Cherry, Ann and Ivan: Class inequality portrayed in Titanic

Media content is supposed to reflect the reality of the world we live in or at least lead people to further think about their familiar or unfamiliar life. In the movie Titanic, James Cameron elaborately portrays the class difference between the first class passengers and the third class passengers represented by Rose and Jack respectively to send the public a message about the social class inequality in the 1910s in England.

Cameron labels Jack Dawson as the third class passenger at the very beginning. Inside a bar beside the departing Ship of Dreams, a group of four young men including Jack are seen playing poker and he finally wins the third class ticket for the Titanic. This scene quickly makes it clear enough to everyone that Jack is a man of no money because it’s obviously that he has neither a good family background nor a decent occupation.
Then comes the description of the leading actress, Rose. She is seen in her stateroom, looking at paintings and marveling at them as she makes to put them up. This scene is a sharp contrast with the setting that Jack is in. The first impression that the director wants to quickly and distinctly let us know by their showing is that Rose and Jack are from different social classes for common sense shows that only poor people play poker and only those who never worry about money and food can have a taste in art.

Cameron then makes fun of this social class inequality a lot of times. First, the France woman Molly whose wealth comes from her husband finding gold tells us the logic that, class is only related to wealth. Only if you are well-off, you can jump into the higher social class and enjoy all the prestige that only the first class passengers have. Second, when Molly puts the jacket of a tuxedo over Jack’s shoulders for attending the dinner provided for the first class passengers, he is dressed in very wealthy clothing and looks like he is to fit right in with the first class crowd. And when Rose shows Jack to Cal and her mother, Cal is very impressed, saying you could almost pass for a gentleman. This arrangement intends to tell us that there are some superficial things that are considered necessary for the first class passengers to strictly stick to in order to preserve their status such as dressing, red-tape and so on.

In addition to this, Cameron also portrays the rich generally bribing their way to freedom, the crew deliberately preventing the poor from reaching safety, and Titanic officers killing a third class passenger. These are all telling us the clear social class inequality on this unsinkable ship-Titanic. Although criticizing on the class inequality may not be the theme of this great movie. It does reflect some truth in the 1910s in the UK that social class inequality is obvious in the whole society. Since at last Jack, from the third class and Rose, from the first class do bridge the big class gap and choose to love each other bravely, Cameron maybe wants to give the audience some hope that class inequality cannot win over everything after all.

Karen, Kason, Man, Winnie: Week8 "Gender Stereotypes"

Gender Stereotypes in Mass Media

It is normal that the mass media use a specific term to label and stereotype a particular group of people. For instance, “Post-80’s” stereotypes youngsters who were born in the 1980s; they are radical and opponent towards the government. However, as the society we live in changes, we also see an apparent change in gender stereotypes, resulting in new labels and new meanings.

In the past, the general stereotype for men is hardworking, a leader, full of authority, taking care of the family financially, and having a successful career. Meanwhile, women were stereotyped to be caring, submissive, serving her husband, doing all the house chores, and taking care of the children. This type of female was appreciated as “virtuous” in the Chinese society. In the past, a good marriage was regarded as the best achievement for women. Some people even thought that marriage is a measurement for a woman’s life value.

Nowadays, however, new terms have arisen due to the mass media, resulting in reversed stereotypes for both genders. Hong Kong men are now often labeled as “Kong Guys” (港男), while Hong Kong women are called “Kong Girls” (港女), or, in certain cases, “Middle-Aged Women” (中女).

Firstly, “Kong Guys” refers to men who are isolated from others, often staying at home, playing with computers and electronic gadgets, and thus, leading to weak communication and interaction skills. These “Kong Guys” often hold a grudge against “Kong Girls”, causing them to constantly desire for their “goddess” (their ideal lover) and hiding in the virtual world.

Why would “Kong Guys” resent “Kong Girls”? The men dislike these “Kong Girls”, who supposedly act very arrogant. According to the media, “Kong Girls” are young women who are materialistic, narcissistic, money-crazy, and cannot cook and do house chores. They often have the “Princess Syndrome”, which means the girls expect their boyfriends to treat them like princesses, for example, pay for everything, buy them everything, etc.

Finally, as for “Middle-Aged Women,” these are typically women over 26 years old, can no longer be identified as “young”, have successful careers with an overflowing income, some even more than men, are smart and powerful, and thus, have a high social status. The only drawback is that they are unmarried and are “failures” when it comes to love relationship. Some media, like TV networks, will label them and use them as the topic for soap operas. A Taiwan’s word-of-mouth drama called “My Queen (敗犬女王)”, uses such a theme. It is a reflection of gender stereotype in the media.

Thus, the current stereotypical roles of men and women are completely reversed, comparing to conventional roles. Women are now portrayed as powerful, while men are weak.

In the last two years, we have found that the three aforementioned terms have grown more popular in Hong Kong citizens’ conversation, after some people have published these issues on web forums. In this case, we defined these terms as stereotypes that people tend to label others who share some of the common characteristics as a group, with most of these terms connoting depreciatory meanings.

Originally, the two terms “Kong Girl” and “Kong Guy” have been in use for many years as an abbreviation to neutrally describe Hong Kong females and males, usually used in newspapers. Yet, many Internet users recently implied some other meanings on these terms to portray negative images. For instance, Net surfer likes to use “Kong Girl” to define Hong Kong girls with evil characteristics like materialism, narcissism and arrogance. Is it true that all of the Hong Kong females hold these negative characteristics?

And why do people commonly feel that women should not be like this? Actually, these terms are sourced from common gender stereotypes portrayed by the mass media. The media had always shaped the roles of both genders. The general public is probably discontent when the fact (reality) does not match with their imagination and recognition. Then, they tend to show their disappointment on the Internet, which finally produces another stereotyping towards the opposite gender. Someone has tried to clarify that the term “Kong Girl” is not only inclining to describe Hong Kong females, but to indicate that all females in the world have those evil characteristics. But why should Hong Kong girls be the representatives of females with bad manners around the world? To explain in any way, “Kong Girl” and “Kong Guy” are not neutral terms anymore since they connote social stereotyping towards gender.

Meanwhile, it has almost become a trend for Hong Kong citizens to use the term “Middle-Aged Women” as a description. The major cause of this is obviously because of the media playing up these labels in a large coverage. We can see different kinds of TV programs, comics, movies, and even pop songs describing many characteristics of this group. The media and the fiery discussion among online forum members advance many new meanings to these new terms, hiding the original meanings. And now, we have new definitions to “Kong Guy”, “Kong Girl” and “Middle-Aged Women”.

Due to the evolution of the society, the role of women has changed. Females are no longer confined in housework. More importantly, they are not the appurtenant of men anymore. Nowadays, women have an equal status as men and can perform outstandingly in the work force. Women’s power is increasing, catching up with men’s power, possibly even surpassing men’s. However, the traditional perceptions about women are deeply rooted in Chinese society. The deviation of the conventional roles and the present roles of both men and women leads to gender stereotypes, existing in mass media and the general public’s minds.

References

星期日檔案《港女‧講男》 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzvXqcozjIA

星期日檔案《港男‧講女》http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IU0P_pS-sOs

星期二檔案 “中女告白” http://mytv.tvb.com/news/tuesdayreport/105177#page-1

“Gender Stereotypes” http://people.unt.edu/jw0109/misc/stereotype.htm

“Gender Stereotypes” http://www.curriculum.edu.au/verve/_resources/Gender_stereotypes.pdf

“港女” http://evchk.wikia.com/wiki/港女

“敗犬女王” http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/敗犬女王

Action News from Apply Daily ( By Ann, Ivan and Cherry)

Action news from Apple Daily

There is a new trend of animated news report in Hong Kong recently which call “動新聞”. It is a kind of video that using an animation to present the news and is first launched by Apple Daily on November 16, 2009 in Taiwan. It is a realist animation to explain news from Taiwan Next Media Interactive Limited production platforms in mobile phone and internet network.

By using the attractive animation and the “kuso” voice over, audience will surely be fascinated by this kind of action news. After this new type of animation news reaches a huge success in Tai Wan, Hong Kong also imports this kind of news report by Apple Daily and also it is popular in Hong Kong recently. I think why this type of animation news can be so success because of some reasons. Firstly, all of these animations were made in a very short period because of the timely requirement of the news. Complementing with the animation and the text, it will let the audiences have a clear understanding of the whole picture about the incidents and cause an immersive feeling.

Also, that animation news will not only place on the official homepage, but also put on another internet network just as the Youtube which is a very popular channel via internet. By placing the animation news on the Youtube, those youngsters who don’t like to read newspaper can also assess the news more easily rather than to buy a newspaper or visit the official homepage of Apply Daily. Moreover, they can easily share this animation news through Facebook and Twitter with their friends. As a result, more and more people can assess to this kind of animation news widely.

Apart from the high usage rate of Youtube, Youtube also have a special function which is attractive for the audience. It is the discussion function. By having discussion function, audience can express their feelings and opinions of the news. And Apple Daily can analyze the opinions and discussions and do some following actions such as having some special or designated topics on the issue.

However, the action news from Apple Daily also stirs up a lot of controversy and complains. As we all know, Apple Daily frequently reports local gossip news and they often prominently reports sensational news not only on their newspaper, but also on the Apple action news. A lot of people think that the action news is so realistic and bald. Apple action news describes the suicide, crime and brutal event tremendously. It makes those audiences feel in person and anxious when dealing with some sexual assault and domestic violence topic. In Tai Wan, Apple action news has even been punished 500,000 yuan NT by Taipei City Government because Apple action news does not have any classification measurement on the action news.

As we all know that internet is a kind of new media, I think that Apple Daily can utilize the multifunctional features of internet and reporting news not only in visual channel, but also the auditory channel which is a good try. I hope that they can invent more new media in the future.

Week 8 – Karen, Janice, Vanessa & Yannie

Theoretical Reflection: Ideology, Hegemony, Media Representation

Apart from the significant others, such as parents, siblings, relatives, friends and teachers, mass media are the other major channels from which individuals may get to know about their communities, countries and even the world. Similarly, people’s beliefs, values and norms are mainly acquired from education and built upon the interpersonal communication and social activities with the significant others. In addition to laws and even some religious ideas with various nations, people are guided to establish their own systems of ideology which they undoubtedly follow without any questions. Yet, as mass media also play a critical role in shaping and modifying our value judgments about the globe and ourselves, hegemony has to be taken into account in this issue. Meanwhile, we should pay attention to motives and thoughts of the ones who stands behind the curtain, controls and directs the mass media.

According to ideas of Marx and Gramsci, it is obvious to understand that attitudes and behaviors of the subordinate classes like the general public are controlled under the hegemony of the ruling classes with strong political and economic powers. This kind of influence from the ruling classes can even be recognized as manipulation or brain-wash when some certain ideas are heavily disseminated into grass roots’ minds. Just take the media coverage about the Iraq war during George Bush’s administration over the United States as an example. Before the invasion of USA, there were frequent messages shown in TV to remind the Americans that Iraq illegally possessed weapons of mass destruction and intended to harm USA. Images, texts and narration of those clips kept connecting to the 9/11 attacks and portraying Iraq as a leading terrorist state. However, there was no broadcast about weapons of mass destruction done in Iraq by the force of USA. Additionally, according to Rendall and Broughel’s analysis, sources advocating the pro-war messages occupied 70% while materials about anti-war merely occupied 3%. Based on such media coverage, the Bush administration successfully justified the invasion of Iraq and gained lots of Americans’ support for the war. Although Robert McChesney, one of the activist scholars in the US media industry, admitted that it was just a fraud the US news media had participated in, it demonstrated how hegemony exactly worked in the so-called democratic government. While some people out of USA might not find the US invasion ethical, the Americans might do so and believe in their government as it shaped the Americans’ minds with their authoritative status and powers in manipulating the media.

Through the media, people are unconsciously receiving a variety of messages which are mostly in favor of the ones with political and economic powers every day. We can learn about the fundamental values and norms from family members and friends, but we may not able to comprehend the world from them at the same time. We, therefore, often rely on mass media, as known as the Internet, TV, radio and etc. to broaden our horizons since we may not experience the real world in person. Unfortunately, ideas of how the world is and should be, again, are greatly influenced under the hegemony of the ruling classes. From personal experience, Disney cartoons are channels which deliver some particular perceptions to people and even create bias. In some of the well-known Disney princess stories, people with unfavorable appearances are portrayed as bad guys with evil thinking, the black males are always fierce and engage in violence, the black females and Arabians are usually associated with sexual affairs. These are the elements which people, particularly children, would unconsciously receive and then use to shape their cognition towards the globe. This example then leads to the matter of media representation as shown below.

According to Stuart Hall, media representation first indicates the way in which meaning is given to the things depicted through the images shown on the media. Second, it stands in for people to take the place of where the subordinate classes cannot be, but the ruling classes can be. Let’s focus on Stuart’s first definition. Since the Walt Disney kingdom is one of the largest scaled multi-national corporations, its cartoons and movies can extensively travel all over the world and reach a huge scope of audiences. While enjoying a fun and entertaining cartoon, audiences especially children should have no idea to beware of those hidden perceptions and deliberately rooted motives which might go against minorities or races. Consequently, the possible outcomes of such a media representation can turn into people’s imbalanced impression and bias towards the minority groups. More significantly, it might even create cultural prejudice and hatred among various nationalities.

It is true that people may be able to spot the gap of representation one day when they discover the difference between how the media represent things and how the things are in reality. It will likely to be happened when an individual has acquired a certain level of knowledge and witnessed how the world truly is in person. After discovered the distortion of subjects by the media, he might start measuring those previously received values and beliefs, and adjusting his initial attitudes and behaviors. Since it is a common struggle that each single metropolitan may go through, it is not absolutely negative to people as it encourages them to think and act critically. Still, people should keep an eye to the motivation and rationales behind politics, significant social and economic affairs when the government or dominant corporations are looking for support.

References:
Robert W. McChesney, “The Political Economy of Media: enduring issues, emerging dilemmas”, Monthly Review Press. 2008, p.105 - 106

Steve Rendall and Tara Broughel, “Amplifying Officials, Sequencing Dissent: FAIR Study Finds Democracy Poorly Served by the War Coverage”. 2003.http://www.fair.org/extra/0305/warstudy.html

Karen, Kason, Man, Winnie: Week 6 "Gordon Brown"

Top News: Gordon Brown

Recently, Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, has become one of the hottest politicians globally because of a newly released publication, The End of the Party. Written by journalist Andrew Rawnsley, the book discusses the anecdote and daily life of Brown, talks about the development of New Labour (the party that Brown belongs to), and even reveals something little-known of the party’s power. Some questions are stirred while reading this news event. After the book came to the public, many criticisms and bad comments of Brown aroused. We believe the book involves the issue of occupational integrity, or called professional ethics of journalists. It concerns about how the use of specialist knowledge should be governed when professionals are providing a service to the public.

Rawnsley’s The End of the Party claims that Brown is choleric and often assaults his subordinates who made minor mistakes. This book has already aroused the international publics’ attention before its publication. But the credibility of it should be the main concern. Most of the sources of this book are declared to be coming from the interviews and confidential conversations with the heart of the power rather than the firsthand contact with the people involved. The trustworthiness of the book has also been decreased, since it is difficult to prove the accuracy and objectivity of the statements of the interviewees.

Apart from its credibility, we should query about whether the author has invaded the privacy of the Prime Minister, as the book is presenting the working attitude and situation of Brown. Should a professional journalist reveal the personal livelihood of the Prime Minister? We have a reservation about that. Brown is a politician; thus, the general publics are interested in his daily life. Definitely, it is very newsworthy publishing a book about him. However, it may infringe the privacy of Brown.

Moreover, the writing intention of Rawnsley is another interrogation point. The author proclaimed that this book provides the definite account of the rise and fall of New Labour, and is even entitled as “The End of the Party”. We wonder whether the book can objectively cover the anecdote of Brown or not. It is not suspected that everyone can have an in-depth study and evaluation on a specific party, organization or even an issue if one does not obtain any personal stance and is being objective. Therefore, before we believe in what we have read, we should critically examine the background of the author in which whether he belongs to the opposite party and/or if he has received some interests from the opposite power.

Additionally, journalists have the power to influence the thinking and action of the general public by writing articles with their opinion. Almost everyone knows that the General elections of the UK will be held in two to three months later. With Rawnsley choosing to publish this book at such a sensitive time, it may possibly give rise to an argument that someone would like to affect voters’ opinion and attitude towards the New Labour or Brown.

Meanwhile, the UK Channel 4 News has interviewed Brown about two weeks ago. In the interview, Brown emphasized that he had never hit anybody in his life and declined the censure from the book. This interview gives the public a chance to study the case from different angles, as well as a chance for Brown to defend himself. As many media report news with bias, frames or with only one specified angle, the audience is advised to connect with different angles of news sources.

We also observed that there is a common problem in journalism. First of all, in order to arouse more attention from the public, reporters are more likely to write their “news” with exaggeration. For example in Hong Kong, Apple Daily reported Brown’s case with Apple Action News, illustrating the scene of Brown hitting his colleagues, and reporting the case as if the reporter has witnessed the scene first handed.

Therefore, we recommend that audiences should query different news. They should especially focus on the judgment to the reported information, which will influence the receiver to have different perceptions within an issue. Also, audiences should not believe in a specific newspaper or news reporter, since the news may guide them to easily believe in what is reporting.

Meanwhile, another aspect being analyzed is ideology. A common perception of a leader is stable, calm, and peaceful, as portrayed by the media. This perception is normalized by the mass media, influencing the public to accept that this is what a leader should resemble. The truth is, if the media had not defined what a “leader” is like, a typical person would not have any clear concept of what a leader should be like. Thus, when it is revealed that Brown is violent, temperamental, and unable to control himself, this incident becomes an infringement and rupture towards our perceived ideology. We would start to question whether an ideal leader is allowed to do such violent actions. We grasp this news as shocking, disturbing, and abnormal. But at the same time, it is exactly what made this event newsworthy.

In conclusion, we do not doubt that the claims made from the book about the Prime Minister of UK, Gordon Brown, and the bully censure are facts or not. The evidences being reported may be true, but at the same time, we do not know whether Andrew Rawnsley had purposefully framed his book, concealing un-supporting facts, and violating the integrity of a professional journalist. But we believe that if all journalists follow their codes of ethics, and the audiences have the ability of critical thinking, the mass media may possibly have a healthier reporting atmosphere in the future.

References

Channel 4 News:

http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/domestic_politics/gordon+brown+denies+angry+outburst+claims/3553242

Apple Daily Action News video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxJoMIFDTSs

Attacks on Voters in Iraq during the Parliamentary Election

Ming Fearon & Jacqueline Wang

 

This week we decided to examine several news sources in order to see how they report on a single story. After first scanning the CNN.com website, we noticed that a particularly riveting story had to do with the Iraqi Parliamentary Elections that occurred early on Thursday morning. The nation-wide election doesn’t occur until the weekend, but the polls were opened a few days early to soldiers, police officers, and security officers so that they could be available to monitor the subsequent public elections. It is interesting because this election is especially important for Iraqi since it will determine who will fill 325 seats in the Council of Representatives and select Iraq’s next government. According to Ad Melkert, the head of the U.N. mission in Iraq,

“The conduct and outcome of the election will be the most decisive moment for Iraqis' future since 2003.” The year refers to when Saddam Hussein, who was the president of Iraq for 24 years until that point, was taken out of office.

Next, we looked at the same story on the nytimes.com website and also tried to find reports of it on Hong Kong news sites. However, we were limited to English newspapers and therefore could only look at the Standard and the South China Morning Post. We were limited in our online viewing capabilities of SCMP and could only see the title of the article and the first line of the article. Meanwhile, the Standard didn’t report on the story.

After reading the two American news sources, we noticed pretty different styles of reporting. The CNN article was more fact-based and straightforward. The Times incorporated more human-interest elements by using quotes from police officers who had survived the suicide attacks at the polls. The CNN article used more numbers and facts in the article and was therefore able to present the logistics of the situation more clearly; however, the Times article painted more of a picture of the situation by using first-hand reports from eyewitnesses of the situation, as well as describing the situation of the actual victims and bystanders in more detail. After reading both articles, we felt more clearly informed by the CNN article, but we felt more of a human connection to the situation after reading the Times article. For instance, Ibrahim Said, a police officer, was quoted saying of his friends, “They promised each other to dance in front of every one of the polling stations” after surviving the attacks on the city’s hospital. However, CNN chose to elaborate on details such as international borders and airports being shut down and early morning curfews for cities being implemented.

What little comments we can make on the Hong Kong newspapers have more to do with language than with content, since we were unable to access the full article in the SCMP. First and foremost, the title of the article (“Suicide Blasts Kill 33 Ahead of Iraq Polls”) is a bit confusing because the word “ahead” doesn’t quite make sense to us in the context of the sentence. In the first sentence of the article, the reporter describes the suicide bomber as “blowing himself up,” which is we thought was an unnecessarily melodramatic way to describe what happened, and we think could have been worded better. Of course, we’re obviously sensitive to the language because we’re native English speakers, but we think it’s important to use appropriate words, especially when reporting on unstable situations.

References:

“Bombs mar early voting in Iraq”.  CNN.com. 4 Mar 2010.  <http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/meast/03/04/iraq.elections.voting/index.html?hpt=T1>.

 

Myers, S. L., Santora, M. “Deadly Attacks Mar First Day of Voting in Iraqi Elections”. 4 Mar 2010.  The New York Times. <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/05/world/middleeast/05iraq.html?hp>.

 

“Suicide blasts kill 33 ahead of Iraq polls”. 4 Mar 2010.  <http://www.scmp.com/portal/site/SCMP/menuitem.2c913216495213d5df646910cba0a0a0/?vgnextoid=a673d1acad727210VgnVCM100000360a0a0aRCRD&vgnextfmt=teaser&ss=Asia+%26+World&s=News>.

 

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/breaking_news.asp?icid=4&d_str=20100304

Week 5 (Janice, Karen, Vanessa & Yannie)

Professionalism in Hong Kong media industry (Glossy Magazine)

As the media industry becomes more mature and open, more different media channels have appeared in the community. In recent years, we have a wider variety of print magazines and pay-TV channels to choose from. Currently, I-cable is even trying to gain the free TV license in order to penetrate the domestic market. Having more choices is undoubtedly beneficial to audiences, the industry and the whole market. However, the expanding media industry does not guarantee a better quality offered by the media. The professionalism of different media organizations therefore becomes a controversial issue nowadays.

Next Media is one of the largest listed media companies in Hong Kong. It owns one newspaper, Apple Daily, and several print and online magazines. Its magazine, Next Magazine, is one of the most popular local glossy magazines. This magazine is well known of its aggressive and flamboyant reporting style. Next Magazine is a typical example of using exaggerated and even fake cover stories to maximize its readership. Because of the commonly used fictional and immoral reporting styles, publications under this company are always criticized for its unprofessional conduct.

Fictional reports represent that reporters attempt to write an entire story just according to a partial fact. Sometimes, reporters’ personal comments or imagination of an issue will be added into the story. The worst case appears when the contents of the whole story is counterfeit and without any evidence. This kind of unprofessional reports is always carried out by reporters and editors of the Next Magazine. Shocking cover stories about the celebrities can always attract readers. Yet, those rumors are always accused of the content inaccuracy by the protagonists of stories. Some celebrities even take legal actions to defend and clarify themselves. In February 2010, an artist named Law Ka Leung and his former wife respectively declared that the cover story of the Next Magazine about their life after divorce was not true. That cover story described Mr. Leung as an irresponsible father and discredited his image by depicting his poor treats to his ex-wife and son. However, this was not the real case but made up by the unprofessional reporters. Mr. Leung blamed that the irresponsible report has seriously damaged his image so that he would keep the rights to sue the magazine.

In addition, some media even unethically make up an entire story of some well-known public figures. In many cases, such reporting would offense the privacy of the people involved. For instance, the paparazzi always invade into celebrities’ apartments in order to look for some personal materials which may help create newsworthy articles. Not to mention letters, credit card and bill receipts, rubbish like empty bottles of skin care products can be collected as sources for reporters’ creative rumors. In April 2003, the famous singer, Leslie Cheung, committed suicide in a hotel. The paparazzi of the Next Media sneaked into his room and foraged his rubbish. Their behaviors were seriously criticized of disrespect to the subject singer.

In August 2006, the Next media again aroused another furor after publishing a cover story about a young female singer, Gillian Chong. The magazine, titled Easy Finder, was once a popular publication under the Next Media. There was a huge coverage in Easy Finder about Gillian Chong putting off her clothes in a changing room. Miss Chong’s naked photos were actually taken by the paparazzi using a hidden camera. Finally, the Easy Finder was accused by the local regulation of obscene and indecent articles ordinance. This incident not only infringed the privacy of the victim, but also the morality of society.

The unprofessional reports of the Next Media led the company into complaints and troublesome lawsuits. Its stories have also brought up heated controversy. Although its eye-catching stories can help bringing huge readerships, its credibility is very low. Its semi-fabricate stories are regarded as personalities instead of credible pieces of journalistic writing.

Nowadays, many media companies put sales into an upper priority over professionalism. Looking for claptrap information for the sake of raising the circulation becomes the most essential concern. Therefore, the bottom line of journalists’ professionalism nowadays becomes loosened. The problem turns into much more complicated when the media coverage was done not only immorally, but also illegally. In order to safeguard the profession and ethics of journalism, self-discipline is very important. The local government, in this circumstance, should perform as a watchdog to protect and balance the interests of the media industry and the general public. Meanwhile, the government should also beware of violating the press freedom. In short, objectively reporting the reality is the ultimate goal of being a journalist. Every practitioner in this industry should respect their identities and duties and behave as a professional.