Blogger debate in Malaysia - or: I haven't learnt anything

Our position should be clear. We try to value objectivity and put respect for other bloggers, groups, individuals, corporations and so on and their opinion above anything else.

There was the debate in Malaysia last week about a comment left on one blog that clearly insulted Islam (http://asiabusinessconsulting.blogspot.com/2004/10/blogger-debate-in-malaysia-ongoing.html).

This debate was very actively followed and commented on by bloggers as well as by the New Straits Times (Malaysia), the country's leading newspaper.

Over the past two or three days, the debate died down, and there was some sort of agreement, communication or discussion between all parties involved - so far so good.

One of our posting called "Have money - Will spend" (http://asiabusinessconsulting.blogspot.com/2004/10/have-money-will-spend.htmlreceived this comment:

"There are tonnes of allegations poiting at one Jeff Ooi as a politician in disguised as a 'free' blogger ..."

The comment was written by someone who called himself "The Allegations". He or she (let's call him a "he", for the sake of simplicity) also runs a blog. I originally didn't want to link to the blog to avoid giving publicity, but if you would follow the links above, you would be let there anyway - so here it is http://bolehtalk.blogspot.com. Reading through his blog only reveals some arbitrary lines of business in his entries - difficult to follow and hard to understand.

Mr. Allegations claims to have guest bloggers who follow their own opinions. One of them is called Mr. X. Others are "Dave", KTemoc, and WakWat. Two of the profiles work, the others are not existing. Mr. X has a write-up, in which he accuses Jeff Ooi to be some kind of hidden agent for whatever and gives him a deadline of 3 days to come out with a statement. The blog entry is in badly written English with mistakes in it.

Question - if "The Allegation" doesn't support the comment of Mr. X, why does he comment on our blog?

And reading through his blog, there is hardly anything that is substantive - only follows some arbitrary lines of thinking in his entry.

I believe he wants to stir up emotion, and we reject the intention. It is just stupid (sorry for the harsh word), shows no respect and develops some erratic lines of thinking throughout the whole blog. This individual hasn't learnt anything. I wouldn't publish this, just like I don't publish press releases, or company promotional material without the chance to comment on it.

I gave this blogger too much space already by having this write-up. Sorry "Mr. Allegation", wrong address.