Guest Lecturer (Pt 1) Or so my lecturer says…

Edited and updated:

Today’s main event of the day was that we had a guest lecturer (for the whole of the Mass Comm. programme I see) was a guest lecturer from OmniMedia, who was none other (cynical drumroll please) than Suhaimi Sulaiman, a TV personality who now provides media content and content creation to others. (Please forgive the cynicness… I’m just not myself today).

The guy is a media strategist (42 yrs old?) and was a broadcast journalist, anchor, editor, content and editorial manager, AND a buyer/seller for Grand Brilliance. His background is, surprisingly, in corporate banking (I knew those types couldn’t be trusted!- mom included). His clients include 1901 (hotdogs), SWIFT (NGO), and Sime Darby. There are more but too lazy to list them. :p

Here’s the lecture, as promised:

There are a lot of opportunities for content creation for the new and traditional media today. Malaysia is still continuing to support the mainstream media but there’s an explosiuon of new channels providing content. The the media thus, is fragmenting because there is a big demand for information keyed and targeted towards a particular group with differing viewpoints, etc. This means that the media, particularly the new media such as the Internet, is getting more and more specialised.

According to him (Suhaimi) blogging is the trend of the future. Apparently Bill Gates calls it the new business tool. While I agree, I would like to point out Suhaimi, that GOOGLE is way ahead of you. It bought Pyra Labs late last year, I think, and Pyra Labs run Blogger.com (which is what I’m using :p).

Another trend is web streaming. Web TVs are becoming more popular (as an alternative to terrestial TV and Astro) as well as Streaming Radio. What is a bigger trend, IMHO, are the evolution of data compression on the web.When the data compression trend finally slows down and stabilizes, we’ll get much better audio and video streaming. The thing to do now is to get ready for that.

All of these translates to huge opportunities for content creations specialists (who could be writers, readers, anchors, etc.) There are plenty of risks, but the profits to be gained fit the risks.

Preparation

One should know how to read between the lines so that one could spot things that are amiss.

You should know the trends/able to see it.

NETWORK with the pros.

Start from being a slave (entry-level, I think) and then slowly graduate to becoming a master:
– Look at the whole process and remember that change comes faster than you think.

Main Problems

People don’t understand, or don’t want to.
Traditionalists will hate you (which answers the question of why PAS never came up with the idea of having their own TV station)

And sometimes: It’s like a YOU-ME-AGAINST-THE-WORLD kind of thing.

Qualifications

The new media is growing side by side with the traditional media.

One has to be prepared to migrate (write, read and talk)

Be prepared to be pulled out of your comfort zone.

Take CALUCALTED RISKS.

Makings of a Good/Popular/Sensational Journalist

Inform, educate, entertain.

Relevant- looking for new topics and opportunities.

Versatile and multitasking.

So, do I still want to be a Journalist? Hell yeah! 🙂

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