Image taken from Flickr user ob124
Over the past few days a story about Crimean Tatar newspapers has been circulating on Eurasia blogs. The topic is the gradual disappearance of internet editions of Crimean Tatar newspapers, written about a few days ago on an English language Crimean Tatar listserv and then picked up by Paul Goble in a very interesting article at Window on Eurasia.
The decline of these online editions means, among other things, that Crimean Tatar diasporas lose an essential link to the happenings in Crimea. Many of the newspapers or news outlets publish at least partially in Crimean Tatar, so these diasporas are also cut off from Crimean Tatar language publications, of which the internet has few.
It seems trivial to compare this to my own experience, but I can't help thinking about how much I depend on American news sources and, of course, English language news. Yes, there is little chance of escaping news about my fellow Americans, or having a lack of internet material to read in English, but I can certainly relate to the importance of online editions to those living far from home. What would I do without my Google Reader feeds and my daily fix of cruising the front pages of my favorite newspapers? Of course in this case the situation is much more sobering than missing out on a news fix with your morning coffee.
Of course it is not just diasporas affected by the loss of online newspapers. In former Soviet countries internet publications have played an especially important role in the development of the press. Online news sources, for example, are also frequently listed as an important force in the time leading up to the Orange Revolution. Goble concludes the article by remarking:
The death of a newspaper is always a tragedy, but the demise of Internet papers from places like Crimea is an even greater one, not only because of the continuing crisis there but also because it serves as a warning to those who believed that the Internet would change everything by giving those who had been kept silent a way of speaking to the world.I suppose I will also close on that note.
1 comment:
That's really tragic, especially for Crimean Tatars living outside of Crimea, like you said. I can't imagine what it would be like not having American news SOMEWHERE.
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