White City

image coursey of NSW government, Australia

by Jelena Maksimović

Though the first blogs appeared a little over a decade ago, only to be considered seriously as an alternative to the mass media, with the emergent citizen journalism movement, it seems that the whole blogging fever may as well be on its way out. It is obvious that blogs can react quicker, provide better coverage from the world’s remotest locations or places plagued by catastrophes, as did citizen journalists during Hurricane Katrina, who did a better job than their professional counterparts.
The terrorist attack in Mumbai or the plane going down into Hudson river in New York City demonstrate that blogs are not as responsive as we once thought they were. People have turned to microblogging - using mobile phones on services such as Twitter, providing news snippets containing only 140 characters. The witnesses, despite fear and confusion, posted their whereabouts and what is going on around them on Twitter. Their subscribers (followers) took notice of it and spread the word. Social networks started buzzing, as more and more people wrote in their status “go to Twitter, follow Mumbai attacks”. Political institutions are following suit, Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs used Twitter for press conferences during its attacks on Gaza.
Furthermore, the whole “You” as the person of the year, proclaimed by TIME magazine in 2006, initiating the rhetoric that each of us, creating content online is making history, proved to be a tad premature. Surely, there have been incidents, where that was the case – take Thai student Alisara Chirapongse, who blogs about fashion under the moniker Gnarly Kitty (gnarlykitty.org), who suddenly and perhaps unwillingly turned into a political reporter, as she started posting photos of a military coup against Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, which drove huge traffic to her personal blog and served as a reliable source on what was happening in Thailand at that time.
Yet in reality, not every budding political blogger can reach such wide audience or monetize on his/her efforts. The most influential political blogs are group blogs, perceived as viable alternatives to the broadcast or print media, best exemplified by the success of US liberal blogs such as The Huffington Post, Daily KOS or conservative Instapundit. They resemble 24/7 news networks in a way that that they provide constant coverage, consisting of unedited opinion or political analysis. Same rule applies for non-political blogs. The blog with the highest number of fans, according to Technorati is Boing Boing - group blog from Sillicon Valley, a pop culture magazine covering politics, gadgets, science fiction and films hosted by sci-fi writer and open source activist Cory Doctorow. Serbian writer Jasmina Tešanović occasionally blogs on Boing Boing.
This all goes to show – blogs can be influential, though only a small portion; blogs can make money for their authors, but not intentionally, as those are perceived in the blogosphere as not genuine are soon abandoned.
In Serbia, blog entered a public discourse, when one of the strongest media brands, certainly the one wanting to be described as forward thinking, B92 initiated a blog on its popular web portal four years ago. At that time, Serbs were already blogging using platforms such as Blogger or blog.hr, as the blogging swept quickly over Croatia, while the common language and cultural references attracted many Serbian bloggers to host their individual presentations there (the same company later established mojblog.rs). BlogB92 wanted to create an alternative public sphere by inviting people, underrepresented in the mainstream media, who reflected the general open-mindedness of B92. Notable bloggers included film director Goran Marković, writer Marko Vidojković, as well as gay activists – Queeria, whose blog remains one of the most popular on BlogB92 until this day.
Blog92 gained popularity and certain notoriety quickly in Serbian media, as clashes between readers and authors, as well authors with different political agendas occurred. In 2006, blogs entered the world of tabloids, as several posts by the renown playwright Biljana Srbljanović on one side and Nebojša Krstić, media advisor of Serbian President Boris Tadić, dealing with the trial to the assassins of former Prime Minister Zoran Đinđić hit the headlines. The decision of the web management team to allow non-VIP bloggers to post on the same platform, while several prominent bloggers stopped posting, diluted blog’s influence. One of the civic initiatives of this blog is a website Majka Hrabrost (Mother Courage, www.majkahrabrost.com), dedicated to the improvement of conditions in maternity wards in Serbia. Due to her posts on BlogB92, the author of the project Branka Stamenković (posting under a pseudonym Krugolina Borup), was received by a Minister of Health, where she was able to present the testimonies of thousands of mothers, who suffered unpleasant experiences.

Larisa Ranković, media consultant from Belgrade, says that we can not speak about the influence of blogs in Serbia. “Talking about stronger presence in the public sphere, I do not believe that an individual blogger can make a difference. Firstly, due to low intake of Internet within society and secondly, printed word does not have an overwhelming significance in Serbian public, as the percentage of newspaper readers is far lower than compared to the same figures globally, as well as in the neighboring countries”. Larisa wrote her first post in 2004, while a year later with a group of friends started a group lifestyle blog called Yahti (yahti.com), which documents their travels, observations on cultural scene, books or TV, has a collection of recipes, photos and videos. This project was presented on European media competition in Berlin – Prix Europa. Meanwhile, Larisa started MediaMix (mediaserbia.blogspot.com), a blog about her professional interests, which got her consultancy engagements abroad, she admits.

Getting a job as a result of the reputation created by the blog buzz is not a rare occurrence, even in Serbia. The case of Nebojša Radović, better known as Eniac, supports that claim. Nebojša started his personal blog (www.eniax.net) in 2005, but soon the topics switched to more professional, such as e-commerce or social networking. His interest in the latter did not pass unnoticed, as he was offered the position of web manager on the first Serbian-language social network Furka (www.furka.com). “All of that would not have happened, if my name was not appearing frequently in discussions on Serbian web, while my posts were quoted or published in classic media” Nebojša claims. His view, confirmed by many, is that Serbian bloggers can not make a living this way, as the advertising revenues are negligible, but certain benefits still exist. In his case: consulting, participating on conferences or job opportunities.
Nebojša dismisses the hype, saying that there is only a handful of blogs with tangible influence, thus turning my attention to the group of blogs, created by the citizens of Bor, one the poorest places in Serbia, known for its copper mine. The most active blogger within this community is Vladimir Stanković, primary school principle in a village Krivelj, next to Bor, whose blog Dedabor (www.dedabor.com) was responsible for the action, which lead to the cancellation of the concert of a pop star Zdravko Čolić (originally it was to be a free concert, for which town authorities were to pay Čolić a staggering figure of 100.000 Euro).
That Serbian blogger community is vibrant is shown on the event BlogOpen, organized for the last three years in different cities in Serbia. The last one, held in Bor, gathered regional bloggers, activists and consultants, allowed them the opportunity to finally meet face to face, have a drink and network. If Serbian business community is not participating, at least parts of it are monitoring what is going on within a blogosphere, Miloje Sekulić, Director of E-PR sector, at McCann Ericsson Public Relations tells me. “My department maintains relations with bloggers. There are two millions Internet users in Serbia, out of which, 1.250.000 people use Internet on daily basis, 100.000 has blogs. With Internet, blogs as well, the number of people reading is not the key, it is more important who is reading. Companies in Serbia, especially those with foreign ownership are aware of the blogosphere, some are closely monitoring. I know a case of marketing director of a company interrupting his Saturday dinner, over something that was published on a blog. Yet, blog posts on companies are of lesser significance, then announcements in the printed media”.
But Sekulić is not too pessimistic, as he followed bizniblog.com, created by the young Marko Bijelić, from Laktaši, close to Banja Luka, who started writing the posts about interface design, online branding and usability, at the age of 17, until its recent sale to a company based in Zagreb. “He shows us what it is all about. If you are selling a blog, you are not just selling the content, but the your ranking on the browsers, your audience, RSS subscribers.” The fact is blogs are read on the area of former Yugoslavia, emphasizes the importance of regional aggregators (Blogrola based in Slovenia does that), which are picking up blog posts, as soon as they appear.
If we look at the blogosphere, Serbia is a place of modest means and rare, but emerging opportunities. Sekulić tells me of his experience on the previous BlogOpen event held in Bor, embodying these paradoxes – “After a night of partying, a bunch of bloggers were searching for a place to have a coffee on a Sunday morning in Bor. As expected, everything was closed, except a bar on the railway station. We were sitting in this outdated setting, remnant of Socialist times, with Robert Basić, a Croat, who is one of the most influential bloggers in Germany (www.basicthinking.de). He was deliberating on the concept of creating useful and profitable applications for the Iphone, while we drank coffee, overlooking the copper mine, which awaits its buyer and all the old machinery there.”

Start exploring

www.blogodak.com
www.planetasrbija.com
www.blogrola.com

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