Out there in the international arena, among Kenya’s prospective guests, there was a void

Some opportunities come by only once in a long, long while. The frenzy that surrounded rumours about a bomb in Nairobi this week was an occasion to show media prowess. But the opportunity went with the wind, basically because the country doesn’t really have the kind of media that would have best covered this.

Under what has emerged as questionable circumstances, the United States slapped yet another terror alert on Nairobi. Only hours later our broadcast stations, Kenya Television Network and Nation TV, brought us the verdict — the Nairobi Stock Exchange tipped downward, and the shilling got a shake.

The next morning, Thursday, the Daily Nation hit the streets with the headline, "Kenya’s fury at bomb alert by US embassy". The paper told the story of government officials seething with rage at what has been termed irresponsible behaviour by a US official in Nairobi, who is accused of causing the costly panic.

Yet the story would have been best told by New Media, on-line journalism. Here is how:

The country wakes up to CNN flashing across the world footage of high-ranking US officials announcing in Washington the terror alert on Nairobi. But a magnanimous British High Commissioner Edward Clay defiantly goes out to eat breakfast in the very hotels said to be death traps — The Stanley and the Hilton.

That is a picture that tells the opposite story 10 times more effectively than a presidential statement. And who is there to tell the story to a world that craves instant news? Only broadcast reporters — whose audience are local; and print reporters — whose stories would be read the next day.

Where this news mattered most — out there in the international arena, among Kenya’s prospective guests — there was a total void.

Had our media been on-line sensitive, what we would have seen last Wednesday is adrenaline-driven reporters pouncing on developing stories with claws drawn. Back in the newsrooms, on-line editors would be running over each other webcasting raw pictures of the United Kingdom’s senior-most official in the region nonchalantly eating breakfast at The Stanley.

Ten thousand kilometres across the Mediterranean and the Pacific, stunning teasers and leads would instantly pop up in Google. The world would instantly know the real picture on the ground. And some 120 tourists in northern Italy who were preparing to cancel their flight to Nairobi would most likely disregard the US warnings and bring us the money and job opportunities we so much need.

The media would have played an unprecedented role in helping prop up our tattering economy.

Or take the case two weeks ago. The IMF is in town working to get our country back on the list of creditworthy nations. This is news that prospective investors itch to get their hands on — instantly. But nothing is forthcoming in the only place where the international audience reaches out to for prompt news — the Web.

It is gross underutilisation of technology. It is also a mark of lost opportunity for us on the world playground. We do not yet appreciate the fact that the Web audience is a pretty impatient lot. We cannot expect them to read the next day the information they want on the spur of the moment.

But we are still far from there. Out of nearly a dozen media houses, only the Standard and the Nation carry comprehensive on-line editions of their news coverage. But even they still churn out what is basically an electronic edition of the newspaper. And they still leave what is flaunted as the future of journalism to Web designers, not to journalists.

The picture is different in the world out there, where more and more papers are moving their on-line staff into the main newsroom.

The current edition of the US-based On-line Journalism Review says that many news houses now require reporters to write their daily stories for the Web first and for print second. On-line editors work elbow to elbow with print editors — not off in some basement office.

But in the past few years, many newspapers have decided that having two newsrooms — one for print and one for on-line — doesn’t make much sense. One by one, papers are moving their on-line editorial staff into the main newsroom.

Had we got to this — like last year — it’s a good bet the world would have taken that adverse travel warning much more differently.

Copyright © 2002 . The Standard Ltd