Today’s GP lesson was fruitful and yet wastefull. We had a great discussion about the evolution of blogs and its effects on our Singapore society. I somewhat attempted to answer the question and got a 5 out of 9 marks. I’ve never gotten above a 2 or a 3. I was quite surprised. But i lacked depth in my analysis and was making a lot of generalisations. At first the two comprehension passages on the democratization of blogging was blur to me. As i read it again today, i understood the arguments of the author. I said wasteful, because our tutor wasted a lot of time ranting and advicing us on how we should approach the question. Whatever she said was good, but she kept on repeating her points again and again. And she keeps emphasising on the length of our AQ (Application Question). I clearly don’t understand why. The length doesn’t matter, only the quality does. One might have written a lot of crap in that lengthy AQ for all i care.

The AQ had covered largely in the area of how blogging is good and bad for the country in general. It allows for the exchange of ideas between people on an equal footing, it promotes a mature discussion of taboo/controversial topics, it creates a Singaporean Identity as the different races come together and more importantly, it relieves our apathy for politics. On the other hand, blogging can misguide the public and easily influence people since most of the blogs have no basis for whatever they claim. Any content that is racially discriminating can disrupt the racial harmony in our mutli-racial society. The government would certainly never allow for that. However, the AQ could also have included the benefits and problems of blogging to the individual person.

It could also have included the emergence of increased advertising in blogging. A lot of blogs nowadays contains Adsense or something like that. The blogs feature ads that will earn money for the bloggers in a per-click basis. This is a new avenue for the advertisers, as blogging becomes more and more ubiquitous. However, a lot of blogs today give first-hand consumer advice, on what products to buy and so forth. There are blogs that advice on what laptops are suitable for a college going student, or what computer software to purchase. With such advice more easily available, why would people want to click an adsense ad? Or any kind of ad for that matter. We might just as well go search for blogs that offer such advice, if we have the need to buy a certain product and are desperately in need for an advice.

Of course, blogging and other related programmes like the Youtube, Movable Type, Friendster and so on can never replace the mainstream media. While people might spend a lot of their time sitting in front of their computer and reading other people’s blogs, they have to turn to the local news channel or BBC/CNN to get latest news reports and live reporting of news. Not that kind of selective reporting that we see in blogs. Blogs might do a good job in reporting, but they also add a certain individual perspective to it. And furthermore, most of the news reported on blogs are not always true or have sufficient evidence to support their claims.

I have realised that my concentration/focus is not that effective as it used to be previously. Last time, when i was in secondary school, i used to do yoga. Not everyday. But as frequently as possible. I loved doing it. I can’t do very advanced poses. But just something like the cobra pose, the bridge pose and the chair pose. They might seem to be easy to do. Yes, they are. But they can exhaust you soon enough. Yoga is something that clears your mind and refreshes your body. Mix some meditation with it, and you would feel the difference in just a week.

Look at me. I’m just talking. I’m not doing any of this now. I know that the ‘i have no time’ excuse is a stupid one. I should at least do the 10-minute meditation to keep my mind in focus. Trust me, those who do it know its effects, the 10-minute meditation is really good. The difference might not be noticeable now. But it really helps. You would start sleeping peacefully, and thinking clearly. You would notice that your breathing has improved. And that your concentration has also improved. I should take my own advice now.