Media News - Thursday, May 31, 2012

Israeli journalist faces trial over receiving secret documents

Israel is to put a journalist on trial for receiving secret military documents from a former soldier. The country's justice ministry said charges will soon be filed against Uri Blau, an investigative reporter for paper Haaretz, "for the offence of possession of secret information by an unauthorised person". Blau used some of the documents in a 2008 article which claimed that troops had been ordered to carry out targeted killings of Palestinian militants in violation of a supreme court order. They were among thousands of Israeli Defence Force (IDF) documents passed to him by a former Israeli soldier, Anat Kamm, who was sentenced in February last year to four-and-a-half years in prison for unauthorised distribution of classified material. In a statement explaining its decision, the Israeli state prosecutor's office insisted that it had taken all "relevant considerations"- including press freedom - into account before concluding "that this case is an extreme one in terms of the severity of Blau's actions." The statement added that Blau had "betrayed his duty – and later his commitment before the state... and could have easily prevented harm to Israel's security without hurting his sources." Press freedom watchdogs have called on Israel not to charge Blau. Blau faces up to seven years in prison if convicted. (The Guardian)

Bundlr shifts to become like Pinterest for curated media

The content curation website Bundlr has announced a new version of its service which allows for embedding of content from a wide range of sources. By partnering with Embedly the site now supports over 200 sources of content, including Storify, Pinterest and Amazon, for users to add to their bundles. Embedly is the service that the new version of Twitter uses to embed photographs and articles in your Twitter stream and is used by a host of other sites such as Reddit and Bitly and comes as a WordPress plugin. While Bundlr was originally seen as an alternative to sites like Storify, which can be used to create stories from curated links and content, Bundlr's focus is now on creating a top-level resource for curated content around a story or topic. Articles can be read in a simplified style, akin to Readability or Instapaper, and interactive content like Prezi or Slideshare presentations can be played from the Bundlr site. Bundlr's new design is very visual and users of Pinterest boards will quickly grasp the idea of creating bundles. One clear advantage over Pinterest is the support for more than just images and links. When clipping various media Bundlr will pull an image for the tile but when clicked on this will display the full content. (Journalism.co.uk)

Bambuser offers free live-streaming service for citizen journalists

Touting its belief in "free speech and democracy," the live video-streaming app Bambuser announced that it is offering free premium access to its service for citizen journalists, according to EditorsWeblog. According to the Bambuser blog, live streaming from citizen journalists is especially important when professional news media don't have access. "Over the past years we've seen more and more activists and citizen journalists use Bambuser to broadcast real-time information about activities and events when they happen. We think that user generated content broadens the overall picture of what's actually going on, and is needed to complement professional news reporting," the site said. Citizen journalists who sign up will receive unlimited streaming and unlimited storage. Plus, Bambuser's deal with the Associated Press (AP) wire service means citizen journalists can opt to allow the AP to access and distribute their videos, explained journalism.co.uk. As the site The Next Web pointed out, Bambuser has been a key mobile tool for spreading the word during the protests of the Arab Spring and the Occupy Wall Street movement. Citizen journalists and activists who want to apply for the free Bambuser service should send an email to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) with their Bambuser username and a brief description of what they do. (Knight Center)

Guardian’s n0tice launches iPhone app for geotagged news

The Guardian's online noticeboard n0tice Wednesday announced the launch of a new iPhone app, to encourage people to read and share breaking news based on a location. The "see it, snap it, share it tool for geotagged breaking news" is now in the App Store. n0tice, which describes itself as the "local noticeboard that lives on the web" and utilises developments in social, local and mobile, wants to encourage "people to see and report what is happening near them in real-time", according to a release. The launch of the free app comes a week after notice announced its "open journalism toolkit", the opening of its API, enabling publishers to take data posted via the platform. According to the n0tcie blog, the technology used to build the iPhone app includes the n0tice API, the release of which came less that a month after the launch of a n0tice Facebook app. (Journalism.co.uk)

New AP Stylebook updates entries on social media, race

The Associated Press (AP) Stylebook, which sets the standard for spellings and style for much of the U.S. news media, on Wednesday launched the 2012 AP Stylebook with more than 270 new or updated entries, including new broadcast and fashion chapters, and an expanded social media section, the AP said in a statement. "At nearly 500 pages, the AP Stylebook continues to evolve to meet the diverse needs of writers and editors," the organization said, reported the Huffington Post. The chapter on social media use was originally added to the Stylebook in 2010. The AP prompted criticism in 2011 when journalists contended that the AP's guidelines on re-tweeting - which are included in the new Stylebook - demonstrated that the news organization just didn't "get" Twitter and social media. See this post from Poynter about other changes to the 2012 AP Stylebook, including guidelines on when to use racial identifications in stories. The relevance of race in the news came to the forefront during media coverage of the shooting of Florida teen Trayvon Martin. (Knight Center)

EU: French press corps irked by EU use of English

The Brussels-based French-language press corps reacted with fury Wednesday to the release in English of the EU's annual report cards on the bloc's 27 economies. In an angry open e-mail to the European Commission, the correspondent for the daily Liberation newspaper Jean Quatremer said - in French: "Once again, all the documents published today are available only in English. This is unacceptable." The Commission released 1,500 pages of hotly-awaited reports on the state of the bloc's economies along with proposals to redress public finances as Europe fights the debt crisis threatening some of its biggest economies. "I can't see why the Anglo-Saxon media should benefit from such an unbelievable competitive edge on the remainder of the other media and I can't see any practical reason for the Commission's incapacity to do this work." "The right to be informed in one's own language about the social and budgetary sacrifices demanded by the EU executive is a minimum right," he added. His protest was backed by most of his French colleagues. A spokesperson for the Commission told AFP that "the translations are coming." (AFP)

More recent Media News:

• 30/05/12 - YouTube wins copyright case in French court
• 30/05/12 - UK reporter won’t be prosecuted for hack leaks
• 30/05/12 - Thai webmaster sentenced in free speech case
• 30/05/12 - Newspapers increasingly eliminating copy editors
• 30/05/12 - Fairfax journalists in Australia vote to strike
• 30/05/12 - Russian journalist attacked in Moscow
• 29/05/12 - Powerful “Flame” cyber weapon found in Iran
• 29/05/12 - Facebook smartphone to be ‘released next year’
• 29/05/12 - Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa asks citizens to boycott press
• 29/05/12 - China’s Sina Weibo unveils new censorship system
• 29/05/12 - Brazil now has its own version of the influential Columbia Journalism Review magazine
• 29/05/12 - UK: Cardiff University to set up community journalism centre
• 25/05/12 - US: Times-Picayune to cut paper to 3 days a week
• 25/05/12 - BBC flexes online video muscle in Europe
• 25/05/12 - Meograph tool to help journalists build interactive multimedia stories
• 25/05/12 - Al Jazeera wants to build a sports broadcasting empire
• 25/05/12 - Press freedom watchdogs demand release of Palestinian broadcaster
• 25/05/12 - Amnesty International 2012 annual report criticizes Venezuelan restrictions on press freedom
• 24/05/12 - Seven media foundations launch European Press Prize
• 24/05/12 - Yahoo seeks to shake up search, Web browsing
• 24/05/12 - 1000s of students protest media in Mexico
• 24/05/12 - Mexico captures suspect in death of US journalist
• 24/05/12 - The Poynter Institute and Craig Newmark to host journalism ethics symposium
• 24/05/12 - “Citizen journalism” focuses on Israeli occupation

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