who was the Prime Minister at that time had lamented on how the Malays were being misled with ridiculous ghost stories because of the Malay media love to project such thing. And when the Internet had existed, he then worried about the harm that globalization could caused.

Schadenfreude Is Worsening in Malaysia

Are Malaysian getting used seeking fun from others misfortune?

See the image above, look at the number of views and also the video suggestions and what do you find. 

When you see people in misfortune how would you feel? If instead of feeling sorry for them, you feel delighted or it pleasures you in someways, well that is - schadenfreude.

In some cases of funny videos, the novelty of the situation is obviously the key on what makes is so funny, but the reality is most of it are just people getting badly hurt.

The word originates from a German word and the way to pronounce it correctly is - scha·den·freu·de. 

As a citizen of Malaysia,  the norm of our people is that we do not applause when others were in the state of misery. Remember when our parents gave us stern, shaming looks if we laughed when others were having trouble? Well guess what, the lesson is not learnt entirely because Schadenfreude is actually a natural feeling for everybody, even our parents felt it. 

The Golden Age of Journalism in Malaysia?

The phase of today's journalism in our country is unparallelled from what Malaysia has seen since its inception.

When the Internet came into the picture, many people think it would be the demise of printed journalism. And as we are now living in the smartphone era, buying newspaper is no longer necessary to be updated with current affairs, in fact, reading newspaper could make us oblivious on what actually is happening.

It seems that many perceived the conventional media is a tool for government and the news had to be biased. And one of the main reason this perception was forged among the rakyat is because of the lack of option within the conventional media sphere.