http://www.temasekreview.com/2009/1...media-quietly-without-leaving-a-trace-behind/
Steeplejacking amateur sites
The Aware saga has provided us an important lesson on how organizations can be steeple-jacked and taken over easily by external groups easily if they are not careful enough.
For amateur blogs run by a team of freelance writers, they cannot afford to be choosy and have to “open their doors” wide to all those who wish to join their team which makes them vulnerable to being steeplejacked.
The government can send dozen of its agents undercover to write for these sites and when the time is ripe, mount a coup to take over their sites entirely or “tie the hands” of their key writers, for example, by requesting that they refrain from writing articles critical of PAP leaders.
Students’ sites can be easily tamed and controlled by undergraduates on government scholarships while other sites can be equally steeplejacked by civil servants themselves.
Furthermore, amateur bloggers usually have full-time jobs elsewhere and they will probably stop blogging when their passion fade away or when they encounter a life-changing even such as marriage.
With time and patience, it is not too difficult to assume control of these sites and set the agenda for them once the founding members have left or become inactive thereby nullifying their “threat” once and for all.
Unfortunately, steeplejacking does not work on closed groups like us because we do not have a proper team – our correspondents are paid to write and they have no influence over our editorial stance or policy.
