The sad story of TRP journalists

These are excerpts from a last month's posting,

• Not an easy job

The other day, just before CNY, another prominent portal, which however is a pro-establishment, got into financial troubles and ended up not being able to pay the salaries of its staff.

I lent a bit of money to a journalist friend working there so that he could celebrates CNY.

It's now past Chap Goh Meh and his salary is not yet coming.

I was actually holding back from telling the whole story.

At that time I was hoping for the journalists involved to still be paid their salaries despite whatever problems the portal was going through.

But I guess, it's not going to happen.

Today, Rocky came out with this posting,

So what's the story, TRP?

Excerpts:

Some 70 journalists and editors were thrown into the streets, not paid a single sen since the New Year, and on Feb 29 The Rakyat Post announced that it was ceasing operations.

Yeah, what's wrong with these people who own The Rakyat Post.

It's terrible what they did to those journalists.

And these people are supposed to be pro-establishment.

TRP was actually doing well and was catching up with the likes of Malaysiakini and The Malaysian Insider as well as beating other prominent pro-opposition portals such as Free Malaysia Today in term of hits.

Its reporting was good and relatively balanced despite the clear editorial policy which leaned towards the establishment.

Yet now the journalists working there were cast out just as if they were garbage.

For me, it's yet another case of the establishment's lousy media strategy or maybe even the lack of it.

Those in charge don't seem to know their priorities or even differentiate between good and bad.

This is one of the main reasons why Barisan Nasional is losing the battle for heart and mind of the people.

The media generals just don't give a shit about what happened to the soldiers who are fighting in the trenches.

All they care about is their cushy highly-paid jobs and being surrounded by boot-lickers.

It doesn't matter to them if the boot-lickers' talent is limited to only boot licking. Let's not even talk about their actual political inclination.

Those who were really dedicated to the job and committed to the cause became so demoralised by the whole thing.

Why bother to work so hard and go the extra mile when you will still be cast out if you don't have the talent of kissing the bosses' ass.

I have seen this happening all over the place.

Well, I have actually been bitching about this since quite a while ago even when I was still going all out supporting the establishment.

Now, I'm just tired.

This TRP case is really the ultimate.

Up to 70 journalists working for a pro-establishment media set-up being treated like garbage in one go, at a time when the establishment needs all the help it can get.

That's really brilliant of the establishment's media strategists.

I give up trying to say more, okay.

By the way, I heard the owner of the Malay Mail Online is taking over TRP. Don't know for sure whether it's true or not. If they do, I hope they can salvage something out of the mess.