Jones ‘getting a dose of his own medicine’

Coalition communications spokesman Malcolm Turnbull has spoken about the Jones saga during a lecture entitled 'Liberty in the Digital Age'.

Turnbull believes that Jones had not been the victim of cyberbullying, but that new media had allowed thousands of Australians to speak up "unedited and unmediated".

He said…

"It is difficult not to believe that he is getting a dose of his own medicine. Just when you thought he had already exhausted the reservoir of abuse he reserves for Julia Gillard he outdid himself, and we learned about it because of another smartphone".

"More importantly perhaps the avalanche of condemnation which followed was delivered by thousands of Australians expressing their views online, especially via Twitter and Facebook making it very difficult for Jones’s friends and supporters in the media and politics to brush that outburst off as just another example of 'Alan being Alan'.

"Thousands of Australians spoke for themselves, unedited, unmediated, via the social media. The names and email addresses of Jones' advertisers were circulated via the social media so that they could be urged directly to stop advertising on his program."

"His Mercedes Benz has been recalled. The management of 2GB have announced his show will be run henceforth without any advertisements at all. For the first time Alan will have something in common with the ABC."

"Mr Jones has sought to lead 'people’s revolts' for many years. But this was indeed a popular revolt against vicious and destructive public discourse. And while the thousands of tweets would not have affected Mr Jones’ sunny equanimity, they had a marked impact on his advertisers."

Read more in the Herald Sun here