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Jan 30, 2010
Relax, it's just the Internet version of coffee shop talk
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I REFER to Tuesday's letter by Mr Keith Gerard Tan, 'New ugly Singaporean', and Mr Lionel De Souza's response on Wednesday, 'Keyboard warriors? New ugly Singaporeans are more like cyber terrorists'.
The term 'Web defacement', or rather the defacing of a webpage, has a completely different meaning. Web defacement is an attack on a website, typically by system hackers, who replace the website they attack with one of their own. Web defacement is illegal and carries a potential prison sentence.
'Keyboard warrior' was a term forged in the Internet age to describe someone who expresses his feelings (mostly anger), thoughts and beliefs online.
On top of this, the cyber warriors who are the main target of Mr Tan do not frequent websites. They are commonly found on online forums and chatrooms, and their very existence is to exchange views and voice thoughts, be they coherent or not.
I am not sure if Mr Tan knows the expression, but I am sure Mr De Souza is familiar with the term 'coffee shop talk', a term coined long ago to describe political comments made over coffee in traditional coffee shops.
Now in the modern age, we should understand we have the tools to express ourselves on a more powerful platform, that of the Internet, and comments will cover the whole spectrum and may even be of an extreme nature.
Having said that, it saddened me that Mr Tan took something that is fundamental to human rights and the human condition - to express one's unhappiness - and somehow married that to Web defacement, a criminal activity. This makes me wonder if it is such a heinous crime in Mr Tan's eyes to express unhappiness with government policies that it is now comparable to a criminal offence.
What is even more worrying is that Mr De Souza, a known security expert, states that keyboard warriors are hiding behind the cloak of anonymity when they are not. In fact, extremists have been snuffed out and tried in court, so there is no anonymity and everyone is and will be held accountable for what he says.
Chai Shiew Chee
Relax, it's just the Internet version of coffee shop talk
<!-- by line --><!-- end by line -->
<!-- end left side bar --><!-- story content : start -->
I REFER to Tuesday's letter by Mr Keith Gerard Tan, 'New ugly Singaporean', and Mr Lionel De Souza's response on Wednesday, 'Keyboard warriors? New ugly Singaporeans are more like cyber terrorists'.
The term 'Web defacement', or rather the defacing of a webpage, has a completely different meaning. Web defacement is an attack on a website, typically by system hackers, who replace the website they attack with one of their own. Web defacement is illegal and carries a potential prison sentence.
'Keyboard warrior' was a term forged in the Internet age to describe someone who expresses his feelings (mostly anger), thoughts and beliefs online.
On top of this, the cyber warriors who are the main target of Mr Tan do not frequent websites. They are commonly found on online forums and chatrooms, and their very existence is to exchange views and voice thoughts, be they coherent or not.
I am not sure if Mr Tan knows the expression, but I am sure Mr De Souza is familiar with the term 'coffee shop talk', a term coined long ago to describe political comments made over coffee in traditional coffee shops.
Now in the modern age, we should understand we have the tools to express ourselves on a more powerful platform, that of the Internet, and comments will cover the whole spectrum and may even be of an extreme nature.
Having said that, it saddened me that Mr Tan took something that is fundamental to human rights and the human condition - to express one's unhappiness - and somehow married that to Web defacement, a criminal activity. This makes me wonder if it is such a heinous crime in Mr Tan's eyes to express unhappiness with government policies that it is now comparable to a criminal offence.
What is even more worrying is that Mr De Souza, a known security expert, states that keyboard warriors are hiding behind the cloak of anonymity when they are not. In fact, extremists have been snuffed out and tried in court, so there is no anonymity and everyone is and will be held accountable for what he says.
Chai Shiew Chee
