Reforms in the media must be done professionally, through debate and separate regulation is needed for internet portals in order to avoid abuse, was the conclusion from the conference “e-society” on “Media and Policy” organized by the Foundation for Internet and Society “Metamorphosis”.
Minister of Information Society and Administration, Damjan Mancevski, believes that online portals are part of the problems in the media because behind some portals, we do not know who their owners are, and whether they are offshore companies.
As a special issue in the media sphere, Mancevski highlighted the phenomenon of fake news.
“The youth from Veles are brought up in a society of fake news. We can not, as a country or a government, deal with this problem on our own, but we need cooperation on a global scale. There is also an ethical problem, in terms of where the level of regulation of the media goes, whether we will violate someone’s privacy or whether there will be censorship. We are open for cooperation and dialogue”, said Mancevski.
Fani Karanfilova- Panevska, the executive director of the Foundation “Open Society” – Macedonia, emphasized that without civil society, which will be professional and an objective critic of the government, will not realize what is needed.
“The question here is whether freedom is possible, without serious protection of privacy. Is the extreme protection of privacy also a restriction of freedom? In my opinion, freedom is more important than privacy, because I need freedom to protect my privacy”, said Karanfilova-Panovska.
Program Director of the Metamorphosis Foundation, Filip Stojanovski, believes that media reforms are very important because they are the fourth power in society, who keeps all the others accountable.
