Talking about online newspapers

Media, both electronic and print, in a modern representative democratic country is said to be the most indispensable entity advocating the views and thoughts of the mass people towards the mechanism of the state. In the age of information and technology people have an easy access to the world of information. Therefore, government should create an environment for the mass people to reveal their opinions as part of the integrated approach to build a welfare state. What can be the easy-going substitute for this effort other than the access to online newspapers? Well, media particularly the online based media, has created the opportunity to get people to have an entry into the world of news and information.
Online newspaper in this regard is a step ahead. People facilitated with mobile phones now can come to know about any event within 24 hours of its happening across the whole world through online newspapers. And when it comes to talking about the online newspapers in Bangladesh, it can be boldly said that the country is going along well with the digitalization process that the country adopted as a part of its development process. Many online newspapers operate in our country now, but how many of them are working professionally is often a crucial question arising in the public mind.
Apart from the objectives a newspaper is likely to fulfil, online newspapers like other newspapers employ a lot of personnel to work as journalists. In that sense it creates employment opportunities, for instance, for the fresh graduates as well. There may be some, who may feel bothered about buying a newspaper, and can avail themselves of reading online newspapers on their mobile phones. There are some places, the remote places of the country in particular, where daily newspapers are not easily available, or the people there cannot afford to buy one; they can learn about the latest news on the online newspaper as almost all of them possess, at least, a mobile phone of their own.
But the media which has always been the spokesman for the mass people, has equally and incongruously been biased towards some ghastly news it publishes either for cheap popularity or for serving the interest of its owners. A democratic country requires a strong media since the whole population of that country represents the government or they make a representative government; every industrialist now in many of such countries insists on possessing a media of their own, at least an online newspaper, for they know the political culture requires the capitalist-industrialists to be patronized by major parties of the country. They know they need media coverage to defend their misdeeds and corruption and draw public sentiments in favour of their stance.
Furthermore, in a modern democratic country there is every possibility for an industrialist of becoming a billionaire overnight as democracy always stands by capitalistic economy creating all the chances to gear it up. The capitalists in their own interests, propose to own a newspaper, particularly an online newspaper which is comparatively easier to run. And when they gain the patronization of a political party, they serve news in favour of the party they are in. This can be understood from the pictures displayed on the online media.
Apart from these, many of the news items published in the online newspaper, tend to draw public attention by presenting highly spiced and luscious news. Such news items, by and large, prove to be cock and bull stories to the readers as they are not drawn from the factual sources. These news items do not have any concrete ground since they are drawn from some other newspapers and various unknown sources. They are simply 'copy and paste' products. In such cases, what they do, for instance, is publish scandalous and outrageous stories about any cultural celebrity and reputed political personality either to serve their business needs or to smash up that person's career.
What's more, the online newspapers have undoubtedly generated  employment opportunities for journalists, but the unnoticed closure of the online newspapers leaving a lot of them unemployed, may also lead the family of those journalists to a catastrophic consequence. So the journalists working in the online newspaper remain vulnerable to such dangers of abrupt closure since they are not able to manage a new job as soon as they need it.        
Regardless of a few partisan facts, online newspapers have proved to be of great help to the people of the 21st century. In this age of hectic pace of life some people may not have enough time to go through a newspaper, but they can very easily have a glance around the happenings of the twenty-four hours on the monitor of their mobile phones. They, therefore, can save their time and avoid carrying a newspaper with them. One more example may be cited in this regard;  Garment workers, for instance, usually go out for their work early in the morning and return in the evening, and sometimes late at night. How can they get to know of the happenings around them as they can not afford the luxury of a newspaper nor do they have enough time to go through one. But in most cases, it is found that the garment workers own mobile phones and read newspapers online.
The present government has announced the digitisation process of the country, and has set a time frame to achieve the goal; this is undeniably a good news for the people of this country. Online newspaper is also a part of this digitisation process. Like many other developed countries of the world, if Bangladesh continues to keep pace with this flow, it is not far away when we shall be able to speak aloud that we have fulfilled our dream.                               
[email protected]