The inaugural Asia Chinese New Media Conference at the Royal Bintang hotel in Petaling Jaya drew about 100 leading new media practitioners and academics from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macau, Singapore and Malaysia.

According to Malaysiakini Chinese edition founder and editor Yong Kai Ping, the conference aims to facilitate discussions among regional Chinese new media organisations and to brainstorm ideas on the fast evolving new media landscape.

"The response to this conference has been very good. We had to turn away many people who were eager to attend.

"This shows that there is enormous interest in discussing the role of the Chinese new media in promoting democracy, press freedom and the betterment of the journalism industry," said Yong ( above ).

He added that regional discussions of this type on the Chinese new media were scarce and the last conference of a similar nature, albeit on a smaller scale, was held in Hong Kong four years ago.

"Unlike the English new media where a lot has been researched and discussed, the Chinese new media, which is growing exponentially, has not attracted the necessary level of discourse," he said.

About 20 papers will be tabled at the conference, including discussions on the challenges they face in such areas as censorship and funding.

New writers group to help indigenous people

The conference is part of Malaysiakini 's Chinese edition anniversary events which culminates with an dinner-cum-fundraiser at the Kuala Lumpur Chinese Assembly Hall on Monday.

The dinner's goal is also to raise funds for the newly established Writers and Journalists Support Group for Indigenous People, which aims to highlight the plight of the maginalised indigenous people in Malaysia.

At the dinner, there will be several cultural performances by indigenous groups as well as a sneak preview of a unvarnished documentary about the sufferings of the Penan tribe who are being forcefully evicted from jungles to make way for the controversial Bakun Dam project.

Malaysiakini Chinese edition went live on July 25, 2005 and has grown from a three-person outfit to a team of five full-time journalists and three editors.

Over the past five years, it has become one of the most popular Chinese new portals in the country, attracting 60,000 readers daily.

It also has drawn a 37,000-strong following on Facebook in the short span of five months.