Online Alternative Media Research Articles

The Construction of Gender Relations in Alternative Media: Cases in Online Media at Magdalene.co and Konde.co (Article in Press)

Domestic violence is rising during the pandemic, especially concerning the impact on constructing public opinion regarding the arrangement of women's social roles in the domestic scope (domestication). This research aims to describe the construction of gender relations represented by alternative online media, Magdalane.co, and Konde.co. The research method is descriptive qualitative, with data collection techniques by documentation of texts in the alternative media. The data analysis technique uses Sara Mills' theory about critical discourse. This research's result provides an overview of alternative media perspectives that focus on angles on the subject of the story. Both media deliver a narrative issue with a slightly different ‘sense’ of description. First, Magdalene.co and Konde.co dare to express their disapproval of discrimination among gender. Second, alternative media can break society's stereotypes and actively voice gender equality for men and women.

Online Alternative Media and Their Effort to Overcome News Desert in Indonesia

The development of technology and the communication industry has caused drastic changes in the media industry, especially print media. A great number of newspapers and magazines stopped printing because it was difficult to compete with online media. Therefore, the term “news desert” appears to refer to a community or area that is not covered by newspapers due to the declining population of local newspapers in various regions. The community or region seems to have disappeared from the public eye. Important issues, problems, and aspirations of residents in the region are no longer heard and their existence seems to be no longer essential. This is certainly troubling, especially regarding the function of the media as the fourth estate in democracy. However, in various regions, online alternative media are now emerging that only focus on local issues, especially issues that are not or rarely touched by mainstream media. This study aims to find out how online alternative media try to overcome the phenomenon of news desert in Indonesia. The research was conducted by case study approach with two sources of information for data collection. The first one is manual observation on two online alternative media Bandung Bergerak and Bale Bengong and the second one is interviews with the Editor-in-Chief of the two media. Based on this research, several results were obtained, 1) alternative media report news about local communities that are rarely presented in the mainstream media and causing news desert, 2) an in-depth data-based journalism approach and citizen journalism in alternative media are capable of uniting local communities and communities, 3) news that does not rely on clickbait or the latest updates in online alternative media can be enjoyed without expiration, and 4) the proximity of online alternative media to the society is one of the leading strategies for overcoming the news desert.

Russian Aggression against Ukraine as the Accelerator in the Systemic Struggle against Disinformation in Czechia

In the last decade, the Czech Republic’s foreign and security policy were destabilised with the activities of external actors, with Russia in the leading role, and also internal actors who followed the Russian and pro-Kremlin propaganda and disinformation campaigns and/or actively participated in such subversive activities. After 2015, within the set of crises and their securitisation, the disinformation network in Czechia was developed using the social media and the so-called alternative online media for the dissemination of disinformation, misinformation, fake news and chain mails including and disseminating these campaigns. As far as the leading persons in the executive belonged to the disinformers, the government did not develop working strategies against the disinformation campaigns as the new hybrid threat until 2021. At the end of 2021, the new government of Prime Minister Petr Fiala commenced in the Czech Republic with a new strategy regarding the hybrid threats, including disinformation. The one-year plan to establish the systemic platform for the struggle against such threats was challenged with the Russian aggression against Ukraine. In the article, we analyse the development of the security eco-system in Czechia against the hybrid threats, specifically the acceleration and intensification of this activity after the 24 February 2022.

Meta-analysis: google classroom on mathematics learning in Indonesia as an alternative online media during the COVID-19 pandemic

The purpose of this study was to determine the research profile consisting of articles related to Google Classroom on mathematics learning in Indonesia. This research is meta-analysis research by conducting research journal studies. The research journals were chosen purposively based on the latest and suitability of the research theme, namely the use of Google Classroom in mathematics learning in Indonesia. This study examines 17 research journals in the last 5 years (2016 - 2020) originating from the Google Scholar database. The instrument in this study was the human instrument, which was the researcher himself who acted as the research instrument. The data collected is a research profile, research objectives, research designs, research instruments, and analysis techniques in research related to Google Classroom on mathematics learning in Indonesia. Analysis of the data used is descriptive qualitative. The results of this meta-analysis show that Google Classroom has a positive impact on mathematics learning in Indonesia.

Phobia: a corpus study of political diagnostics

This article is a rhetorical corpus study of the use of -phobia in online alternative media. The term phobia is used in the psychiatric domain to refer to a range of anxiety disorders, but is now also commonly used to identify social tensions. Terms such as transphobia and Islamophobia have within a few decades become central to contemporary political debate. The article examines in what way such coinages are used in a variety of online publications, and thus seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the entanglement of political and medical vocabulary. The study is based on data from the Genealogies of Knowledge Internet corpus, which are analysed in terms of collocation and other forms of linguistic patterning. The analysis reveals that online articles situated on the left of the political spectrum contain a large number of formulaic but open-ended lists of socio-political phobias, supplemented with other other undesirable attitudes such as sexism and racism. The article further reflects on the connections between the rhetoric of listing and intersectional analysis, on cultural conceptions of pathology, and on the polarised alignment of attitudes towards scientific and political issues in today’s public debate.

Making Use of ‘Rumah Belajar Portal’ to Improve Students’ Ability to Read Descriptive Texts at Grade VII of SMPN 31 Bengkulu Tengah

Rumah Belajar Portal (RBP) is an alternative online media that was built by the Ministry of Education and culture (KEMDIKBUD) to provide content learning materials for teachers and students, RBP contains some feature but the researcher focused on Sumber Belajar and Kelas Maya feature.This researcher aimed to find out if the use of Rumah Belajar Portal could improve students’ reading comprehension abilities on descriptive text, to describe the students’ participations in the classroom activities, and to describe the students’ responses. The design was classroom action research, which was conducted in two cycles. The subject comprised the students at grade VII of SMPN 31 Bengkulu Tengah and consisted of 11 students. Qualitative and quantitative data were used. The instruments were reading comprehension test, observation checklist (field note) and interview. The result showed that RBP could improve the students’ abilities in reading descriptive text. The students who passed the minimum criterion of mastery (KKM passing grade ?70) improved from 18% in preliminary data to 45% at the end of cycle 1 and to 82% at the end of cycle 2. As for participation, the students were active and enthusiastic in asking and answering the question about the lesson in teaching and learning process. The students’ responses were positive. This shows that RBP was effective to be used in reading descriptive text.

Internet alternative media, movement experience, and radicalism: the case of post-Umbrella Movement Hong Kong

This article examines the relationship between online alternative media consumption and public support for radical social movement goals and tactics. Theoretically, online alternative media use could relate to the holding of more radical views either because such views are propagated by the alternative media or because of the breeding of extreme views through communications among like-minded people. At the same time, this relationship is expected to be particularly strong when online alternative media use is coupled with specific types of movement experiences. Analysis of a representative survey (N = 1012) in Hong Kong shows that both online alternative media use and participation in the Umbrella Movement in 2014 related positively to the attitude toward violent protests and toward Hong Kong independence, and the relationship between online alternative media use and radical views was particularly strong among the Umbrella Movement participants. The analysis also shows a distinction between the implications of consumption of alternative media belonging to different political factions.

Digital media use and participation leadership in social protests: The case of Tiananmen commemoration in Hong Kong

During the process of social mobilization for contentious collective actions, some ordinary citizens may play the role of participation leaders by making an early participation decision and calling upon others to join the collective action. This study extends the literature on the impact of digital media on political participation by examining if digital media can influence not whether individuals would participate in offline protests or not, but whether people would take up the role of participation leaders in such protests. Using the annual rally in Hong Kong commemorating the 1989 Tiananmen movement in China as a case study, usage of Facebook, microblogging services, and online alternative media are found to contribute to online political communication activities, which in turn lead to participation leadership. Further analysis shows that the impact of online political communication activities on participation leadership exists only among the young rally participants. Implications of the findings are discussed.

Social Implications of Using Online Alternative Media towards Participatory Democracy in Malaysia

Modern technology has resulted in rapid communication over unlimited space and it must be understood as a network of human and non-human actors bound together in seamless web. In this context, understanding the Internet should be in terms of the relationship between different actors to serve for participatory democracy. Now many types of horizontal dialogues are possible through email, chat rooms, discussion boards, usenets, real-time audio and video conferencing. Public feel disappointed since their opinions, needs, and consumptions were not wellcovered and reported through the mainstream media. Dissident voices become dominant group in order to voice out their views. This study explores the social implications of using online alternative media towards participatory democracy in Malaysia. The method employed for the collection of data is through phenomenological study where the data were collected using online asynchronous interview via emails. The researcher used thematic analysis. Nine themes emerged for the data analysis which falls under social implication. Participants need to fulfill eight criteria of being selected as interview participants. The findings showed that there is high level of awareness among the general public to participate through online alternative media. They have tendency to contribute for participatory democracy. This study suggests to other researchers who are interested in doing the same area of this study to conduct a hyperlink study; to explore other websites or other resources to enable to see the whole macro picture about the implications of online media towards participatory democracy.

Diverse roles of alternative media in Hong Kong civil society: from public discourse initiation to social activism

This is an interdisciplinary article, integrating Political Science and Media Studies to examine the roles of alternative media (AM) in civil society. AM plays diverse, overlapping and interacting roles in civil society, namely (1) providing alternative information and to serve as (2) an alternative public sphere, (3) a platform for social activists and civil society organizations, (4) an initiator of public discourse and (5) an agent of civil society activism. This article explores the different roles such media plays by conducting a case study of In-media, an online AM in Hong Kong, through an evaluation of its functions in civil society and in the political arena.