Behind the plot to break Nvidia's grip on AI by targeting software

Big draw: Nvidia chief executive officer Jensen Huang speaking at an industry event in California. Some big tech companies are trying to show developers how to migrate away from Nvidia’s dominance in AI. — Bloomberg

Exclusive: Behind the plot to break Nvidia's grip on AI by ...

 [1/2]A smartphone with a displayed NVIDIA logo is placed on a computer motherboard in this illustration taken March 6, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights

Nvidia's grip on AI by targeting software.html

Alliance seeks to use alternative open source software 

SAN FRANCISCO: Nvidia earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial-intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from startups to Microsoft, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet .

Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than four million global developers rely on Nvidia’s Cuda software platform to build AI and other apps.

Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm, Google and Intel plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going after the chip giant’s secret weapon: the software that keeps developers tied to Nvidia chips.

They are part of an expanding group of financiers and companies hacking away at Nvidia’s dominance in AI.

“We’re actually showing developers how you migrate out from an Nvidia platform,” Vinesh Sukumar, Qualcomm’s head of AI and machine learning, said in an interview with Reuters.

Starting with a piece of technology developed by Intel called OneAPI, the UXL Foundation, a consortium of tech companies, plans to build a suite of software and tools that will be able to power multiple types of AI accelerator chips, executives involved with the group told Reuters.

The open-source project aims to make computer code run on any machine, regardless of what chip and hardware powers it.

“It’s about specifically – in the context of machine learning frameworks – how do we create an open ecosystem, and promote productivity and choice in hardware,” Google’s director and chief technologist of high-performance computing, Bill Magro, said in an interview.

Google is one of the founding members of UXL and helps determine the technical direction of the project, Magro said.

UXL’s technical steering committee is preparing to nail down technical specifications in the first half of this year. Engineers plan to refine the technical details to a “mature” state by the end of the year, executives said.

These executives stressed the need to build a solid foundation to include contributions from multiple companies that can also be deployed on any chip or hardware.

Beyond the initial companies involved, UXL will court cloud-computing companies such as Amazon.com and Microsoft’s Azure, as well as additional chipmakers.

Since its launch in September, UXL has already begun to receive technical contributions from third parties that include foundation members and outsiders keen on using the open-source technology, the executives involved said.

Intel’s OneAPI is already usable, and the second step is to create a standard programming model of computing designed for AI.

UXL plans to put its resources toward addressing the most pressing computing problems dominated by a few chipmakers, such as the latest AI apps and high-performance computing applications.

Those early plans feed into the organisation’s longer-term goal of winning over a critical mass of developers to its platform.

UXL eventually aims to support Nvidia hardware and code, in the long run.

When asked about the open source and venture-funded software efforts to break Nvidia’s AI dominance, Nvidia executive Ian Buck said in a statement: “The world is getting accelerated. New ideas in accelerated computing are coming from all across the ecosystem, and that will help advance AI and the scope of what accelerated computing can achieve.”

The UXL Foundation’s plans are one of many efforts to chip away at Nvidia’s hold on the software that powers AI. Venture financiers and corporate dollars have poured more than US$4bil into 93 separate efforts, according to custom data compiled by PitchBook at Reuters’ request.

The interest in unseating Nvidia through a potential weakness in software has ramped up in the last year, and startups aiming to poke holes in the company’s leadership gobbled up just over US$2bil in 2023 compared with US$580mil from a year ago, according to the data from PitchBook.

Success in the shadow of Nvidia’s group on AI data crunching is an achievement that few of the startups will be able to achieve.

Nvidia’s Cuda is a compelling piece of software on paper, as it is full-featured and is consistently growing both from Nvidia’s contributions and the developer community. — Reuters

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Credible media vital in fight against coronavirus and epidemic of fake news

Taking risks: Journalists have been working overtime to keep the communities they serve updated and help them make sense of the fast-evolving and far-reaching crisis, like this newsman in London. – AFP

The stakes are high as Covid-19 is dealing a severe blow to newsrooms' ability to operate as revenues dry up

As the coronavirus continues its relentless spread across the world,, infecting over a million people and killing tens of thousands, news stories of lockdowns,, social distancing and overwhelmed hospitals have been making the headlines just about everywhere.

Newsrooms have been working overtime to keep the communities they serve updated. Audiences have surged. Apart from news reports, people are turning to analyses and commentaries, videos and explainers, to help them make sense of the fast-evolving and far-reaching crisis.

Amid the welter of information swirling about on social media, professional newsrooms that have long invested in building expertise have been meeting the public's hunger for objective reporting, based on journalists speaking to informed sources, providing context and perspective, drawing on historical knowledge and institutional memory.

These have also helped inoculate communities against that  other virus that is on the rampage - fake news, which is sowing anxiety and confusion, as well as undermining the public's trust in the reliability of information they receive at this critical time.

In the process, some reporters have succumbed to the coronavirus while on the job, having to be isolated and quarantined. Some newsrooms have had to evacuate hurriedly, with staff rushing home, laptops in hand, to try to keep their platforms updated and the presses rolling.

THE DANGER OF 'NEWS DESERTS' AND 'INFODEMICS'

But here's the heart-breaking news: Among the victims in the intensive care unit, gasping for breath, are some of the media organisations themselves, alongside many others from sectors that have also been hard hit, from aviation to retail.

Several, especially local and vernacular titles, might not be able to meet their financial commitments, or even pay staff salaries, in the months ahead.

Advertising is drying up, plunging by between 30 per cent and 80 per cent, according to a recent survey by the World Association of News Publishers. Revenues from media-related events, a new and growing source of funds, have also plunged as social distancing measures are put in place.

Many newsrooms, including The Straits Times, have also made content on the pandemic freely available, as a public service, thereby constraining their ability to grow revenues from subscriptions.

The upshot of this is both ironic and tragic: At a time when audiences are turning increasingly to established media titles, as recent surveys have shown, newsrooms are seeing their resources gutted, and some are even being shut.

In the United States, Gannett, the largest American newspaper chain, announced last week plans to cut salaries and lay off some staff temporarily, while Rupert Murdoch's News Corp has said it will stop print editions of 60 newspapers in Australia, with similar measures being taken in the United Kingdom and elsewhere.

This has heightened concerns about the emergence of "news deserts" - communities with no access to local government and community news as media groups cease to exist there.

There is also much angst over "ghost newsrooms", titles that are snapped up by investors as they are still profitable, who then slash their reporting capabilities to boost margins, resulting in a lack of resources to produce local, original or independent content.

The implications of these developments for society are grave. At a time when communities are most in need of critical information, many newsrooms are increasingly hampered and finding it harder to deliver on their mission.

This has led the World Health Organisation to warn of a coming "infodemic", with misinformation spreading and undermining public trust at a crucial time.

To be sure, the financial struggles faced by newsrooms are hardly news. Oxford historian Timothy Garton Ash pointed to this in a keynote address at the St Gallen Symposium in Switzerland in May 2017.

He said: "Very simply, the Internet is destroying the business model of newspapers. For at least two centuries, we have had a public good - news, the information we need for democracy - delivered by private means... People would pay for a newspaper and (there was also) advertising revenue. The Internet has just knocked away both these pillars. So the newspapers produce the information. Facebook and Google get the profit.

"And this has a very negative effect on the newspapers on which we have relied for our news... The amount of serious news, investigative journalism and foreign reporting is going down because that's expensive.

"This is a real problem for the journalism we need for democracy."

Covid-19, however, has mercilessly compounded this challenge and hastened both the shift to digital and the plunge in advertising.

ALTERNATIVE FUNDING MODELS

So, is there an antidote to the virus-induced media malaise? Among the proposals that media leaders have been making urgently to their stakeholders are these:

• Declaring the media an essential service: To enable journalists to go about their jobs during lockdowns, keeping newsrooms functioning and news agents running;

• Granting financial assistance: These include tax breaks or holidays, short-term loans and wage subsidies to help newsrooms pay their staff and bills in the face of falling revenues. Denmark has set up a €25 million (S$39 million) fund which will grant news outlets that have recently seen revenues fall by between 30 per cent and 50 per cent relief of up to 60 per cent of their losses, while in Lithuania, state subsidies are also given for critical infrastructure such as broadcasting and printing facilities;

• Giving tax incentives for advertisers and subscribers: In Italy, advertisers are given tax deductions of 30 per cent of their spending in newspapers and online, while Canada allows subscribers to news titles to claim tax relief;

• Stepping up government advertising: Public education campaigns tied to the pandemic can help make up for the fall in private advertising;

• Making Big Tech pay: Technology platforms should be pressed, as France has done, to make more meaningful contributions to the news outlets they rely on for content.

But while these steps might see media groups through the crisis, they are not without risks. Not least of which is the damage that could be done to the credibility of the media if it becomes overly dependent on state funding. This is especially a concern in societies with painful experiences of governments seeking to muzzle the media, through cuts in funding and advertising, shutdowns of newsrooms and even arrests of journalists.

To safeguard against this, beyond the crisis, new business models will also have to be fashioned to ensure the media remains viable and sustainable for the long haul.

Various experiments are now under way. While some big players like The New York Times and Financial Times are growing subscription revenues from readers, others such as The Washington Post, South China Morning Post and Los Angeles Times have been bought by wealthy business leaders, who have given these newsrooms a boost by investing in journalism and technology.

Elsewhere, media groups have been given mandates by the state, with funding for public service broadcasts and journalism, as in France, Britain and the Scandinavian countries.

WHAT'S AT STAKE

Some newsrooms have opted to be public trusts or not-for-profit companies, with a mission to provide public service journalism, such as The Guardian in the UK, and The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Salt Lake Tribune in the US, and also Japan's Nikkei group.

Which of these models works best remains unclear; nor perhaps is there likely to be one model that works for all, given the very different political histories and cultures that newsrooms operate in around the world.

This much is certain: The coronavirus pandemic might have begun as a public health crisis, but some wrenching economic, social and political changes could follow in the months to come.

People and communities will need to make sense of developments unfolding around them as well as to figure out the way forward. To do so, citizens and voters will need news organisations they consider credible, which they can rely on, and trust.

The writer is president of the World Editors Forum (WEF), a network of editors that is part of the World Association of News Publishers. This opinion piece was endorsed by members of the board of the WEF, in solidarity with newsrooms around the world.

Warren Fernandez

Editor-in-Chief

Live: 'New China' “全景中国”，出发！

https://youtu.be/VMjYxdFr6MI

Live: The launch of CGTN's special program
 
2019 marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. 70 years ago, China was a country that had fought its way through several wars. Now it is the second biggest economy in the world. To show our audiences an in-depth look at China 70 years on, CGTN is bringing you a special program called "New China." As our crew prepares to kick off the 12-day journey to southwest, southeast, and northeast China in three mobile studios, join us for the launch event.

China's fast development 中国的高速发展"

https://youtu.be/viRjnVMARKA

Celebrating Chinese mid-autumn festival from across China 全国各地共度中秋

https://youtu.be/RT7plNFRtXo

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Ask anyone among the older generations in Hong Kong about the economic relationship between the Chinese mainland and the special administrative region (SAR), they will keenly share countless stories of mutual support uplifting each other over the years through hardships.

International community visits Xinjiang to dispel Western bias against region

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People's Daily criticizes USA as " source of turnmoi in the world "

霸气！党报狠批美国为世界“动荡之源”

导读:尽管和平与发展是当今世界的主题，但是局部冲突依旧不断，而这背后，或多或少都有美国在插手。

党报狠批美国_英语新闻网

The People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of China, has criticized the United States as the "source of turmoil in the world."

北京9月18日电 中国共产党官方报纸《人民日报》批评美国为“世界动荡之源”。

The newspaper on Sunday published three articles by Chinese scholars to analyze the causes of expansive and hegemonic moves by the United States from systemic, ideological and strategic perspectives.

《人民日报》于周日发表了三篇由中国学者撰写的文章，从内在体制、意识形态、国家战略方面分析美国的扩张和霸权主义运动。

An editor’s note on the page said that U.S. interventions are behind unrest and disputes in many places, including the Middle East, Eastern Europe and the South China Sea.

报纸上一位编者的卷首语写道，多地的动荡和纷争背后都有美国的插手，包括中东、东欧和南海。

"The United States is keen to make messes in the world, cast shadows on order and stability in multiple regions and jeopardize peace and development in relevant countries," the note said.

“美国热衷于在世界制造混乱，给多个地区的秩序与稳定投下阴影，对相关国家的和平与发展构成威胁。”卷首语写道。

An article by Yang Guangbin, a professor of politics at Renmin University, pointed out that the "military-industrial complex," which former U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned against, is "kidnapping U.S. domestic and diplomatic policy."

杨光斌，人民大学政治学教授在文中指出，美国前总统艾森豪威尔曾警告说，“军事工业复合体”正“绑架着美国的国内和外交政策”。

The "military-industrial complex" naturally demands war and military expansion, resulting in the Iraq war, "Arab Spring" uprisings and growing tensions with Russia and China, Yang said.

“军事工业复合体”自然是要求战争和军事扩张，这就导致了伊拉克战争、“阿拉伯之春”起义以及与俄罗斯和中国关系的不断紧张。

Yang also criticized the United States for selling its ideology, which has brainwashed the elite in some non-Western countries.

杨光斌还批评了美国推广其意识形态，这洗脑了一些非西方国家的精英分子。

"Countries that have followed American-style ’liberty and democracy’ are not turning into American-style states. Instead, their lives remain the same, or even become worse," the article said.

文章写道，“信奉美国‘自由民主’的国家并没有因此而变成美国式国家，依然过着自己固有的日子，甚至境况更差。”

Another article by Li Wen, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, noted that the United States’ eagerness to make trouble around the world is due to its "hegemonic anxiety."

另外一篇由中国社科院的一位研究人员撰写的文章写道，由于“霸权焦虑症”，美国急切地想要煽风点火。

It is "to a large degree, a reflection of a twisted mentality of an empire moving downhill," according to the article.

文章写道，这“很大程度上是一个衰落中的帝国特有的心理扭曲在行为上的反映。”

The scholar also denounced the United States’ measures to contain China by causing trouble in East Asia.

这位学者还谴责了美国通过在东亚制造事端包围中国的措施。

A third article by Lin Hongyu, a professor at Huaqiao University, said U.S. maneuvers in the Asia-Pacific region are just part of its overseas expansion and interventionist diplomacy to maintain its leading international role.

第三篇文章由华侨大学教授林宏宇写道，他表示，美国在亚太地区的军事演习只是其海洋扩张和干预外交的一部分，目的是为了维持主导的国际地位。

The article called on Chinese authorities to manage disputes between China and the United States in a constructive way and to build a new type of major-country relationship together.

这篇文章呼吁中国政府以建设性的方式处理中美之间的争端，共同建立一种新型的大国关系。

Source: 编辑:David Yang (人民网) 双语

http://news.iyuba.com/m/essay/2016/09/19/49492.html

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British media 'barbarians' need lessons

'Barbarians' in UK media should learn manners from 5,000 years of Chinese history

While the rest of the world is discussing unguarded comments made by Queen Elizabeth II saying that Chinese officials were "very rude" during Xi Jinping's state visit last year, Chinese state media has only seen fit to author a single editorial on the subject.

Chinese-language editorial (see below) published earlier today,  the Global Times said that "barbarians" in the British media had blown the incident out of proportion and they could stand to learn some manners from 5,000 years of Chinese culture, via SCMP:

“The West in modern times has risen to the top and created a brilliant civilization, but their media is full of reckless ‘gossip fiends’ who bare their fangs and brandish their claws and are very narcissistic, retaining the bad manners of ‘barbarians’,” it said in an editorial.

“As they experience constant exposure to the 5,000 years of continuous Eastern civilisation, we believe they will make progress” when it comes to manners, it added in the Chinese-language piece, which was not published in English.

For its part, the Global Times simply shrugged off the Queen's comments: “It is not surprising that there are off the record complaints. Chinese diplomats must have mocked British officials privately."

The Queen mocked Chinese officials in private comments that were made public during a garden party in Buckingham Palace. The 90-year-old monarch spoke candidly with the officer in charge of security during last year's state visit -- which was said to have kicked off the "Golden Era in UK-China relations" -- while a camera rolled nearby, picking up their conversation.

The video and the Queen's remarks have made headlines across the world. However, the official reaction in China has been very muted. When asked by reporters at a regular Q&A session yesterday if that "Golden Era" still continues today, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lu Kang opted to neither confirm nor deny.

Felicia Sonmez from The Wall Street Journal also asked if China thinks that the video was released on purpose. "I think you should refer your question to those who put the footage on the website," Lu replied, though that question was later deleted from the official transcript of the briefing.

Meanwhile, a report on the Queen's comments carried by BBC World News was blanked out in China.

Last October, both sides declared that the state visit was "very successful." The Queen herself said that it was “a milestone in the unprecedented year of co-operation and friendship between the United Kingdom and China.” Prime Minister David Cameron said that the trip had managed to drum up $58 billion in Chinese investment.

With those economic ties in mind, the Global Times sees the Queen's comments as very minor. “The Sino-UK relationship will not be influenced by this. The Golden Era is based on profound interests,” the editorial said.

Of course, the Queen wasn't the only one to make an epic political gaffe this week. While talking to Her Royal Majesty and the Archbishop of Canterbury at Buckingham Palace, David Cameron boasted about the quality of attendees he has arriving at an anti-corruption summit in London later in the week, seemingly unaware of the cameras that recorded him saying:

"We have got the Nigerians - actually we have got some leaders of some fantastically corrupt countries coming to Britain."

He went on: "Nigeria and Afghanistan - possibly two of the most corrupt countries in the world."

The Global Times editorial took a jab at these twin blunders, writing: "But among the Western countries, Britain is one of those that gets caught with its pants down and exposes itself most often.” It's hard to argue with that assessment, following Cameron's remarks, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari urged the UK to return assets stolen by corrupt officials. "I am not going to demand any apology from anybody. What I am demanding is the return of the assets," Buhari said at the anti-graft event.

Many have argued that while Cameron's comments may have just been foolish, the Queen's comments were publicized in order to cause chaos in improving UK-China relations, as an indirect attack against Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne. The Global Times was quick to reject this claim, saying that "if they had deliberately done so, that would have been truly crude and rude."

Meanwhile, others have pointed to Queen Elizabeth's umbrella as the true mastermind behind this whole fiasco, The Daily Telegraph reports:

Sources told The Daily Telegraph that the reason the Queen’s comments were audible on the TV footage was because her clear plastic umbrella, which she uses to allow people to see her while sheltering from the rain, had acted like the cone in a loudspeaker, amplifying her voice towards the microphone.

“If she had been holding an umbrella made of fabric, it wouldn’t have happened,” an insider said.

“But because it’s plastic, it reflects the sound like a satellite dish.” - SCMP

社评：英媒爆炒女王私话，八卦术折服全球

英国女王伊丽莎白二世10日在白金汉宫花园举办下午茶会，与伦敦警察署女警官德奥丝有一段私聊。女王的摄影师把它拍了下来，后来不知怎么着漏了出去，英国媒体一顿爆炒。

　　德奥丝是去年中国领导人对英国国事访问时安保工作的“警方首席指挥官”，视频中她向女王抱怨中方与她打交道的官员“粗鲁”，做得“不合外交礼仪”。女王应和了她。英国媒体对这段视频如获至宝，不仅有些当“头条”报，还分别向英中外交部以及英王室问询态度和反应。

　　英国王室和外交部的回应都是：中国领导人对英国的国事访问获得圆满成功，各方通力密切合作，确保了国事访问的顺利进行。中国外交部也做了类似表态，强调访问的成功，以及双方对两国工作团队的努力给予了高度认同。

西方媒体最喜欢报花边消息，而英国王室和英国政府似乎中招的时候最多，经常被媒体揪住小辫。就在同一天，卡梅伦首相同女王和大主教等的私聊也被拍了视频，卡梅伦当时聊得很嗨，称尼日利亚和阿富汗“可能是世界上最腐败的两个国家”，而尼阿两国领导人12日、也就是今天将参加伦敦举行的国际反腐败会议。

　　国家关系越亲密，官员们打交道越多，彼此“有看不顺眼的时候”应当说很正-常，“自己人”私下抱怨几句也没啥大不了的。中国外交官私下里想必也奚落过英国的官僚们。中国互联网上的评论是公开的，去年女王曾被中国网民比喻成“西太后”，卡梅伦被比喻成“李中堂”，当时编排他们的段子红遍中国网络社区。

　　然而中国外交官们做事严谨，很多西方大国也搞得跟“外交无小事”似的，媒体很难逮住官员们议论他国的“私话”。在这方面英国即使在西方国家中也是最经常“露内裤”和“走光”的之一，跟它有一拼的是美国，白宫最近几届的主人似乎都有“忘记关麦克风”的时候。

　　不可想象英国官方故意把这些视频漏出去，因为相信他们知道一旦故意那样做，才是真正的粗鲁和无礼。那是很不文明的市侩做法，自尊的英王室大概更会重视那样的底线。

　　然而“整个英国”还是有些嬉皮士，英媒对八卦的迷恋似乎到了要让一切都“腥”起来的程度。看在这个国家对人类近代史贡献颇丰的份上，让我们主动为它做个解释吧：人都会有毛病，伟大的国家也是一样。 　　相信中英关系不会受到此次事件的影响，两国间“黄金时代”是由深厚利益打造的，而在这两个历史悠久的国度里，理性都有着不可撼动的地位。

　　中国已经站在拥有了全球影响因而树大招风的位置上，世界上的秘闻奇事层出不穷，但那些能跟中国沾上边的，就更容易被发现出来，炒成“一件事”。中国人终将会见怪不怪，耳根子也会越磨越硬。

　　西方自近代以来走到了前面，创造了辉煌文明。但那里媒体不管不顾的“八卦狂”们既张牙舞爪，又很自恋，似乎留了些“蛮夷”的不文雅。然而我们同样相信，在与东方五千年文明的不断接触中，他们会进步的。

国际新闻_环球网

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Information is power, overloaded, who and where can we trust?

A global survey gauging trust in society finds that people of a feather really do flock together.

THE person you see in the mirror is the most trusted.”

No, that is not a self-help mantra or nostalgia for Michael Jackson’s old hit Man in the Mirror.

Rather, as the 2016 Edelman Trust Barometer reveals, that is a common belief in the world when it comes to trust.

People now are increasingly reliant on a “person like yourself” (rising 6% in trust) more than the “leaders” of society like CEOs, government officials, technical experts or even academic experts, according to global communications firm Edelman’s annual survey that measures trust levels in the world.

Says Edelman Malaysia managing director Robert Kay, it reflects the way people in Malaysia are increasingly sharing and weighing information and opinions online.

“When it comes to information on social networking sites, content sharing sites and online-only information, Malaysians trust friends and families more at 74% compared to a company CEO at 57% or elected officials at 53%,” shares Kay at the launch of the Barometer in Kuala Lumpur last Tuesday.

For its fifth survey in Malaysia, Edelman polled 1,350 Malaysians online from October to November last year.

What some might find surprising is that in today’s celebrity-obsessed world, online personalities rake in only 45% “believers”, while celebrities rank last in their trustworthiness at 30%.

Interestingly, Malaysians’ overall trust in online content, specifically that shared on social media has dipped seven points to 42%.

Kay points to the rampant sharing of misinformation online in the past year as the main reason.

Consequently, search engines hold their lead as the most trusted source for information at 66%, he adds, as people feel they have more control over what they read and see.

The rise in peer-to-peer trust inevitably coincides with the decline in public faith in public institutions and the business world.

Faith in the press among the “informed public”, however, has jumped 13% – from 46% last year to 59% this year.

Asked how much they trust the media – on a scale of zero to nine – to do the right thing, Malaysian citizens say they have a lot more faith in the press than before.

This, says Edelman, puts Malaysia’s more informed citizens’ trust in media at the same level as the elite of the United States.

“Malaysia has one of the biggest rises in media trust among the informed public globally, possibly due to the constant coverage of alleged corruption at 1MDB,” Kay notes, stressing that it is crucial for the media to continue pursuing rigorous, balanced and transparent reporting to maintain credibility.

While the survey did not distinguish between trust in local and international media, the trust in the media in Asia highlights the perceived role of the media in this region, Edelman Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa CEO David Brain reportedly said in Mumbrella Asia, a discussion site on the region’s media.

“The media – through Western eyes – is expected to keep politicians to account, but in Asian countries such as Singapore and Malaysia, there is ‘a social contract that the role of the media is about nation building’, and less about revealing the truth,” Brain had explained.

In a panel discussion on the Barometer results, The Malaysian Insider CEO Jahabar Sadiq points out that even as trust in business captains and political leaders fell, those who are perceived to be critical and caring of society and are vocal on social media, such as CIMB group chairman Datuk Seri Nazir Razak and former Cabinet minister Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz, are deemed as “trustworthy”.

Comparing Malaysia to Britain and the United States, Umno Youth exco member Shahril Hamdan suggests the dip in public trust towards the government is a natural development as the nation matures.

“As democracy matures, the cynicism level of people toward the government increases.

“Regardless of how the government communicates or performs, people will put less trust in the government and its leaders.”

Maxis Malaysia Head of Consumer Business Dushyanthan Vathiyanathan believes that it is time for public institutions and the business sector to transform and engage more with people.

“People now are interested in knowing what is happening and not in what you tell them.

By Hariati Azizan The Star/Asia News Network

“You have to be transparent with them and inform them of anything and everything. That’s because now they have information and do their checks.”

Related:

Panel Discussion of the 2016 Edelman Trust Barometer for Malaysia



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