Online journalism worldwide has profound impact on media landscape - Bolashak scholarship graduate Yerzat Tursunkulov
There is still discussion going on the transition to the Western system of higher education in the CIS countries. Do you think that Western education system differs from ours too much? Apart from your education in Great Britain, what impressed you the most during your life abroad?
I studied at the department of journalism of the L. Gumilyov Eurasian University in Astana when I received Bolashak scholarship in 2006 to study abroad. I was admitted to Bachelor degree program at Glyndwr University - one of the youngest higher education institutions of the University of Wales. I have completed my degree program Media studies and Media communications last summer. Three years have passed very quickly. Surely, Western education is completely different from our educational system. Obviously, the western education is much more applied subjects comparing to ours. It means - less theory and more practical experience. However, I would like to talk about another vital aspect of studying abroad. It is the way how person changes while living in different cultural environment. It allows changing person's old perceptions and creating his new vision of the world. Some people change their values and alter their principles. This is what happens to the most of young people who go to gain Western education. Living outside of your own cultural environment gives you a chance to have a look at it from different angle as well. You are able to see your own culture through the prism of different values - in this case through the prism of modern western values. And to certain extent I think this is brilliant. It allows us to not only to see the cultural or social changes of our daily life but also to take actions and to progress further. In these terms, I would like to thank our government for supporting an initiative of our President N. Nazarbayev on establishment Bolashak scholarship program.
Everyone knows how famous and popular is BBC not only in Great Britain, but in the world. You had a chance to study media communications in the heart on new media industry technologies. What sphere would you like to apply your knowledge in?
I am keenly interested in journalism, especially, online journalism. The area of journalism which Kazakhstani media experts call 'online journalism' is actually known as 'new media'. 'New media' means Internet-related media technologies, which do not belong to such traditional forms media as press, radio and television. The Internet itself is new media. The term was coined after the Internet became massively accessible in the beginning of 1990s. Therefore, all Internet-related media technologies can be included into new media phenomenon. New media are highly developed in UK as in the majority of western countries. Cutting-edge media technologies allow British media industry to progress even further. New media industry in Kazakhstan is developing as well but it still is in a primitive form. Therefore, traditional media in Kazakhstan consider online journalism as an optional extra source of information. Online journalism in Kazakhstan has an impact on social level but it is not as influential as press or television. For example, most of Kazakhstani TV channels run their websites. However, there is no video service on those websites - this is what I mean by primitive form. I remember of not being able to watch our channels on the Internet in UK. There is no Kazakhstani TV channel on YouTube website as well. Most of western TV channels started YouTube broadcasting few years ago and they have found out that YouTube is one of the fascinating ways to widen the audience. Another example can be The Guardian website - one of the major British newspapers. The newspaper's website is far more sophisticated than hard print version. The website is not designed to copy the content of the newspaper. The whole concept of the website was set as an interactive multimedia platform bridging journalists and editors with regular readers. It shows that we also can implement this model to our media websites and turn them into interactive multimedia collaboration platform. It will allow content providers to have more information about their audience as well. If they need audience feedback, they can use their website for that purpose. These examples demonstrate how online journalism can contribute to traditional media in many ways. I think this is the time for journalists and editors to stop considering websites as optional 'copy-paste' places for information, and start seeing websites in much more sophisticated ways as interactive platforms for collaboration between journalists and readers.
Is there a big difference between Kazakhstani and UK media industry? What are main problems on our way to go forward?
I reckon there is no point to compare and try to find differences between these two industries since there is a huge gap between them. That is what makes difference. Apart from institutional, legislative or even educational differences, there is one core gap, which is 'technological divide'. UK media industry possesses supremely advanced media technologies. For example, digital media technologies, which allow traditional media forms and new media forms to converge into one multimedia platform. By 2012, there will be no analogue to TV receiver in UK. Kazakhstani specialists are still working on those sorts of technologies. In UK new media, the Internet, which once was considered as an alternative source of information, is turning into mass media by means of social networking and user-generated content. In Kazakhstani media landscape, we can notice these types of conceptual changes but they are not significant. We will eventually face similar conceptual changes but it needs technologies and will take time. I hope that in near future our media industry in terms of technology and content will show progress and attract more dedicated readers.