THE MASS media landscape dramatically changed. Thanks to technological advances, people can now instantly access and share information through the internet and social media. We, too, are tapping these new technologies to reach out to more audiences – within and outside Western Visayas, across the country, and around the world.
But these technological advances come with challenges, like “fake news.” Unscrupulous quarters use the internet and social media to sow half-truths or downright false information.
Our advice to everyone: better check the source of your information. In the age of fake news, credibility sets good journalism apart from lowly peddlers and fabricators of falsehood.
Thirty-seven years ago when Panay News came out with its maiden issue, its first editorial immediately set forth what it wanted to accomplish – a reliable bearer of truth and information in the region. Right after martial law, the provincial press became alive once more. In Western Visayas, local journalism’s reactivation was more evident in the region’s capital – Iloilo City. There were more than half a dozen tabloids aside from the national dailies.
Before Panay News, Iloilo readers were treated to the mainstays of pre- and post martial law papers. Why one more? We were intended to cover the island of Panay – a coverage that was not and could not be filled by any other paper at that time. Certainly no by the national dailies whose distribution then concentrated in the city, and most certainly not by the local weeklies existing at that time. “Not” in the sense that the existing papers could not even cover the proportionate number of readers as against actual population in a given locality like Iloilo city and province.
Now, with new technologies at our disposal such as the internet and social media, we are all the more excited to use these to remain faithful to our covenant with the reading public within the region, across the Philippines and beyond our national borders.
As we mark our 37th anniversary, allow us to revel for having stuck it out for so many years. The momentum for further growth using new media platforms signals more exciting years ahead for us and you, our dear readers.
