KUCHING, After seven decades of experiencing the rise and fall of the media industry, See Hua Group, a private-owned media company in East Malaysia, remains relevant, harmonising the evolution of the journalism world – from traditional media to digital age.
Added to the inevitable rise of artificial intelligence (AI), the company has foreseen the challenges specifically involving all of its journalists at See Hua Daily, The Borneo Post, Utusan Borneo and Oriental Daily, therefore ensuring they are geared up to embrace ‘new’ ways of reporting.
‘For our side, we are organising courses for our reporters and editors that would give in-depth knowledge on the latest developments in the media industry, hence more eye-opening for reporters.
‘However, the human mind is greater than AI. We still need to maintain our intelligence… after all, it is operated by us,’ said The Borneo Post and Utusan Borneo General Manager Phyllis Wong Yang Yong during an interview with Bernama.
Marking her 46th anniversary as a journa
list this year, Phyllis noted that media practitioners are urged to adopt and adapt to the current evolution by participating in courses involving the latest technology, such as mobile journalism and AI.
‘Yes, we need AI to help with enhancing or transcibing and a few other things, but do not misuse it as we still need to be ethical as well as truthful to your readers and yourselves, no matter how far the technology evolves.
‘In journalism, originality is very crucial, we still need that because reporters have their own style of writing, but if you are fully dependent on AI, what is the point of being a reporter? You (reporters) are original, do not ‘dye’ a copy,’ she said.
Phyllis said the newspapers under See Hua Group, which have also provided online news since 2007, are currently utilising social media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram to reach out to their non-traditional readers, especially the younger generation.
The group started with the establishment of See Hua Daily in 1952, followed by Th
e Borneo Post in 1978, Utusan Borneo (1986) and Mandarin Oriental (2003), making it the only newspaper company in Malaysia that provides a full-fledged paper in three languages; English, Bahasa Malaysia and Mandarin.
Founded by the late Datuk Lau Hui Siong in Sibu, The Borneo Post first began in Sibu, before its expansion to Kuching in 1979 as well as Miri and Sabah in 1986, whereas Utusan Borneo started as an insert in The Borneo Post before becoming a full-fledged paper in 1999, offering daily news in Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Iban.
Asked whether the company is ready to ditch print newspapers and shift entirely to online news, the Kenyalang Shell Journalism Laureate 2013 recipient said the group started to seize the transition when its Kuala Lumpur-based newspaper, Oriental Daily News which made its debut in 2003, officially went online in 2021.
‘We have to face it, one day that everything will be online, which is why Oriental Daily News is fully online now… hopefully that will be a model for other news
papers,’ she said, adding that currently, a total of 217 journalists from Sarawak, Sabah and Peninsular Malaysia are working for the newspapers under the group.
The National Journalists’ Day (HAWANA) 2024, themed ‘Etika Teras Kewartawanan Mapan’, will be launched by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim on May 27 in Kuching.
HAWANA 2024, the largest gathering of Malaysian journalists, is organised by the Ministry of Communications in collaboration with the Sarawak government, with the Malaysian National News Agency (Bernama) as the implementing agency.
Source: BERNAMA News Agency