I have now been running this blogsite for eleven years, with a blog or more going up every day of those eleven years. Has it been worth it?
One obstacle I had to get over was that I wasn’t being paid. When I was a columnist with that Venerable Organ The Irish News, and then a columnist with the death-wish Daily Ireland, I was paid. As I was when I did radio work, whether with the CBC in Canada, BBC in Newcastle-upon Tyne, BBC Radio Four or BBC Radio Five Live, or RTÉ. All paid me. So did the B(ritish)BC Raidio Uladh/Radio Ulster, until they decided Kenny Donaldson was their new Controller. For my daily blog, I haven’t got a red cent. In fact it costs me, as you have to pay an annual fee to keep a domain in place. So what, you might ask – and yes, Virginia, I have sometimes asked myself – what is the bloody point? Other than leaving yourself open to legal threats?
If you read the article from the Dublin satirical magazine The Phoenix, which I put up on my Facebook page recently, you’ll know the answer. Politicians like Jeffrey Donaldson are very critical of what he refers to as ‘keyboard warriors’ – aka social media commentators – because they often don’t present the same carefully controlled line that the establishment main-stream media do. As the Phoenix points out, the outcry at Sinn Féin’s success in the last election was seen as linked to the party’s obvious online support. This was a mistake.
“There is an emerging appreciation that online campaigning must be tackled seriously in future, not least as SF won the popular vote despite the print and broadcasting frenzy that party was subject to during the general election.”
But don’t hold your breath. The establishment will do all that it can to discredit social media commentators who don’t sing the right song. The mainstream media, north and south, are solidly anti-republican. Social media offers another perspective, and the Establishment will either need to tie it up and gag it, or invest in a twice-a-day change of underpants.
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