By Oon Yeoh
Jun 14, 11 | MalaysiaKini

I clicked with interest on an article on this website titled Umno needs better ‘cyber warfare unit’. I was hoping to gain some insight into cyber strategies the party has in mind for the next general election, which seems to be looming.

But alas, it was just an Umno vice-president, Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, saying that the party needed to create a more systematic and efficient online unit to counter the opposition’s message and to get the party’s message to its target audience.

That much is obvious. The government’s online strategy seems to be non-existent, or incoherent at best. Then again, the same can be said of the opposition.

Yet, if you ask people from either side, they will tell you, “Yes, the Internet is important. Yes, cyber-warfare plays an important role in galvanising votes. Yes, we realise the need for a sound mobile strategy.”

Since I believe it’s vitally important that both sides are able to make their case effectively and efficiently to the voting public, I’m going to do an act of national service here and give free of charge – well, almost free: they have to have a Malaysiakini subscription – some cyber strategies that both the government and the opposition can use.

Website as central hub

Each party needs to have its own website of course, but when it comes to the general election, people vote along coalition lines. As such it’s important for each coalition to have a central hub in the form of a website.

Leading up to the election, such a site should carry statements by political leaders on the hot issues of the day. People should be able to go to this website for authoritative information on the government or the opposition’s official stance on various issues, especially contentious ones.

Quite often we hear politicians complain that they were misquoted or that their comments were taken out of context. Well, set the record straight by publishing on the official website of your coalition.

During the campaign period, this central hub should be the place where people go to find out where the various ceramah are being held. In the last election, such information was often obtained through word of mouth.

Sometimes, last-minute changes cause people to miss out on good speakers. This should easily be resolved by publishing a comprehensive list of ceramah sessions and political rallies.

Many companies and people underestimate the importance of creating a mobile website. The reason why a mobile site is so important is that full-blown websites, which are designed to be viewed on a computer screen, take forever to load on a mobile phone and the user interface is all wrong.

When you have a mobile site, it’s much smaller in terms of data and the navigation is designed for a small screen. Have a look at Malaysiakini’s mobile site and see the difference between it and the full-blown website.

Mobile Apps

The app culture has hit Malaysian shores. Most people who have smart phones would have downloaded some apps onto their phones, especially if they own an iPhone (though android phones are catching up fast too).

Apps are very versatile and can be used to deliver multimedia content in a more seamless and efficient way than can be done on the web. Apps can also be programmed to download and store content on the phone so that it can be consumed offline as well.

Tablet Apps

Tablets are the hot new thing, with iPads leading the way. But many new android tablets are also coming into the market this year. While phone-based apps will generally work on tablets as well, the experience is far from satisfactory.

To really make full use of the tablet platform, dedicated tablet apps need to be built. Like phone apps, tablet apps have the kind of versatility that allows you to deliver all kinds of content efficiently to the target user. Through the use of clever apps, your tablet could be a virtual TV, a radio and newspaper.

Podcast

Podcasts are audio clips that can be synced directly to iPods. They are quite popular in the US but have not yet taken off in a big way here. Perhaps this is because local content is lacking.

The number of podcast downloads at BFM 89.9, a company I used to do some consultancy for, however, is very encouraging. It shows that when you produce good local content, people will download it so they can listen to it at their convenience.

I don’t know why local politicians have not made more use of this medium. Leaders from both sides can literally have their own radio shows, so to speak. It won’t be live but available on demand. They can say what they want and have it delivered directly to their target audience.

The great thing about podcasts is that the files are not big and heavy like video clips. So, you don’t need high speed broadband to download them. Any broadband or wireless access would work fine.

Video

In the US, political parties will run short commercials, dubbed “attack ads”, which do exactly what you expect them to do. They are designed to counter and attack your opponent’s views.

While TV commercials here are expensive and not to mention, TV is a regulated industry in this country, there’s always YouTube, which allows you to create your own YouTube channel. The clips can be embedded onto websites.

If you want to have live streaming of your events or perhaps town-hall style meetings, you can always use UStream, which like YouTube, is also free and embeddable.

The above suggestions are merely a starting point. Of course a lot more can be done but it’s a good starting point and frankly, if either coalition can even do what I’ve listed above, it will already go a long way towards helping voters make an informed decision when they vote in the next general election.