The Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) and Presidential Security Group (PSG) conducted the Digital Media Forum with the theme, “Advocating Positive Change Through Digital Media” held on Tuesday, March 7, at Kalayaan Hall in Malacañan Palace, Manila. The forum’s live broadcast on PCOO’s Facebook account reached more than 1.3 million people.
Forum speakers include former Department of Interior and Local Government secretary Rafael Alunan III, PCOO secretary Martin Andanar, Globe vice president Yoly Crisanto, and Newsbytes Philippines founder Marlon Magtira. RockEd Philippines founder Therese “Gang” Badoy Capati also joined in the discussion. PSG assistant chief of staff for civil-military operations Lt. Col. Michael Aquino, facilitated the forum.
“Digital media innovations have indeed offered us new opportunities in reaching more people to promote our organizations’ advocacies more efficiently,” PSG Commander Brig. Gen. Bautista said.
“As we reach and engage more people in the digital world, we build our organizations’ reputation in the process. As protectors of change, the PSG is not only strong in its mandate to protect the physical well-being of the leader of our land, but also to support his initiatives in the digital sphere,” Brig. Gen. Bautista said.
Andanar stressed that digital media will play a bigger role in the future of the nation and there is a clear need for its truthful and quality content. “The thrust to support social media reflects the administration’s commitment to public accountability,” Andanar said
“This administration is all about transparency,” Andanar said. “Transparency can be achieved through constant engagement, which can be achieved with digital media,” a comment in the live feed thread said.
Andanar said the Duterte administration is crafting guidelines that will allow bloggers to cover Malacañang events along with mainstream media.
Alunan said parents should be responsible for their children’s use of social media. “It offers our kids new ways to access communication and entertainment but let’s put it this way — the long-term effects on our children are still unknown because there are pluses and negatives,” Alunan said.
“Social media is an important part of socialization that markets goods and services as well as motivate people to become part of a larger community,” Alunan said.
Hinting that digital media triggered the proliferation of fake news, Capati said it traces its roots to the tendency of humans to tell lies. Badoy said the best defense would be to be more discerning about consuming news online and be more responsible in reading all dimensions, including contradictory positions on issues.
“There are a lot of opportunities on digital media for any organization. Making the digital connection can held build relationships with constituents that can create an efficient venue for promoting our advocacies,” Magtira said.
“We recognize that change has really come with respect to the digital media landscape. we recognize that digital media would be an efficient platform to disseminate what we do—that we are not only here to ensure the safety and security of the commander in chief and the president but also assist him in positively changing as well as uniting this country,” Brig. Gen. Bautista said.
“We are bent on leveraging the power of modern technologies to disseminate information about the positive change we now observe in our country,” Brig. Gen. Bautista continued.