 Good morning Philippines and to all our viewers from other parts of the globe, thank you for joining us today to learn more about political PR and advertising and why truth should matter. Now even before the official election campaign period begins the matter of delivering true, honest and accurate profiles and candidates and their plans has become crucial. That's because this early there have been a great number of dishonest, fraudulent, exaggerated, misleading and even offensive messages scattered all over social media. Now even the truth about the survey findings on who are leading have become doubtful due to the state of the art interventions with hardly any regard for ethics. Welcome to the fourth installment of the National Forum on Communication and Democracy. The Philippine elections 2022, our topic for today of course is truth, well told, political PR and advertising. I'm your host, Chris Ceresguera. I'm a news anchor at the ABS-CBN News channel that will be here to serve as a moderator for today's program which may also be viewed via live streaming on YouTube at the TV UP channel, as well as on the TV UP and the Philippines Communication Society Facebook pages. We also have some live tweeting so please use the hashtag PCS Forum Series which are posts. Now before we begin, let us acknowledge the following. I'd like to thank the University of the Philippines system, the Office of the Vice President for Public Affairs, Philippines Communication Society, the UP Information Technology Department Center, TV UP, the Internet Television Network of the University of the Philippines and everyone who has helped to make this forum series possible. And because we have a lot of faculty and students watching us today, PCS members who have watched at least 50% of the webinar duration will be receiving a certificate of attendance as a benefit of their PCS membership. If you have not applied for a renewed or renewed your membership yet, this is your chance to be part of the premier organization that represents the communication discipline to the Philippine Social Science Council. The online membership form is available on the PCS website that's philscomsoc.org slash membership. Now and because this is a national forum communication and democracy, we want to make sure that everyone has an opportunity to be heard. So we'll be using Mentimeter so that our viewers on Facebook and YouTube will also be able to participate. We encourage everyone to participate in our mini quiz. Your answers will be discussed during our panel discussion later on and you will also see how the other viewers have answered. Again, all of our viewers including those on Facebook and YouTube, please open your browser and go to menti.com and fill in the menti code 47657474 or simply scan the QR code on your screen. Okay. At this stage, you would like to welcome Professor Felipe Salvosa, he's the head of the journalism program at the University of Santo Tomas. He's also a journalist, a former editor of Business World. He's now the editor-in-chief of the online site or the news site. Okay, we'd like to welcome Professor Felipe Salvosa to give us the opening remarks. Good morning, Christian. Good morning everyone. May nag sabe, truth is the first casualty of war. Is it the same thing during the elections with candidates employing an army of PR writers, publicists, ad bookers and campaign strategists working on focus group messages. And with the advent of social media, carefully curated public images. And if there are armies battling against each other, including troll armies, war analogy is also applicable. And if it's war, we already know that the scenario is sancho about it. All war is deception. Now truth in PR and political advertising. We in PCS believe this is a very important topic in the 2022 campaign about to kick off. It will take a year to clear the air. What is the role of PR and advertising in HALALA? Is this the victory of a candidate at all costs, even at the expense of truth? This is the fourth webinar under the National Forum on Communication and Democracy, Philippine elections 2022, which we hope will contribute to the elevation of the national discourse on this touchstone of our democracy. On behalf of the board of the Philippines Communication Society, I welcome all the students, faculty members, scholars and researchers and communication and media practitioners joining us today. We invite you to engage with our resource persons, ask them later in the Q&A, and also post your opinions on social media. But good morning to all of you. Thank you very much Professor Felipe Salvosa for that opening remarks. Again, I hope you take advantage. You guys watching on Facebook and YouTube, you take advantage of this forum because there are a lot of questions that will be answered candidly by our resource speakers. And this will be helpful for all of us to better understand how election campaigns work in the Philippines, especially during the pandemic, especially during the 2022 elections. At this point, basically, by the way, Professor Salvosa will also be joining us later in the Q&A panel. At this stage, you'd like to start our mini quiz. You may now start answering the Mentimeter poll on your screen. Simply go to menti.com and fill in the Menti code that's 47657474. So basically, these are the questions that you may answer. For this question, basically, you may be able to input the public image or persona of our candidates for our word cloud. Now, the words will increase in proportion to the number of people who have answered that same as you, the same as you. Okay, for example, corrup or makabayan, matulungin habang lumalaki yung salita. Basically, mas dumarami yung sumasagot ng genong salita. So basically, that's how this works. Now, later on, we will reveal the answers or the most common answers in our word cloud later on during our discussion during our forum. Now, let's go to the next question. Okay, now, which narrative works best in the political ads for you? You may choose only one. So, here are the options. For instance, galing samahirap. Okay, basically, that's the image or the narrative that a candidate projects about himself or herself. And if you agree with that, yung ba yung mas effective for you as a voter? Or inanang bayan, action bilis, healing president, tough on crime. Galit sa corrup, pangako ng pagbabago tumugon sa pandemya, pagpapatuloy ng dating nagawa, continuity. Okay, so basically, I think this works for administration candidates or none of the above if you're looking at other narratives which you think are most effective for you. Okay. Now, at this stage, let's now hear the word on the street with a person on the street interview with TV UP. Personally, I believe that there is some truth naman talaga sa mga political ads. Haas lang ako naninwala. Kapang wala, wala pang idea whatsoever. I think, di ako fuli naninwala unless nere-search ko siya. Yung yung iba, makatotohan naman. Pero yung samopit, moron marketing kasi is fuli ang ads naman to promote either products or services ko. Taum is mo like selection. We should be aware na itung mga nasa ads na to, ang pinapakita lang mga punila jyan, ay yung mga willing sila na ipakita na nagbabapogi ng kanila mga kandidato at kanila nga pinupush forward na mga ideas. Apto lang, political ads is talaga para mabust yung popularity nila. For me, what makes a good political ad is that kapang sinakita nila na, an din sila mismo. In making a good political advertisement, merung dalawang point of view, kung sino yung gumagawa at kung sino yung mga katanggap. So speaking from a standpoint ng tumatanggap, for me, an effective political advertisement would be something that resonates with me. It's madali tayong mapanawala ay. Specially mga jingle, ganyan makapatigin ka talaga. Mga echo yan sa utak mo, pabalik-balik na itung jingle na to, kaya politician A. An effective political ad sa mga butante, is naka katulong nito na makapat-design yung mga butante. I hope na we will continue to get to know the candidates better. We weigh our options. O gaya maliniwala agar sa mga video. Specially sa YouTube and TikTok, kasi game dalai yung fake news na nakakalat. But at the end of it all, ang pinaka-importante dito pa rin, is kapag mong boto tayo, at ang makikita natin ay itung ads na to on how it shapes our votes. Yung end goal pa rin natin is to have a better future, of course, for our country. Okay, so thanks for those opinions coming from some of our, of the people who were interviewed. Okay, at this stage, simulan na natin yung, very interesting. I promise you this will be very interesting because of our crop of resource persons that will be joining our roundtable discussion this morning. Okay, at this stage, I'd like to introduce our first resource person. We have with us, historian. He's also an expert in strategic and crisis communication, as well as political communications. He served the speech writer, the two Philippine presidents. He's also a colonist at the Philippine Daily Enquirer and a lecturer at the Colegio de San Juan Directra. Please welcome Mr. Manolo Quezon. Next, we have with us on the panel a political communication instructor at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines' College of Communication, Department of Advertising in Public Relations and Communication. He also serves as PUP social media writer under the Communication Management Office. Please welcome Professor Earl Jainos Buzman. Also on the panel, a persuasion specialist. I hope he explains this tag later on. And a political veteran, political campaign strategist. I'd like to welcome Mr. Alan S. Hermann. He's the president of Agents International PR. Now rounding up our panel, we have with us the legal counsel of the Advertising Standards Council. Let's welcome attorney Reggie Dularbal. Okay, let's start the discussion for this morning. Okay. Let's talk about political PR and advertising and if you really have the truth and authenticity on this issue. Let's start the discussion with Mr. Alan Hermann. He's a veteran political strategist. The enemy for today. Okay. I think his self-deprecating room more prefers to describe himself as a member or part of the dark side. But that's just a joke. Okay. Let's start with you, Mr. Alan Hermann. A persuasion specialist. What basically makes an effective or a good political PR or ad? Well, what makes a good ad? I think would just follow the same formula as engaging any person to buy a product or a service. That's what we call APC, Awareness to Choice. So first, you need to do it in stages wherein you will establish awareness for the candidate and then slowly transition your campaign into why you should choose it. So that space between Awareness to Choice is what we call submit proposition, which is superlative, important, believable, memorable, tangible. You need to be the best at something. You have to establish you're the best at something. That something has to be important to the people. We've seen many candidates in the past they were the best at something. That's not important to the people. Then there's the B. This is probably the most anchored in our team now, Truth Well Told. It has to be believable. Because if you don't have a reason to believe that you're claiming it, it will become unauthentic and it will not be a threat to the person. It has to be memorable. You need to have a catchy slogan, jingle, that's a bonus. N.T. is tangible. Your on-air or online behavior needs to support your offline behavior. So that's what for me, in summary, makes an effective political campaign. So basically you're talking about authenticity as a big part of it also. One of the factors, yes. Not entirely the entire factor, but yes, an important factor. Okay, Professor Earle. Over the past election cycles, for instance, Alain spelled out to us the elements of a good political PR and ad. But basically, especially, you can also observe how things have been going when it comes to candidates. Example for President in 2022. They actually see those elements or basically, it will be more effective during election campaigns. I mean, we're seeing a lot of changes, probably most pronounced, these changes for the other candidates, because they've been around far longer than myself. But we're seeing some of the trends that were popular back then, being repackaged and being innovated upon at the export now. I think it was Gareth Edwards who drew a distinction between classical PR and new PR paradigm or new PR context that we have today. And some of the tactics that worked before, such as creating monikers for candidates, for example, I think it was Ramon Magsaysay who carried the moniker, the guy, if I'm not mistaken. So these tactics, they were effective back then, but we also saw them again. For example, I think it's Mark Filiar who uses the moniker, the builder. And this is because the use of monikers and the use of names has a way of communicating what these people, what these candidates are all about and what they are set out to do. Because we're also seeing some trends that can be powerful in the elections in 2004. If I'm not mistaken, like the use of Fernando Codes Jr. with his celebrity status and his celebrity identity. And we see that people are starting to veer away from or even lost the lust of using celebrity identities. We also see that the narrative, a long-standing narrative in Philippine politics, the poor, poor versus rich, little by little repackaged. I do expect probably that this narrative of the poor will be something that we can see, for example, with the likes of Isco Moreno. But there's also a resurgence for, there is a resurgence for reform. If we can notice, almost all or many messages that our politicians have seen is geared towards reform. Reform and a certain nostalgia for a golden age or some golden days that are difficult to pinpoint where we are. Manolo, let's also add to this, let's add more historical perspective to the discussion. We've seen how campaigns are run in different electoral cycles. Have you actually noticed certain changes, perhaps for better or for worse when it comes to how candidates are trying to sell themselves to the public? Or somehow, we also see voters somehow learning to see through grossly inauthentic political messaging? Well, Christian, maybe we should read what Alan and Professor Jaino are saying. So to me, if we're going to do sort of lens or lens, let's look at these three aspects. There are calendars, there are instruments, and this is the example of how to take care of people. So, if we look at the side of the campaigns, there are six instruments that we're looking at to help the voters decide who to vote for. The most important thing here and we forgot to mention is the sample ballot. Because one big part of taking care of the voters is to follow the rules or to follow the code. So this is the code, this is the sample ballot. Second, and I think this shows you the evolution of our campaigns. The second would be, the most important would be the jingle. The jingle for the campaign. After this, there are comics. After this, there is a biopic, the movie, the candidate. And there is also the commercial. First weather on the radio. The jingle is connected here and especially on TV and now on social media. And there is also the social media. Now, all of these things are based on the calendar. So how does this work? In our experience now, we are moving to a calendar. The first part of this is based on the deadlines. The first deadline we had was in October, the filing of the candidate. So what are the rules of the candidates to begin with? They started there to raise their consciousness to get to know people. There are two reasons for this. First, you need to get to know them, to present yourself in our culture, to present yourself as a candidate. Second, because you get to know people and there is an instrument that I am using here, the polling to see if your consciousness supports you. This is also a challenge for those who are giving money, who are giving support, or who are not going to commit to you. The requirement here, by October, you need to get to know so that you will not get to know as a candidate. And you will be able to enter the needs of the world and be able to give support, money or whatever you want. And this is unique to the past since 2016. There is a second deadline, the substitution deadline, that is what we are looking for in November 15. That is why the headlines started yesterday. So what this means is there is a first call and then in November 15, you will be able to know who are the real candidates. And then after that, the formal campaign started in February and March. And what this means is there is only the Philippines, this political grey area that has a campaign, because there are no candidates, because the campaign hasn't started yet, so all these things will enter here in the future. Now number one for quite a long time now, the dominating influence on the voters is ads. Because of the TV. The time has not ended where the candidates are going around in the squares and they are helping. It's not like that. In fact, we are really a virtual country. There is a survey that found out that if a voter who is sitting in their place or going to their place, the candidate, even if they didn't see it, that counts as growing there. Because for a voter, they look up to the candidate if they heard what was going on there. That's a very virtual attitude of things. So famously, Senator Sergio Smenia, his system, he will not go to the places, he will only go to the radio stations. And that's his system. So there is a survey in 2010 that said, if you ask the voters where the information will go to decide who will vote for you. Number one, in Balita. But they asked this survey where Balita will go. And I remember the number one was something like, let's say, like TV patrol. But at the time, number two, Wawawee. So in the time of the voter, the game show is a small source of news. Just as in the radio, when they were asked where Balita will go, number two or number three was love radio. In my periods, number one or number two was bulgar. So we are in the Philippine daily choir that we saw there. Number one, Philippine daily choir, number two, bulgar. So that's the reality. And all these things, now, in our culture, we know, there is a coincidence that is formal or for things like this, decent, poor, but there is also the background in Calais. So the language used is also different depending on where the campaign is going. So in the interview, the candidate needs to be statesman-like but there are trolls. It's good to say and the ads are positive, but in the social media, the audience is trying to and if it becomes viral, it will become viral in the media, it will become part of Balita and it will become an issue in the campaign. But there is no connection to the candidate because they are not that kind of people. There is a deniability. There is a formal, informal, there is a very idealistic and very practical approach. And all these things are mixed. And over the years, what happened is the total domination of TV, number one. And now, we are seeing a shift from TV to social media. Thank you very much, Manolo for the connection. It's good to know that it's a shift. By the way, I'll just update that even in the Philippine Daily Inquire, within the publication, the source of news is the column of Dalian Carvajal who is a dear friend of mine, by the way. But we know that Dalian is a showbiz columnist. But just tracking back to the very good point of Manolo, the public can't see the distinction between what is straight news and what is perhaps a secondary source of news or even a tertiary source of news. Okay. It's good to take off before I, for my next question, to Attorney Reggie. I think in terms of your point of view, do you agree with Bardagulan? The one who backed back, even though it's a premium in front of the camera, but on the ground, Bardagulan. Okay. I want him to dovetail on the topic of, connect to the topic of negative campaigning Attorney Reggie. We saw this in Calier, the company, it's moving, right? But on the TV, on the radio, the dissents, supposedly, of course, President Duterte somehow changed or threw away the conventions in 2016. The pastures became effective in a way. Here, let's put in context negative campaigning. What does Batas say? Does Batas say or leave? And let's connect to the culture of the dissents, is negative campaigning acceptable or not? If we look at Batas, it appears to allow negative campaigning. Because the campaign is defined as influencing for or against. So against, it can include negative campaigning. So that's what I think of Batas. And so, the campaign is already there in the enemy, as a means of projecting oneself, reverse. And sometimes, as she was saying, people want to know what's coming. Especially in issues involving crime, etc. It's important to know what's coming. Related to advertising, the Ad Standards Council and even the broadcast companies or networks, they don't screen as a general rule political advertisements. Because it's part of protected speech. And we don't want to proceed with the screen or against our candidates. So, political, yes. But what are the limits? Let's say, technically even, as Komalik said, allow the negative campaigning in the Philippines. Although, culturally, voters might frown upon that kind of practice. But what are the limits? Let's say I'm a candidate. I want to be against a fellow candidate. What are the limits that I can do? And then, what are the ethical standards that should be followed? The limits are the laws and liabilities. And if the network or the broadcast station looks at it, there are certain ethical standards. But again, it's up to the network or the candidate to place his position. Christian, I'd like to just add on to some points raised earlier. I can see two big influences in changing the landscape in campaigning. One is, of course, internet-based protocols, internet-protocol-based platforms. Because these are own platforms. They are not dependent on network-owned or third-party-owned. You can have your own platform. They also provide the immediacy of response. In the past, if there was a campaign against you, you would still do it to print or broadcast what you want to answer. Now, your own platform, the internet, allows you immediacy of reaction. There are also now a new bridge called Influencers. In the past, you should have an encore, etc. Now, that's why game shows are a platform because they have influence. And hosts are influencers. You can use them. So that's one. The second is the fact that elections are held every three years. Mr. Kesson said that the strict calendar is not very effective. Because as early as three years before an election, it will be a campaign in quotes. So political campaigning and positioning is done practically 365 days a year. Every three years. Including nontraditional, you would see potential candidates endorsing certain products. It's not just him, but he has already positioned his face on the billboard and creates what we call recall. Those are the things that I think are new to the political campaign. I think a related issue is that this is also a problem for election reform advocates. Election reform advocates who use incumbent officials for state resources. Because it's very difficult to establish a fine line between promoting a program and culture in the Philippines promoting oneself. I'll just advance one question here in the Q&A so I think this is very much related. Although there may be a Q&A portion. It's a valid to be told. We ask the speakers and perhaps the leadership of the organization to declare their political color leaning, affiliation, and especially clients. This will at least let us know their bias if there is any during this forum. Thank you. Actually I'll ask later specifically. Seriously? Very directly. Well, as very nicely laid out by Manola a while ago. I can't accept a presidential candidate because the landscape is not yet clear. It's still November 15. Now in the spirit of disclosure all of them with the exception of the exception of former Senator Bongbong Marcos for obvious reasons have made inroads and have made dialogues with me but I cannot sign a client just yet because November 15 will be clear the political landscape. Who is the candidate? Actually, if the conversation should be more candid we should talk about political strategies who prefer to work behind the scenes or in the shadows. That would be me until I got dragged into the light so to speak. Okay. Professor Guzman political affiliation or leanings? I think it's clear what color and what color I will be wearing and the color pink I believe if we are going to progress we need to give we need to give more space for the feminine leaders. We need to give a special for the women and other gender identities to take. Thankfully, I think I don't have clients I'm not I'm not Mr. Alan I'm advertising in public relations and I think it is more of my personal commitment not to work with politicians. Of course. I take it to mean you're supporting Vice President Lene Robedo. Manalo Queso. Also pink but for the first time in a long time I'm not involved in any campaign. Wait I can just update that if we're talking about pink I think it's very public knowledge that in 2016 I helped the campaign of VP Lene. But you're not necessarily working for her now? Until November 15 I cannot definitively say but I think it's well known that in 2016 me and my firm did help in the campaign of VP Lene Attorney Reggie Well I don't have a client I'm not allowed to get clients being connected with a broadcast company In fact being an officer of the broadcast company and also the KVP we didn't meet the candidates On a personal basis I have a different outlook that's why I'm not able to work with the company within the company and within the circuit So that's it We haven't met yet because he wants to declare a court I hope the audience will be open minded even with the disclosures of certain preferences he would focus on the message on the discussions, on the issues because it's related to the election At this stage anyone can speak freely to be informed When you go to the office there's a big conference room and I stand by that the statement is that even among our staff and our employees that is our mantra This is our job We are mandated to do it well It would be a disservice to our clients if we didn't We promote by profession but we vote by conscience Having said that I don't agree with the client based on a moral compass if you wanted to dramatize it that way it would be like that There's still a chance I saw it on the first floor of my house I don't want to see it later Okay Alan, you go first You gave me authenticity How important is it to package or sell a candidate in an election How truthful and authentic that candidate should be so that he can be a celebrity Sorry for the term that I'm using but this is how things work A perfect term I think I'm going to get more than a smile from Manolo I'm probably going to get a nice grin from Manolo with my example because the best example there is really Senator Mar I love him dearly but I think that is the best example The best negative example The best example of what not to do The best example of what not to do What happened there When Mr. Palenque came first there was a reason to believe The message was really authentic because he was very very much involved in the Palenque operations as DTI Secretary So it shows him in the Palenque He's talking about price control He's talking about the price of buying for the next two years So, Sechmar what we call as I always say only the best candidates in the Philippines Got candidate, hard candidate or head candidate Sechmar is the perfect example of a head candidate I have a lot of life here I have a plan and a solution I have a good system of the business Unfortunately, for some reason and I'm not saying I'm not criticizing any team that did it But the message was they were trying to portray him as a Got candidate What is the Got candidate? Idol Idol If you see what you're doing you want to take a selfie You're going to get bigger That's not really Sechmar's personality But then they tried to They said Daniel Padilla There was an unreleased video of him I mean, you can believe If you can believe with him rapping with the likes of Jay-Z and Chris Lawrence There was that thing The worst part was that whole projecting We're talking about Araneta Rojas This guy has never written a pedicab in his whole life Although he's very down to earth Let me ask you a related question You can also add to this Talking about authenticity But why did it fall when President Duterte died? Right? He built one of the most enduring political dynasties in the Philippines But why was it so effective? But the projection of the difficult was not for Araneta Rojas Okay Let me contextualize that PRRD actually did not run on a promas That wasn't his one nail That's what we call bed of nails versus one nail That's not the one nail of PRRD His one nail was changes coming Militante, peace and order It was really that change In fact, maybe this is for a later discussion That was not truth well told That was not truth well told Because it changes coming When he became a leader he thought of the administration of Pinoy Right? He didn't think of the administration of Pinoy Did you think of changes coming or you thought of changing But I'm getting ahead of myself So PRRD was more aware because he wasn't really portraying himself as poor In fact, his ads weren't kissing babies along with walking around in depressed areas It was all And of course, we all know about his famous Christmas ad It was a long time ago It was always the tough guy I was always the criminal I was always the criminal and drug pusher Peace and order sort of thing Okay I remember I think it's the attorney The image because in the 30s it started long before he ran for president as a candidate for mayor or an incumbent mayor in Davao City That was his projection That's why he took it as Alan was saying he didn't have to project himself as a president because he had that at that time he was running It's like Joseph Estrada I'm intimately familiar with Yes because of the advantage of his being a movie star People didn't realize that he was a movie star Manola, you were saying something Manola, you were saying something He has very expensive tastes Manola, are you talking about the truth? When you're talking about authenticity The famous quote of Emelda comes to mind he said, perception is reality Whatever you believe to be the truth becomes the truth So the point here when it comes to the close of the campaign the first thing everyone is doing is, in a sense, market research What are the strengths What are they looking for in the next election And then, as Randy Dovid said We don't have any party We don't have a system like those days where there are members who are looking for a candidate who should be their partner in the career We don't have that We have now, or what Randy Dovid calls political impresarios Basically, the party will fill a coalition, a group and they will look for a candidate and they will promote and it's okay if Manola is their partner What this means is usually they will look for a candidate who can focus on the needs of that time Of course they will also go on the stage because they really want to be president they will look for a way that is more difficult to look for a way compared to those who are easily defeated because they are really close to the needs of that time So a very good example is President Duterte because there was a massive campaign This was the revenge of the middle class and because of his campaign the frustration of those who have money to have a company they have traffic and they want to be promoted in Cali because they have traffic and they want to be able to fix that problem and so on and so forth and because of that he was also connected to his previous image This is an image that has been there for 20 years and not only in Davao It was hard to connect this let's say in the case of Marojas because the most difficult candidate there is is the continuity candidate because you are also involved even in the lack of the government so that is really difficult and all the other candidates they are candidacies Grace Poh and even Mayor Binay when they talk the questions they want to answer the economy is growing we are already able to follow and then Duterte comes in and then changes the whole conversation now that is the situation we are looking at now the main thing there is let's keep coming back to the point of this whole discussion does the truth have a role in this yes and no because it should be as easy as a rotary club 4-way test is it the truth etc etc but because we are different tribes we are different from the expectations or what we are looking for for the candidates this is tailored fit for all the small tribes and so you are not necessarily lying but you can sort of tailor fit it to your particular audience to insist in having Sir Manola I think why this work for President Duterte a combination then of how we took advantage of the disgruntlement market that we have now it's similar to what Trump did here you have people who are fed up with the establishment here you have people who have been disgruntled and have been failed by the promises of the past and now here comes President Duterte who is seemingly willing to save them or save them from this predicament by using by being so brazen and being so bold and using street in a way or at least what President Duterte did as an outsider the establishment I am here to overturn you can see I don't respect the establishment at all and that is something that we want to change or at least that is his position it also helped I think from an expectancy violations perspective the expectancy of people from a president is someone who is dignified someone who is respectable so here comes someone who abandons or at least tries not to fit in that mold and people resonated with it people actually like it or at least in his fan base he became more reachable in what they use in our language of tabernacle okay question can I just add something because there is also a question here by Romel Lopez how does this drama on substitution affect the credibility of candidates in the eyes of the voting public now I want to bring this in because connected that is what we are talking about and the basic fact is the media is the source of the company because it depends on the news the decision of Duterte now how does the drama and substitution affect the credibility not at all because the point here is drama the whole drama of substitution to be exciting the first part of the campaign and because of this the coverage is also being dictated starting yesterday no other candidates except two and that is also the secret of President Duterte in 2016 because he is dramatic because he would bulldoze through all rules he became hot copy and again, no reporter no news outfit none of them could afford to ignore him or not in short a depressing situation in reality election campaigns are really more about the showmen because we are human beings and in a sense we are still monkeys we are apes and how is leadership determined you need to have a gorilla chest and you are going to beat up that is the way whether we like it or not we are mammals and that is the way it is done you hope that there will be an element similar to what Alan said not just the heart but the head as well and the most effective candidates in my argument are those who can provide both Alan, you wanted to say something just bring a quantitative aspect to the conversation you know the Filipino has a changed partiality when the last survey, if I am not mistaken 2018 or 2019 we ran a survey the question was very straight forward do you agree with the administration, this is for local 24.6% of the respondents actually said yes yes, we agree but it would be better if you said yes it is an odd maybe this is the 8th behavior that we are talking about but how is it different but let's try change partiality and this is the 8th master talking the tamer of the apes earlier, the attorney raised a very important point the rise of social media influencers a major factor or personality in the election campaign we saw this recently the people who went to jail before they filed a COC interviewed Tony Gonzaga and of course you could not blame them why would you pick being interviewed in a talk show or by a journalist there are more followers of Tony Gonzaga and of course Tony Gonzaga and of course millions of subscribers Tony Regi in this situation how do you help voters how can we help voters actually better understand or see through candidates if most of us are seeing them through the lens through the puff questions of social media influencers it's a difficult question because social media is really an animal that's so difficult to predict but I think to counter influencers you need a group of influencers also do influencers on the broadcast, radio and television do they have a rating if they are interviewed you want to find the right one also on social media and by the way traditional media radio and TV broadcast have also shifted towards or adopted the social media platforms as part of their extended platforms okay very important there is a related question so the journalists they are trying to harness the advantages of social media so they are trying to wear a different hat or another hat, journalist and also social media influencer right? now do the same ethical standards for journalism apply to them if they are wearing their other hat social media influencer for instance, let's say I have a radio program ethically I follow standards because I am working as a journalist I am on my YouTube page can I receive money? let's say from Bongbong Marcos from Lene Robredo to basically what are their advantages you know Christian our discussion on KBP Tungkul because in KBP we are discussing whether to include IP based or social media platforms as part of our scope and the conclusion we reached we haven't codified this yet but the conclusion we reached is if you are a KBP member a broadcaster and you extend your presence in social media you should be subject to the same ethical standard you can't have two standards but one ethical standard must be broadcast otherwise you will have a crisis of schizophrinics who is one who is one person in broadcast and another person in social media so that's the conclusion by the way Mr. Kelson brought up in the survey Love Radio Love Radio is an FM station nothing used in public affairs but they have a set of influencers that's where it goes it's not even the traditional broadcast but in the social media platforms okay anybody would like to add to that the issue of influencers Professor Guzman or would you like to add to that in influencer because this is a shift that we saw in social media influencer our treatment here in the Philippines these are opinion leaders they know what they're talking about or at least that's how most of their viewers think these people leveraging on their popularity they are able to position themselves as credible opinion leaders I think it was Ong and Cabanes who identified who identified the use of influencers as a tactic in shaping public opinion the use of influencers is something that political communication has imported from PR the use of influencers is from marketing advertising in public relations it's something that is imported from political communication later on influencer as we know them today Instagram accounts YouTube channels it becomes problematic we somehow or at least in this post-truth condition that we have created we have somehow made it it appears to a lot of people influencer journalist same credible same truthful we know that this is not true why journalists have to adhere to certain in strict codes of ethics there are strict standards journalists don't have code of ethics the bloggers but when they cover does that make them online journalists very good point I would like to add just to flesh out what Professor Buzman said journalists are bound by strict ethical standards of course he will return for example as a journalist you can't accept a congressional candidate to intervene and then he would end up controlling the questions but if you are a YouTuber you have a term I haven't come to terms yet YouTuber you can accept money from these candidates and then they would dictate how they are supposed to be interviewed that's one example Manola you wanted to say something let's just go back to what we talked about influencers they have a connection to the truth or the truth of the truth it is not the truth that the candidate is bringing but whether the candidate is reflecting the truth of the voter because the point of the campaign is to bring the burden from the indecision in the ballot box where the name of the candidate will be put so in that journey I think we have to remember that we just have to remember that we already know and this I think is very much reinforced in social media information bias yes the question is the things that are happening in social media will it change minds or there is another way of thinking which I subscribed to which is you don't need the majority to win as president you just need a minority who is bigger than other minorities because since 1987 there has been no 50% plus one president it's a plurality so it's a different game from what the older generation used to think in that case earlier I was saying there are many small tribes you just need to find them and help them so they can go and vote which means the wonderful thing about social media is you can really segment your message and then you can really say what the voter wants to hear so you can encourage them to vote now then it comes to the point where are we talking I think there was a recent survey on our on our online behavior and if I'm not mistaken one of the findings was we don't want to talk too much about the election and politics in our friends because this will end but we like to talk about it with people on forums and their thoughts in other words we like to reinforce each other the cult of belonging and out of the family out of the community the influence because he became a spokesperson of your time and that's where they fought Alana would like to add but before that I think related issues Manolo said this came out in a study recently I think by Jonathan Ong and other researchers focus also on Viber groups micro targeting for instance there's a Viber group there's a Viber group there's a Viber group basically basically really very micro so Alana wants to add something but you can also answer this question you used the term not troll farms you didn't use troll farms you used rate accounts the question is can candidates actually afford to run a strong campaign without employing rate accounts on social media local definitely in fact for my clients I obviously have more local clients than national clients we actually do a cost benefit analysis on smug that social media operations group I will actually tell my candidates going back to Manolo's point magic number calculate the magic number if you need it statistically we have three different software to validate that to come up with that number and then you will work backwards because the conversion of social media is small let's not treat social media like the magic genie that will change elections and really so plant everything that has come before it yes it is momentous in scale but it is mostly awareness the conversion rate of social media is only 8 to 11% especially when it comes to static social media when it comes to static social media meaning your pictures your posters your page that's closer to 5 to 6% so the conversion of social media is very very low even lower for the micro targeted groups and I am familiar with that study of Dr. Jonathan he is not a doctor he is a doctor he is a doctor big shot in fact I think he is running a seminar right now even as he speaks I am familiar with that micro targeting low in the local I am sorry in the national scale he is a local he is a local so they have their own Vibre group they can talk about it for the local candidate it has a lot of influence do you need rate farms let's say you are running for president senator or vice president 100% yes I would recommend all of my national clients to have small my next question is how many what are the truth be told truth be told the cheapest you do the math the swell in the moderator we call it LTN unfortunately that's a term line troll network line troll network by tensian with one moderator on top or admin admin is the one who compose message tree and cascade the swell of one admin the lowest the lowest 40,000 a month the lowest if you have a 10 line troll network half a million admin you will pay you will pay you will pay the landing pages you will pay the tech call center you actually have seats they go on 2 hour shifts it's a national campaign so it's like you are running a call center so next question attorney reggie you wanted to say something just an information that might be interesting buy social media account or rent a social media account to have control rent a account so that's something to look into I thought I would choose sir reggie self-incriminatory although you are saying that the attorney reggie saw us on facebook the sequence who started the page and then who used it well again the need necessity is the mother of invention so let's again let's step backwards the model for all ALDUB and I remember when ALDUB phenomenon I really learned this because it had many lessons that were later on applied to politics the ALDUB phenomenon showed you how you could get a mass movement without necessarily buying everyone because this system is this simple there are many small fan clubs those fan clubs were told to follow a certain number of accounts there is an account let's say at 7 or 8 in the morning the hashtag will be released after that the obligation of all fans clubs to take the hashtag and return it to them and there is a time where we all will tweet the hashtag at the same time there is a parallel organization the group for compliance there are also their job to correct the words when they tweet so they stay on message or to force compliance and then there are to meeting if the volume depends on their needs to become number one trending if not they will send a message and then you will find our path it reinforces because there is a collective feeling of achievement within a very short time span that's a dream idea which is why fan clubs are now important politically because you don't need to pay and they will do it but there is one problem in any political organization is you can have all the volunteers you want but if they don't feel if they don't like they want debate it doesn't help you politically and therefore the practical they will shift to well you are paying you need to perform otherwise you will be removed from the list the dream of every campaign is to have enough motivated people that they will self-organize within the method but as Alan was saying you don't leave it to chance now again the point here where is the truth in all of that it is an ability to motivate people that are saying of this candidate depends on what they want to motivate which goes to another question here because on the side and I just want to preempt it what is the role of the masa and all of these things I think what social media is teaching you is in the past if you have A, B, C, D and E there is a cross there are people in Forbes Park who used to watch Wawawe as much as the people in Tondo etc etc so what we are going to learn is first of all porous the cahons if they exist at all and because this is a role of finding minorities even if one sector is far away let's say the biggest in our country it is half of them they are not as a monolithic group half of them have the same views on Forbes and Kondo and that sort of thing and that's what the campaigns are looking for by the way Professor he talked of these traditional lines in terms of coaging campaign battles there is an air war there is a ground war the command post of course the net war also includes social media unlike to ASEA attorney Reggie because I think there is also still an agreement despite earlier you were textualizing the conversion capability of the campaign in social media we are not supposed to give that too much credit you said that don't get me wrong it's important the awareness that is the number one tool conversion doesn't convert many people let's talk about the air war attorney Reggie the TV and of course the power of radio especially in the far flung areas I ask attorney Reggie what efforts are being made over the years to basically clean up news coverage for instance to allow truth to actually surface more than the lies during the campaigns to be very strict about this for instance are there efforts to basically minimize influence or paid influence by candidates in the news broadcast to avoid the paid encourts paid journalists that you are doing by the way how do we address those issues how do we address those issues it is not KBP the function of KBP our role in that is to push ethical practices among its members but it is mainly a network issue and concern self regulatory yes self regulatory they should clean up so that that will not happen because their name is the name of the network at the end of the day the network will be called to be judged on whether it is credible or not so it is important for the network to discipline its ranks so far as political meetings of its members are concerned its staff is concerned it is a bit difficult to understand because we know that it can be dismantled when it comes to the news relevant to the current news but it is not a project and by the way as it extends to social media it appears that there is the credibility of the station extends to its social media acceptance in terms of an influencer but in terms of believing what is said we see that there is more influence or believability if it comes from an influencer who is attached to a traditional broadcast social media so the columnist who has a social media account of course with a social media account the credibility of the fan pages of their accounts is higher someone was tracing his hand Manolo you wanted to add we will not forget that all of the media business meaning that they have to earn money and elections are traditionally used to be a gold mine for all media the problem over the years for example some media becomes more dominant than others the most important TV airtime now YouTube airtime because there is limitation when it comes to campaign there are minutes allocated to each candidate you have quota and if you are just a woman you really need to choose where to put now this means that for the networks they want business from everybody if they are viewed as too biased towards any particular candidate they will not put ads on them or if they do then they are liable to get angry which is what ABS CBN discovered because earlier Attorney Reggie was saying there is no limitation in the law when it comes to negative advertising and we realized that the limitation is one number two you can change that is perhaps the biggest incentive of all the next reality there is competitive media so let's say there is a candidate a media outfit but if there is a negative story because everyone is going to cover it in this case they can't ignore it Attorney Reggie said the audience if they are really seeing the censor of this but on the other hand it raises the temptation especially for media they have in the current environment which means for print and to a certain extent radio because the audience of radio is going down at least the national radio networks because there are a lot of local radio networks and this is more important in a sense there is a self-correcting mechanism because of the market involved Alan, you wanted to add well, me just a couple of points going back to the earlier discussion points first, Aldab let's not forget that it also gave rise to what is allegedly purportedly supposedly what is known as the Aldab machine or the Israeli NZ machine which is automated that gave rise to that allegedly supposedly purportedly that the Aldab phenomenon was in part automated in short, it was not organic part of it was organic allegedly, part of it was organic and part of it was done with the aid of a nice machine from Israel called an NZ machine in fact, in local parlance we actually call it the Aldab machine the mythical Aldab machine I've never actually seen one it's just different it's just not described by the fellow political strategists of this Aldab machine but Facebook actually cleaned up its algorithms so the automation can't be done anymore that's one secondly about the minutes, that's a great point the minutes what the candidates are doing since the minutes of their ad there's nothing stopping them from for example, Alan Herman congressman I have my traditional ad which is a minute or 90 seconds that will be taken against my time but nothing is stopping me from getting an influencer and have a 30-minute blog about why Alan Herman is not necessarily showing me but just talking about me it's not my time so what we're saying because what we're using are the our opponents that's what we're doing so what we're saying is for every Skyway what do I mean by that if Tony Gonzaga who is softball leading questions questions about going to Skyway maybe you do maybe you do an interview with Christian Esguerra to ask him or I think that is the responsibility also using that metaphor Alan how the candidate can afford not to go inside because there's a fight in Skyway okay, what we're doing is that the word that we're using is your view be careful be careful of reporters be careful of tabloids of asking that's what we're doing amen at least okay, now before we go to our Q&A session let's talk about political imagery what do you think about the political images that are being effective so far in the 2022 campaign who would like to start we saw that in 2016 Tata Idigo Nani Lenny well to that point one of the most effective in fact Truthwell told our conference the easiest way to do that actually is to build an alter ego based on the truth and it works for Penoise you have Mr. Palenque iconic for me is Mr. Exposei that was brilliant he's Mr. Exposei last election we had Mrs. Hanep Buhay that was Senator Cynthia Test Daman they did alter egos this election Nani Lenny Balita the whip is not gaining much traction and I think the campaign is shifting towards solution-based solution-based messaging particularly the pandemic right now it's a free plan the art of the campaign you can also add that join us because it's a better conversation just ask Alana before others respond to this also the image tree is transferable for example the image used by Mani Villaran 2010 is it transferable to the child I saw it in the Senator in 2011 that's a great example number one I'll just comment on the campaign of Senator Mani at that time actually that's a great case study actually give that to the case study the target market is also important because it was late in the campaign when they realized that their campaign was resonating to non-voters non-voting age their campaign was too young the jingle in fact there's a famous video of Chris carrying Bimbi then he asked baby Bimbi then at that time then he asked in a rally of Pinoy our leader because he was resonating to the child but that aside it is usually transferable but in the case of because it became a attack the Filipino word wants to be attack attack insert last name attack isguerra so that's how they will softly justify a political dynasty it's a mark attack isguerra but in the case of the billionaires the secretary mark has adopted an entirely different arc he's building on the build see what I did there he's building on the build build build infrastructure Mr. Build Build Build in the same way Senator Cynthia he didn't adopt Pagat Yaga he did his PNASI device he's living in business you're suffering you're enduring something but he used the color orange he used it in 2010 because he did it in the orange era and Mani Villier but that's a function of Hongsoy mostly in my experience as a political strategist again when we're talking about moments of truth the color is there 100% of my clients give any meaning to the implications of the color what it symbolizes or represents usually what they do is what Hongsoy is saying there's an ad the point of Alan earlier the solution based image we used a term politically political advocacy communication with the candidate they attach themselves to a certain advocacy as a solution to problems in fact related to what I said it's too early there's a political potential candidate or ex-current person sitting in an office he promoted his advocacy to the image when he was there for example Senator Loren Lagarde entered the environment that's his advocacy so he has they push their attachment to advocacy as part of their image but can you also fake an advocacy and be good at it and the advocacy also has to be important in fact Senator Lagarde as an example also because the advocacy he chose we go back to submit superlative yes she's superlative in that but apparently it wasn't so important to the voters environment in fact the common thread then was sad I mean I'm not necessarily saying I agree with it but that's why we need to strictly adhere to the submit commandments superlative important to the people who fight okay okay Manolo before we go to the Q&A well I think many about 20 years ago we did the documentary called Papogi the Imaging of Philippine Presidents and the takeaway of being involved in that effort was there's a famous saying by Carlos P. Romulo Romulo said Filipino is a person who decides for everyone so that's our concept of the leader there are other politicians who have said they're not interested in the details they just want to know if the candidates recognize the problems they face and if they fix that there's not much hassle for the person that being the case if those are the parameters to find and expectation for a leader the role of the candidates that they need to do that are they afraid because if you're afraid it means you're not going to make a decision that you really want to be involved in your decisions there's violence you can't make a decision and so on and so forth in which case again in a sense what we're talking about in a sense looking at it through a western magnifying glass because in our phasilogic we're looking for character traits that to our mind will compose a leader capable of leading I'll ask very briefly so we can go to the Q&A I have to ask this if character matters if character matters I'm not referring specifically to any candidate but why the corruption even though I'm already a candidate it doesn't matter to voters okay Manolo what was the quote of Carlos Romulo what was the quote make decisions for them Filipinos want a president who will make decisions for them thank you sir and that's why he's Carlos P. Romulo the great immortal Carlos Romulo and I am Alan Herman political clown right because my rule is different just make them laugh or make them angry you make people laugh you make people cry you make people angry you can win even if you're the most corrupt person in the lot I'm really really hoping that the Zeitgeist will change that the tone in the timbre of the Filipino voter and slowly we're seeing that last elections from local but so far the change is slow and coming sadly make them laugh make them cry make them angry Christian it's very simple don't forget since 1992 when we had our present elections if you have a chance to win don't forget if you look at the actual votes no one ever got 50% so everyone in a sense was judged against by by the public the closest was ERAP the campaign team was good I know that the campaign team was good he was the closest truth be told that's why Alan Herman promoted the ERAP campaign because his dad was the one who ran it and yourself I saw a pop up question I just like to answer it somebody said is Alan admitting the truth doesn't matter absolutely I'm not just to make it clear in our agency the truth absolutely matters because if you run a campaign based on this ingenuity or on lies or on falsehoods that is a clumsy, immature campaign your product should set itself on its merit we don't engage in that I just like to answer thank you for the clarification before we go to the questions we have we will go to the result of the Mentimeter okay so we can see the sentiment we have again we had two questions so the first what is the public image of the candidate that you remember the biggest word in the word cloud is corrupt so I will say there are many words that are corrupt so next there will be and then anti-corruption let's go to the next question there which narrative works best in the political ads for you what are the most corrupt okay there is a change there is a change partiality and by the way that's exactly the percentage I mentioned earlier wow it's a microcosm are there any rate accounts maybe the second I don't know what they are looking at the tough on crime basically there is no answer I think this is basically the narrative of a huge part of that okay I was wrong and then number 10 10% okay at this stage let's go to the questions that you are watching okay okay Mr. Anonymous attendee Mr. Allen Heraman and Professor Guzman do you think there should be a regulation in the PR industry with regard to historical revisionism how do you think the PR industry should address misinformation and disinformation Professor you want to take that first okay the question is a bit loaded do you need policy or regulations in PR and maybe by extension advertising PR much like journalism we operate under a code of ethics self-regulation self-regulation in public relations as pointed by Hannah Arendt before and by Lee Edwards in 2020 self-regulation is that at the time in public relations in advertising the most aggressive relationship and the most aggressive accountability that you have with your client and the public definitely there would be people in PR in advertising that will disagree here but we know because we teach this to the client your BOL and your bottom line is important it is difficult because if we regulate how will it affect journalism and how will it affect free speech because it will go there we can't talk about regulations in public relations we can't talk about the possible effect of this on our cost or the cost of money in terms of I have a question what are handle misinformation in this information it is also difficult to answer because there is a stake there is a professional stake in public relations in fact I hope that this doesn't sound as an indictment of public relations but public relations and controlling they are the same tactic we can say that race social media operators race accounts trolls it is difficult when we talk about this and we refer to them as trolls or rates as if they are excluded or working outside the pounds of public relations the trolls are given and the trolls have allowed PR and advertising public relations and advertising a way to sidestep their accountability by giving us a boogeyman where we can see where we are how should PR deal with misinformation if they have a stake I think a careful and critical re-evaluation that our business is in order how we should prioritize our case of balance the need to be ethically accountable and to be accountable to the public as well when you are promoting when you are promoting politicians when you are promoting when you are promoting political ideologies they cannot be treated as the same as promoting a brand or product whether you are promoting a soap or a toothpaste it is very inconsequential it is very inconsequential to be affected by the reality it is very inconsequential to be affected by reality but when we are using advertising and public relations to influence shape opinion and behavior then we should say PR has a heightened ethical role because are we living up to it are we able to look critically at the practice of advertising in PR and admit and acknowledge let me have a complicity here in our in our post truth crisis we need to know to acknowledge that there are lapses of advertising in PR and what can we do about it most of the time maybe later not in PR but in advertising and public relations we need to learn maybe we need to restore trust restore trust in journalism restore trust in people in the news and then add PR I think this is one of the posts in Garret Edwards in the discussion of PR in the new context self-regulation works for now but we have to be more critical about it we need to make ourselves accountable to the people that finds and then third for me is acknowledging our own complicity here and in doing something about it okay I think you're going to respond can I load this I have a rider question there are two rider questions okay go one from Paolo Tanglao as a political PR practitioner how does one concretely balance both their conscience in the case that they have so basically that's a great question number two from Mark Olivares may we ask all those who with experience in political advertising in PR if they had or have always upheld the truth in their work or have they at one point in their careers manage truncated truths on behalf of clients okay fantastic questions and thank you for giving me the opportunity I think PR is being in a way I'm happy to be that guy a bit of a bogeyman here using Professor Earl's term but let's not forget at the end of the day the job of PR is three things it never changes and it can be summarized by the three A's upload attack and avert that is it that is all we do in different percentages but the messaging is always the same and the job of PR is the same we applaud our candidate we attack our opponent and we avert bad news we are flower arrangers we have to put the wilted and the unsavory facts about our clients in the back behind the fragrant blooming flowers but having said all that truth matters truth is upheld when I applaud my candidate I will not make up a diploma I will not say he graduated from university he did not I will not say that he has found a cure for COVID I will not say that that is not only disingenuous it will bite me back that's bad practice it's bad business practice in this age and time information can be readily verified when I applaud I uphold the truth when I attack my opponent when I do attack my opponent that's it I have an군 I will not engage in fake news I will not say it's a lie This is a lie I will not make up a diploma I will attack I will try to assert issues that are not important and I will shed light on it I will put a spotlight I will never be disingenuous I will avert the bad aspects of my client, that's why we call it spin doctor. I will spin it, so if you call my client, your client is weak, but he has a heart attack and he will appoint a skilled advisor when he becomes the head of my spin. I'm not the one who does what I want to do, that is a bad practice. Am I for regulation of the industry? Oh my goodness, I would love that. Well, this is my ego talking, I would blast everybody out of the water if there was regulation of our own fakes. That would work to my advantage, I wish, but it will never happen. It's a very important question that we will answer to Attorney Reggie and Manola. But before that, there is a related question because I would like to ask Alan, we will talk about the avert. So how did you tell the last minute expose, how do you avert that? The close to the election, the enemy will not fight against your candidate or another candidate. And I know for a fact that the person I am referring to is watching because he messaged me. So hello, shout out to unknown person who is watching what happened. That was our experience in a... Who is he? This is a mayoralty race, I will not call it a mayoralty race. And one week before the election, there was a famous broadcast journalist at a big station who went to the place of work of that person and exposed supposedly both buying mechanisms and illegal campaigning, etc. where the facility happened. This is one week before the election. And that's what we lost, at least I was angry at that. How do you avoid that? Number one, make sure that there is a contract, if there is a famous station that went to you, and you do that, get an equally famous station on your side. And make sure that if that is the case, it is likely that there will be a microphone. Because that was one week before the elections. Unfortunately, that took us completely by surprise, but it won't happen again. That's what we do. We learn from our past experiences and we improve the system. It's an ever-improving system. So, just to put finality on that, PR is not a practice of wrongdoing. Unfortunately, a lot of practitioners do it. That's why I would love it if there was some sort of regulation. But it's like pornography. One of the main issues about pornography, why they can never legislate against it, is you can't even define the word. There is literally no definition of pornography. So, in the same way, how can you police or legislate or even regulate PR, when in fact there are so many channels that can be construed as PR? So, it's hard. I hope it happens. That's okay. By the way, I was looking at the time. But I think the organizers gave us leeway to extend the content if it's okay with you. It's a good discussion. In fact, sorry, can I add? You know the best way to, and call to action here, you know the best way to police the PR industry? Punish them. Punish them. Who can punish them, the voters? If you see the primary weapon or the primary tool used by a candidate, this information, don't do this. Don't do this. So that PR will be able to control it. That tactic doesn't work. So, it's a related question. Let's ask Manolo and Attorney Regi. How then can we help our voters be critical in deciphering the truth behind the political campaigns? You know, I think let's give, we're too harsh on the voters. You know, there's a saying you can fool someone sometimes, but not all the time. Yeah. And, you know, a case in point is, you know, presidents rise and fall in popularity. Image making PR can only take you so far. Going back to the truth, you know, you're entitled to your own opinion, but you're not entitled to your own facts. Yes, we should have defined the truth very early on as when it comes to facts, that is the mortal enemy of PR, actually, because kung tuto o, and it's a fact, mehirap ilagan, you know, you can't, you can't just get around it and it will, it will come out and it will hurt. Or it will come out and it will vindicate you. Maybe not instantly, but definitely over time. So ang puntu dito is the BS detector of the voter, of the Filipino voter is very high. Earlier, you were pointing to the Villar thing, ang patunayan ng Villar campaign, money cannot buy you an election. You know, just having money in itself will not work kung, kung, kung dito matun saa imo. On the other hand, it is also, in a sense, the free market that helps it because dahil meh competition not only between media outfits but between candidates, it helps bring out things that other candidates may not want to come out. So, I personally feel campaigns should be longer. If campaigns were longer, perhaps we would make it so. Hey, that's a great idea. The second thing I would say is that all these artificial distinctions, the thing I think most necessary is finance reform, what is spent. Because if you really get down to the spending, then that's what provides the opportunity for good and bad. Oh, okay. Attorney Reiji. There are a lot of tools now. Let me put it this way first. There are a lot of false information in the platforms or social media platforms. There are a lot of tools now available to check, fact check what is on social media. In fact, there are sites where you can fact check. It's important to educate our voters. Although I agree with Manolo that our voters are discerning. They just need proper guidance, maybe additional guidance, whatever, in how they can spot false information, etc. And for me, we should reinforce educating them, not only in terms of who the proper candidates are, but also fact checking on issues or positions that are put in media. Okay. I think we have time for one more question. There are a lot of questions directed to Mr. Alan Herrmann. Okay, bring it on. But we have a question for all of you. Do you even investigate your clients, or before you accept them, you do a background check? Absolutely. We go to what is known as a confession booth. Because that goes both ways. We need to investigate so that we know if there are any evidence. We need to know all the evidence of the client. Number one, if it's possible to spit it out, but if it's true, then we won't accept it as a client. And number two, we also... go ahead, sorry. No, go ahead. May I take that question? Yes, we also need to know what are your strengths and temperament. Are you a gut? Are you a heart? Are you a head? What is your dominant selling idea? We also need to know that. So yes, we do intensive background checking. But there is a lot of confession. Let's say he released all his business, but you end up not accepting him or her as a client. Yes, yes. It's like a lawyer. How do you deal with the enemy in the next election cycle? It's not happening yet, but that's an interesting scenario. It's very interesting. But ethically, I definitely won't be able to do that. Okay, Mr. Caymanolo, that's a very light question. Have you ever considered running for public office? And number two, who did the study on ALDUB? You answered ALDUB. That's from talking to colleagues who are in political communications. Although I do... my understanding is Twitter sent a team to study ALDUB in the Philippines when it was happening. In terms of politics, I'll answer it with this. There are a lot of questions. And then I once asked my aunt, who knows a lot about politics because of my grandfather. And I said, oh, should I enter politics? And she said, you should answer one basic question. Do you wake up in the morning craving to be with people and to do something for them? If you don't wake up with that hunger, you are going to be a bad politician. Never mind your... what do you want to do? And I realized that I'm a nerd and I'd rather be with a book. So it's that simple. And that is the... that's the authentic Manolo. Well, you know what to call in case you do, boss. There, Alan is volunteering. Anyway, I think we have the last question for all. I think this is very significant. I asked this to everyone to answer. From Elton James Gagni. Okay. Do you think there's still an opportunity to de-weaponize social media, especially with the digital landscape so growing at an accelerated rate? How do you think will be... will we be able to do this? I would like to start. Okay, I'll go first. Great word because in fact, weaponizing social media is something that is close to my heart. But do I think there is an opportunity? Actually, it has significantly been de-weaponized. As it is, we got to give Facebook more credit. 2016, what I saw in 2016, and I was, my God, neck deep. Maybe forehead deep in that fight. And boy, social media was really what I called a zombie apocalypse. Zombie apocalypse, that's it. My enemy is that horde. Zombie horde is my enemy. So 2016 and now, and the big difference is Facebook Clean House. Facebook deactivated a lot of the inauthentic behavior. It's so hard to make a Facebook account now. Automation, the one that I mentioned earlier, the mythical machine that I was speaking about earlier. As soon as you stick that in, it will detect that. It will block you. So Facebook, police, it's ranks. It's a plus and a minus because it became more expensive now. It became more expensive. But going back to the question, do I think it can be de-weaponized? I think it will be a natural progression. I'm hoping that the BS meter that Manolo referred to earlier will kick in. It may be kicking in more slowly than I would like, but hopefully it will kick in and they will realize that BS on social media is BS on social media and the medium by market forces will just deteriorate in effectivity when it comes to spreading this information. So short answer, yes. Attorney Reggie. By its nature, I believe that it's hard to de-weaponize in social media. On the level of the users, on the level of Facebook, for example, Twitter, owners of the platform, they have already, as Alan was saying, adopted the algorithms which would limit how the platform can be used or to avoid it being weaponized. So I'll talk to you if you want to weaponize it. And I believe it's a very limited way that we can. It's to educate the users, educate on how social media can be used and can counter those that use it for negative purposes. One of its users, but again, I agree with Alan, the limit net of your algorithms to being adopted and things like fact checking, etc. are there to try to control using social media as a weapon for those purposes. Take note, it's also positive in so far as recognizing it for positive gains. Okay, early. For me, I believe, yes, we can de-weaponize social media, but probably it won't be in the ways that we imagine. There's no social media and no one's priority on Facebook or in Twitter anymore. At the end of the day, we need to remember that we created these technologies and although it shapes us, it acts back on us. As creators, we can change its trajectory. And I believe this is also starting with the personal choices that we make. When I was in college and when I was in high school, we didn't have a subject of media literacy, we didn't have a subject of information literacy. What we had was computer. And this is not the case, it's not responsible to use communication technologies, especially in public discourse and to engage in democracy. But now, we can see that even in the high school level, we have signatures or subjects that are geared towards media and information literacy. And I think that's a positive step for us. Even though we are informing and educating students that yes, we have access to these tools, but we need to be mindful, not just careful, we need to be mindful in how we use these tools. Because the social media, I think it was intended, if we will return these tools, it was intended to foster connections. But look at it now, it's no longer doing what it's supposed to do or what it was envisioned to do. But we can change this because as we go on and we support efforts in form or in creating a media and information literate public, I believe, even though we can overcome some of the hurdles and undo some of the damage that have been done by social media. So a short answer is, if we can go for nuclear disarmament, then we could probably still go towards social media disarmament as well. Okay, Manolo. I think it's basically, evolution is constant. And when it comes to social media, evolution is on warp speed. So when Facebook became toxic, all of a sudden, everyone just shifted their conversations to chat apps, to WhatsApp, to other things like that. And everyone who is trying to capitalize on the social media has to change their tactics accordingly. The one thing that all our comments have in common is, the providers or the makers of social media apps have to be responsive to two pressures, public pressure and government pressure. Government pressure is being driven both by self-interest of the politicians and the public. And that is the interplay that happens to drive efforts to improve and make it safer and more positive experience for people. Okay, this ends our question and answer session for this forum. But let's move on to our esteemed guests. Basically, we will be listening to the afterword of parting shots or parting words, sorry. But you can also do a parting shot if you want. Hardly. At this stage, okay, let's flash our Zoom panel evaluation poll on the screen. So basically, this will give you time to think of your parting words. So parting shots, okay. So to our Zoom attendees, please take this moment to answer this quick poll of just five questions. They have graciously taken the time from their very hectic schedules to be with us today. Okay, so now for the first question. The panelists demonstrated thorough knowledge of the topic. So, yeah. Of course, the host and the panelists are not allowed to vote because that would be self-promotion. Okay, so I understand. I thought I would wait for the results to come in. It's just open. Okay, you can answer this poll. In the meantime, let's hear messages or parting words from our guests. Okay, let's start with Attorney Regi. Thank you, Christian. Earl? For me, I would like to go back to what Anon Pierce et. me cron in in their theory, the coordinated management of meaning. Because the CMM believes that our communicative lives and our lives are directly influenced by the communication that we that we'll partake in the end of the conversations that we are a part of. Maybe we should be more aware of what kind of communication our employees are working on, what kind of conversations we choose to be a part of. And let's not forget that in terms of discussion and in terms of argument, what they are doing in social media, in terms of arguing about the truth, we need to be mindful, we need to be open to other realities, to other possibilities without losing ourselves or without forgetting our stance. I think in this conversation, we are giving a unique opportunity to be reflexive, we are giving an opportunity to sort in how we are using communication to make up the reality that we are divided and we are against one another. At the end of the day, we have an agency, it's our choice, how we use comm. Okay, thank you for that, Manalo. Hey, you're on mute. Hello, okay. It was a very community-oriented approach to life and national problems and the national conversation. You have infinite choices, where to get your information and infinite choices, which of these sources of information reflects your worldview. Because of this, what used to be easy, because there are consensus in all the things that are important, if the truth is true and if it is false, the world is no longer like that. Which means, when it comes to the election, where the challenge is to bring the button to the president, where he is going, it is not done in the style of what we are doing. You need to find the majority and then you will succeed. Now, you just need to find a group that is a little bigger than the other small groups. The view of this challenge is different. And so what happened, as I said earlier, everyone believes in the truth. The problem is, everyone can now have their own truth. And the candidates now rely on technicians who can identify the whole menu of truths and individually satisfy them, so that they can reach the president. So the solution, I think, always comes in that very old-fashioned word, Sibika. We need to go back to what we are talking about, what we are thinking about as a country. And there, we can find a better process to make sure that when we talk about the truth, is our definition from the start the same? If there is really nothing to be said about debate or debate, that's it. Thank you very much, Manolo. I'm sure those who are watching us will learn from you. They are not afraid of anything. I was talking to you in the Philippines. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, Mr. Hermann. Well, first of all, thank you very much for being here with me on this beautiful panel. And I have given you the opportunity to talk to all of you. Truthwell told is the title of our conference. So, right, Manolo, there are many different truths and experts like me can tell it well. Truthwell told. We are learning this. We take this job very, very seriously in order to tell the truth well. So, my parting shot is counter-intuitive, in fact. Take the process of seeking the truth and choose by elimination. It's counter-intuitive. So, find out what are the non-negotiables to you. Instead of choosing who I like the most, who I am the most, who I am the most type of candidate, who is the most beautiful candidate, start with your non-negotiables. I'm not going to vote for the good, I'm not going to vote for the bad, I'm not going to vote for the bad in our country, and so on and so forth. And seek the truth as far as the track records of the candidates you are choosing from. And eliminate those who do not meet the criteria of non-negotiables to you. And that's where the true and the most beautiful candidate will come out of your vote and the deserving of your sacred vote. So, that's it. Thank you very much, Mr. Alan Herrman. Thank you very much to all of you who came to our roundtable discussion. I think we're getting good feedback because of you guys. Thank you very much for joining us. We know that you guys are very busy, but it has been a very insightful discussion. Thank you very much, Mr. Reggie, Alan, Earl, and Manola. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Okay, at this stage, we will show the results of the evaluation poll that we did earlier. So, first question, the panelists demonstrated thorough knowledge of the topic, strongly agree. Okay, the panelists were well prepared and organized, strongly agree. The panelists spoke clearly and audibly, strongly agree. The panelists used appropriate language with technical jargons, adequately explained. Yeah, strongly agree. And last, the panelists contributed to the perspectives and knowledge on political PR and advertising. Strongly disagree. Strongly agree. We have a 1% hater. Just one. Two out of 294. Well, thank you very much for making this possible. Thank you very much. At this stage, we're now launching our post-test so you can access your progress in knowledge and understanding acquired from this webinar. Okay. So, we will keep the post-test open in the background as you proceed with our program. Okay. At this stage, I'd like to introduce to you the President of the Philippines Communication Society, as well as she's also the Vice President for Public Affairs at the University of the Philippines System to give us her closing remarks. Welcome, please, Dr. Elena Purnia. Hello, and good morning to everyone, to our moderator and our esteemed analysts, as well as to our audiences who have taken the time this morning to get educated on the topic of political PR and advertising. We began this morning's webinar with the context of war. Our opening statement from our director, Felipe Salvosa, pointed out that truth is actually the first casualty in war. Therefore, setting the stage for this morning's discussion in the context of elections as war, where PR strategies are the ones who determine who direct the war itself. Our persons on the street interviews pointed out that there is really hope in the voter because voters and the general public are able to discern what is truth. If we take these three as representative of the opinions of the public, then we can note that we do have intelligent voters who see that there is just a glimmer of truth in what candidates point out, plus the fact that they, together with our panelists, say that it is the discerning voter, the importance of discernment and a critical perspective for our elections to be successful. Our panelists pointed out so many things, and I really advise our viewers to watch the reruns of this entire webinar. Let me synthesize by trying my best to put out what their important thoughts were regarding truth. Number one, is there truth in political PR? Well, the answers range from yes, there is truth to yes, there is limited truth. There is truth because the image of candidates are put together with what their strength is, what they are known for, but this limited truth can be twisted and constructed, depending on what are the needs and the interests of their audiences. In terms of strategies that have evolved over time, political strategies that evolved over time, these were affected by the change of our media from the large mass media, which carried most of the messages just two generations prior. Now, strategies are more limited, more directed at smaller audiences, the micro audiences, and also affected by the movement from journalists, columnists, opinion makers, to the micro influencers. We learned terms like the raised farm instead of the troll farm. We learned actually, if candidates were listening, our panelists here were already giving advice on structuring, you know, working with this micro influencers. We also learned that in terms of the media themselves, now there is an importance and there is a large value that the owners of the networks place on ethics, they have a large stake in making sure that there is truth in the content of their media. But then there is a movement as well of journalists from journalism to becoming social media influencers, where there is a murky, if at all, concern for truth and ethics. In the end, our speakers, as well as our, you know, as well as our commenters in the chat box, point out that there is hope for our democracy in the Philippines, because it is the voter in the end who must make up his mind, her mind. One of our speakers pointed out that voters have a BS detector within them. They are deserting, but then they do need some more training, some more instructions on determining what is truth and non-truth. And it is in this context that myself and our society, the Philippines Communication Society, as communication educators must take the cue. You know, it is incumbent upon those who are in the profession of education in the profession of communication and media to contribute to our public's increase in media literacy. And then because I am a communication teacher, and many of our audiences are communication students, I want to point out that there have been many theories that were bad news about this morning, which you students might be able to use in your own studies about politics. We heard about expectancy violation, information bias. We heard about CMM and also social construction. May I throw in? Professor Prenia, I think we're having problems with her connection. Go ahead. Okay, all right. I'm sorry. Okay. As a last sentence, as a communication teacher myself, I want to listen again to the reruns and learn more about applications of theories like expectancy violation, information bias, CMM, social construction theory, but then I'll throw in a few more theories which will be helpful for you to understand the situation of voting and campaigning in the Philippines. Among them are the functional theory of political campaign discourse, elaboration likelihood theory, and also agenda setting and framing all set within the context of deliberative democracy. Again, our thanks to everyone who has been here, both in front of the camera and behind the all audiences who have given their comments. I hope this has been a learning session for everyone because it has been for us. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for those closing remarks and synthesis. Professor Elena Prenia, thank you very much. At this day, I'd like to share with you the results of the poll or the post-test results that we can post-test results. We're sharing them now. Now for the next question, here are the results. Okay. Which political narrative works best in the political ads for you? Okay. Change. The change narrative, still number one, followed closely by tumugon sa pandemnya. Okay. And none of the above. Okay. So these are the post-test results that we're sharing you. Now, those who have actively participated will get the most out of this interactive program. As mentioned, this webinar is part of a series of national forum on communication and democracy, Philippine elections 2022. The PCS will be having a webinar every second Wednesday of the month until May 2022. So I hope you guys take advantage of this. Next month, we'll be featuring another topic, an equally important topic that we hope you won't miss. The topic is how credible are political surveys. With Steve DeLisa, and as your host and moderator, please stay tuned for updates on the PCS website and Facebook page. At this point, we'd like to formally close our fourth national forum on communication and democracy, Philippine elections 2022. We look forward to your company again every second Wednesday of the month, 9 to 11 a.m. Manila time. This has been your moderator, Christiana Segira of the ABS-CBN News channel. Thank you very much for joining us today. On behalf of the Philippines Communication Society, let us strengthen our country's democratic foundations through communication. Thank you and enjoy the rest of the day.