National Alliance of Bloggers: The Journey Begins

Technorati tags: National Alliance of Bloggers, Malaysia, Blogging

Walski's lateness apology: This post comes a lot, lot later than Walski had hoped, but just got back from a day-trip to Kuantan, so didn't manage to get this out earlier.

April 5th, 2007 - a date for Malaysian bloggers to remember. After several discussions and deliberations, the Naional Alliance of Bloggers kicked off yesterday evening at the National Press Club. The innaugural meeting was attended by the Malaysian who's who of blogging, with such blog luminaries as Rocky, Jeff Ooi, Raja Petra Kamaruddin, Datuk Ron, Malik Imtiaz Sarwar, Elizabeth Wong, Nuraina Samad, Mob1900, Patrick Teoh, Zorro (Unmasked), Politikus... and many, many others in attendance for this very historic meeting. Also in attendance was Susan Loone, who had just flown in from Bangkok, (almost) specifically for this meeting. Oh, and Anon from Miri definitely came to KL just for this, and it was a pleasure to finally meet the person behind the name.

The purpose of this meeting was to kick-start the Bloggers Alliance, which is to serve two primary purposes - as a recognized body to protect and to promote blogging and bloggers. And by recognized, Walski means that the alliance will be an entity that will be registered with the Registrar of Societies (ROS).

Rocky started the meeting with his opening address, where he outlined the purpose of the alliance, and some of the aspirations that such an alliance can bring.

And we definitely need parking space as anyone attending the meeting will gladly attest to!
(more of the report, pictures, and links to other reports, in the full post)

Several other key blogging individuals then took the stage to voice their opinions and share their experiences and anecdotes. Among those who spoke included:

Shieh aka Kickdefella

Jeff Ooi

Patrick Teoh

Band of Sister Bloggers (led by Susan Loone)

and of course, the evening wouldn't have been complete without a few words from

Raja Petra Kamaruddin

There were a few others who spoke as well - unfortunately Walski didn't manage to capture those moments on camera.

All in all, everyone there was in support of the formation of the alliance, albeit some initial disagreement as to what to call it. Initially, the plan was to call it the National Media Bloggers Alliance. However, a number of us, Patrick Teoh, in particular, felt that to be specific would be to exclude possibly a large majority of bloggers. And so a more inclusive name was decided upon.

Next on the agenda was to select the Pro Tem Committee. And this went off without any major hitch, officiated by Shanghai Fish. The task of this committee would be formulate the alliance's constitution and other matters working towards registering the alliance with ROS. The Pro Tem committee, selected by the blogging community in attendence (their real names):
► President: Ahirudin Attan
► Vice President: Jeff Ooi
► Secretary: Nuraina A. Samad
► Treasurer: Tony Yew
► Council Members: Patrick Teoh, Bernard Khoo, Syed Azidi Syed Abdul Aziz, Syed Jamal Al-Idrus, Rajahram Ramalingam, Annuratha K, Ami Husni, and Soon Li Tsin.
(interesting identity hint: Walski is one of the council members)

Pro Tem President Rocky and VP Jeff

On a more personal note, Walski was glad that he finally managed to meet a number of people whom he feels are important, not just as far as blogging is concerned, but also important in the bigger picture of what they do, like Malik Imtiaz Sarwar, Haris Ibrahim, Susan Loone, Nizam Bashir, and Raja Petra Kamaruddin.

And thus, the National Alliance of Bloggers takes its first baby steps, in what is surely a worthwile journey! It is perhaps cosmic synchronicity that yesterday, Jeff decided to post on another equally momentous journey that happened exactly 77 years ago.

And with the Pro Tem committee set up, our own journey begins...

Walski's roundup footnote: Apart from Walski's, do check out these other reports and commentaries of yesterday's meeting (this is definitely not an exhaustive list):
► Rocky
► Jeff Ooi's Screenshots
► Kickdefella
► Big Dog
► 3450 Jalan Sudin
► Aisehman
► and too many more to mention in a simple list