Chengdu News Asia sez: Podcasting not allowed during elections

So the Gahmen has come out and stated the rules for the use of podcasting during the coming General Elections.

Chengdu News Asia, or CNA, has a report (why Chengdu? Check out the photo used in the report).

From the headline, it looks like podcasting is TOTALLY banned during the GE, but of course, if you read the report, what Senior Minister of State for Information, Communications and the Arts Balaji Sadasivan (wah, very long title, can?) said was that during the GE, audio and video podcasting "of explicitly political content" and using podcasting for election advertising, is not allowed.

I am not too sure what is meant by "explicitly political content", but I am sure it does not mean political candidates taking artistically nude photos.

Ya lor, and I also agree with Dr Balaji that some of these local podcasts by private individuals from well-known local blogs can be quite entertaining!

P.S. Here's an interesting link I found: if you go to singaporeelection.com, the site there is some StarIslands company or committee. Don't ask me what they do, I read all the pages of copy and it is some vague project, and even the page called StarIslands Committee mentioned no names of real people, but alludes to "top government officials, CEOs of multiple MNC" and "people from specific government departments". Odd.

Technorati tag: singaporeelections, singapore, mrbrown, podcast, podcasting

Excerpt:

Dr Balaji said: "There are also some well-known local blogs run by private individuals who have ventured into podcasting. The content of some of these podcasts can be quite entertaining. However, the streaming of explicit political content by individuals during the election period is prohibited under the Election Advertising Regulations. A similar prohibition would apply to the videocasting or video streaming of explicitly political content."