The existence of mankind with its unique social life style, entirely different from all other creatures on planet earth, is basically dependent on the exchange of information. In fact, being social beings, it is impossible for humans to sustain their life without information. As generations and advanced civilizations come and go through time, human beings have discovered various methods of information exchange, ranging from the simple verbal to sophisticated electronic communications such as social media.
Government Communication Affairs Office and Ethiopian Broadcast Corporation (EBC) have recently organized a forum under the theme “Social Media, Our Concern”. On the occasion, different stakeholders, leaders of political parties, representatives of the public and students of higher learning institutions discussed the contributions and impacts of social media to nation’s socioeconomic and political progress. Research papers on the historical background, current realities as well as future trends of social media were presented in the discussion forum.
Dr. Getachew Dinku, head of School of Journalism and Communication at Addis Ababa University (AU), indicated in his presentation that since the 1990s, the introduction of internet and social media has brought about radical change in societal interactions. According to him, it was a crucial period in history that has once and for all changed societies’ mode of communication around the world.
Gradually, with technological advancement, the social media have become a very dominant and influential factor that transformed information exchange. “Communication between governments, businesses and the public has since changed dramatically. Social media have created a favorable conditions so that governments become more transparent to and work closely with the public, whether they like it or not” noted Getachew.
Describing the influence in terms of information communication, he pointed out that previously, the information flow has been from a single dominant source to the mass public. But, social media changed that reality that now multi-source information exchange prevails.
“Back in the days, the task of gathering, organizing and distributing information was in the hands of few mainstream media outlets. Now, that reality has changed and the social media have provided the public with the opportunity to practice citizen journalism.”
As a result, the public’s participation in gathering, organizing and distributing information has significantly increased and this has increased the accessibility of information.
According to Getachew, more than 30 million Ethiopians have accessed mobile phones, out of which 4.5 million use social media. Social media have contributed a lot to connect people and enhance relationships. In addition, it has also played a key role in improving press freedom, innovation and above all, transparency and good governance.
Even though censorship has been put aside for long, due to some reasons related with editorial responsibilities that intend to address issues like relevance, appropriateness, balance, accuracy and other journalistic ethics, some media outlets still intervene in the flow of information, according to Getachew.
Getachew also noted that most social media outlets are not committed to such professional principles.
In addition, since the social media have international accessibility, it has the potential to change or craft human beings with new thoughts. “There is no doubt that these innovations have their own power to influence and shape our way of thinking,” he stressed.
Speaking of the current situation in Ethiopia, Getachew said the information flow through the social media has its own problems that need timely response from the government, the public and the companies that run the social media.
He indicated that offensive messages, fake news, hate speeches, irrational arguments, messages that are intended to instigate chaos and conflicts and identity theft or violation of privacy are some of the problems that prevail in social media. As a result, “we need to create our ways of crafting the ethics of the public to avoid the side effects of these media,” he said.
Esayas Kasa from the Information and Network Security Authourity said the problem is not only observed at individual level in the social media. But some governmental media outlets also have their own short comings in terms of timeliness, transparency, relevance, accuracy and policy interpretations in their reporting.
Moreover, even if the social media have many positive contributions in different socioeconomic and political aspects of a nation, it has become mandatory to introduce regulatory mechanisms to avoid the negative impacts. But these mechanisms should not be implemented in a way that puts aside the government’s accountability. They also have to be implemented in a way that builds or encourages the public’s sense of responsibility.
That way, such regulatory mechanisms would ensure supremacy of the law, accountability of the government and responsibility of citizens.
This could be achieved through different mechanisms. And it is indicated that self-control, marketing, technological and legal regulations are some of the major solutions considered by the government, according to him.
Based on the documents presented by Getachew and Esayas, participants of the forum have raised several issues of concern about the positive and negative impacts of the social media. For instance, the cases of information that contradict with and are dangerous to Ethiopian cultural values have been major issues of the discussion. Some also suggested that introducing technologies that promote the peoples’ original cultures and avoid imported harmful habits could also be among the solutions.
On the other hand, awareness raising has been the other issue. But most of all, some participants have stressed that since the youth are major practitioners in the media, the establishment of social media incubation centers for the youth is necessary. It is possible to organize and engage them in the social media so that they can financially benefit from it. If the youth are provided with such access, they can also contribute to building the image of their country through the media.
On the other hand, Juhar Sultan, a law student at AAU argued that there is no clear regulatory statement in the law to govern the social media and this needs due attention from the responsible body.
Natnael Tsegaye, a social media journalist for his part said current technologies provide a user platform to get rid of unwanted information in the social media. Irrelevant information or messages could be blocked by the users themselves.
Meanwhile, in order to use the social media for intended constructive purposes for the wellbeing of all Ethiopians, everyone needs to be part of the initiative and must be well aware of the issue.
The pilot research conducted in Ethiopia mapped out some instances of hate speech in the online. It also illustrated that there is indeed a significant murmur of hate speech online through which different ethnic, social and political antagonisms are created, according to Iginio, Gagliardone, Alishia Patel and Matti Pohjonen (2014, p.36)
Thus, the victims of unreliable information and identity crisis from unethical social media practice are mostly the youth. If there is no better knowledge about how to appropriately use the social media, the consequence could be worse. We have social media pages meant for social inspirations. There are also people who come up with fake profile with worthless, unethical and distractive intentions of radicalization, promoting sexual videos and images, and hate speeches. Therefore, regulatory mechanisms are important but awareness is the best way to control such disaster.