Gate Keeping, Paparazzi in News Media
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Paparazzi
In this assignment, I had to watch a movie called Paparazzi and interview a senior editorial of any news media to find out how journalists regulate themselves. The movie Paparazzi is about this group of paparazzi that were stalking a famous actor, called Bo Lamarie who was still fresh in the movie business. The paparazzis main goal was to take juicy pictures and stories about him to certain extend that they violated Bos privacy and almost caused fatality to him and his family. One day, Bo could not take anymore havoc the paparazzi had created in his life, so he plotted a revenge against them. In the end, two paparazzi ended up dead and one was framed for murder. In regard to this movie, I had to interview Mr. Muzli Mohammed Zin, the news editor of Malay Mail in order to get a better understanding about the system of gate keeping and where do they draw the line. With the interview, I finally obtained a more clarified answer to my inquiry on how far the reporters go just to get good news
. Malay Mail has always been different from other newspaper in terms of coverage. They are famous for their more controversial and open-minded way of reporting news. According to Mr. Muzli, this is because Malay Mail, unlike other newspapers like The Star or News Straits Time, is not a mainstream paper, but a tabloid newspaper. They focused more on the human interest and is known as the “peoples paper”. Mr. Muzli explained to us that while the mainstream papers would highlight on the new ruling announced by the minister, Malay Mail would touch more on how the people feel about it. It is quite noticeable that their news stories are more towards exposing scandals and corruptions of certain famous people because they know those are the things that many people want to read about. When asked about the freedom of the press, Mr. Muzli chuckled and said there is no such thing in Malaysia. He said that Malay Mail actually get its expose from viewers who called in through their hotline to disclose information or complain about their problems. At times the newspaper will get tipped off about interesting information.
Malay Mail had certainly gone relatively far in its attempt to get FrontPage news. Many reporters do undercover jobs, such as applying jobs as security guards or pretending to be drug addicts, just to get one step closer to the source. It is common to find journalists posing as somebody else. In other words, they are willing to take risks to expose the truth, like corruptions and crimes. However, they have no jurisdictions to turn criminals in to the police. Their job is to highlight the news and they leave it to the authorities to take action. Despite their daring efforts, Mr. Muzli said that every media have guidelines on the things that they can and cannot do. For example, they are not allowed to put out revealing pictures. If a guideline is not being adhered to, they might receive a warning from the ministry and at times, their license will be suspended for a while.