Resources - Spotlight Archive
The Media Self-Regulation Guidebook
If you don’t be the boss of you, somebody else will be.
That’s the underlying theme stressed in The Media Self-Regulation Guidebook, published this spring by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).
This 100-page guide is available to order, free of charge, in French, English and Russian. It carefully chronicles steps unregulated media groups can take to become more self-regulating. The guide is structured in a Q&A format, proffering logical questions and then giving lucid answers in concise sentences. This creative format easily facilitates practical consideration of a rather serious topic.
The book is useful for editors, publishers and owners. It gives well thought-out advice and offers short theoretical clues as to why it provides the advice it does.
Self-regulation can save a lot of money. More importantly, codes of ethics can, when publicised and respected, increase a newsgathering operation’s credibility with – and accountability to - the public.
“Respect for a visible code of ethics significantly reduces the risk of statutory intervention and expensive legal action. The alternative to a code is the courtroom.” (read more)
Pro Publica
The answer to one of the questions tormenting everyone concerned with the future of journalism may be Pro Publica.
This non-profit newsroom, based in Manhattan, is be filled with 26 proven editors and reporters focused solely on investigative journalism. It is registered as a non-profit and will be funded by philanthropies.
Pro Publica launched 10 June. It's 20-odd journalists from some of the top newspapers in the United States have been hired to work for former Wall Street Journal managing editor Paul Steiger. The website, which has been creating much buzz in industry circles, promises stories are soon to come.
Non-profit journalism is not new. But what’s new is how many groups are organising for this pursuit. It is perhaps the fastest-growing arena for investigative work that is beneficial for citizens. In his paper, The Growing Importance of Nonprofit Journalism, Charles Lewis writes:
“…If commercial journalism had been functioning well with great independence, courage and enterprise, man years ago, none of the investigative reporting centers discussed here would have even been necessary or created. They began expressly to respond to a perceived need for more and higher quality reportage. And they have been fulfilling that need, with limited capacity and sometimes difficult financial circumstances with unflinching courage, creativity and perseverance.”
(read more)
A Reporter’s Guide to Sports and Olympics Reporting
When I was in the fifth grade, I wanted to be an Olympic swimmer. Clad in Barcelona T-shirt, my 9-year-old self watched Summer Sanders and Jenny Thompson win gold at the1992 Summer Olympic Games from the cool beige carpet of my parent’s suburban home.
My swimming abilities reached their limits even before the Atlanta Games, though, petering out somewhere around flip-turns and the butterfly.
It turns out I have a far greater chance of making it to the Olympics as a reporter than an athlete. According to “A Reporter’s Guide to Sports and Olympic Reporting,” published by the Reuters Foundation, 10,500 athletes – and 21,000 journalists – cover the Summer Games.
This guide is an ideal introduction for any newbie to sports or Olympic reporting. It gives practical writing and logistical tips alike. (read more)
Cafe Babel
It’s tough to own a café.
Every decision you make – be it in regards to function or fashion - dictates what kind of people will come through the door. The kind of beer you pipe in, the style of music you play, the décor on the walls.
Café Babel, one of a few truly multi-lingual magazine websites, re-launched this month. It maintains its hetra-lingualism (that’s seven languages, for those of you whose language proficiencies don’t include Greek). It continues to be comprised entirely of user-generated content. Articles are translated by an entirely volunteer set of translators.
The nature of the content remains the same: Culture and politics written for and about a young, educated, European audience, simply put.
Which gives the distinct impression that if Café Babel were a real place – which sometimes it is, as the site organises occasional meet-ups – its patrons could be described as hipsters. (read more)
Berkman Center for Internet & Society
Museums are for history. Or art, but often not unless its creator is, well, history.
So it can’t be a good sign for the newspaper industry that a museum recently opened to pay it homage.
The Newseum opened in early April in Washington, DC, to mixed reviews. So even though the weak dollar means museum visits in the States are cheaper than a visit to your local friture, there might be better places for media wonks to spend their holidays.
Journalism enthusiasts interested in the future of the news industry are better to traverse up the East Coast to the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, which is part of Harvard Law School. In fact, on 15 May, the Boston-based Center will host Berkman@10, a two-day anniversary conference. (read more)
Big Think
Some people know more than you do.
At least, they know something different from what you know. One of the best places to find some of these people is at an easy-to-use video platform called Big Think.
The cleanly edited vault of videos at Big Think is a direct antithesis to the chaos of YouTube. The site, which launched two months ago, was founded by two graduates of Harvard University, Peter Hopkins and Victoria Brown.
“We interview thought leaders from almost every pursuit. From rock star to Nobel Laureate, our aim is to collect the thoughts and expertise of these individuals and use it to catalyze a global conversation around issues and ideas,” Brown, 33, said via e-mail.
(read more)
News Videographer
Journalism has always been a profession which requires practical experience.
No matter the medium, certain skill sets are paramount. These do not develop overnight, or in a university library: an ability to relate to a variety of people, an ability to make deadline, consistent production of professional work, gut instincts and a wicked work ethic.
These abilities are the little black dresses of journalism; they won’t ever go out of style. But with video for the web increasingly en vogue, there are some new trends to master.
One of the best style guides for video on the web is the News Videographer blog. (read more)
Ushahidi
In Kenya, purveyors of press freedom are struggling.
The government there declared a media blackout when violence broke out as a result of bitter contention and opposition to over the 27 December elections, which saw the incumbent President Mwai Kibaki re-elected in what international observers called a flawed and questionable process.
It was in this fiery climate that prominent Kenyan blogger Ory Okolloh, who writes at Kenyanpundit.com, teamed up with friends to found Ushahidi.
The site allows anyone in Kenya with news of post-election violence to report it – via SMS, or e-mail. Then editors like Okolloh will then verify the report with local NGOs or other reputable sources before posting it. The homepage of the site features a map mash-up showing where incidents – like property damage, deaths, looting, government forces or peace efforts - have occurred. (read more)
Online Journalism Blog
Calming, thoughtful voices – with a European accent – are not so easy to find among popular journalism blogs.
But the Online Journalism Blog, run out of Birmingham, England, is a professional resource infused with ideas both scholarly and practical. It covers a potpourri of subjects relating to the Internet and the capabilities it offers the ever-evolving profession of journalism, particularly in terms of interactive storytelling, blogging, citizen journalism, podcasts, computer assisted reporting, photoblogging, vlogging and uses for automations like RSS. (read more)
Regret The Error
Nothing wrings a reporter’s innards quite like being tersely informed there is an error in a piece of work he’s published.
However, the queasy stomach and glowering editor are a dozen roses next to the eye-popping terror of seeing the inevitable correction globally publicised … courtesy of Regret The Error, a three-year old weblog addressing corrections in mass media.
But for the hoards (dwindling though they may be) of everyday citizens who get their news from the mainstream media, sites like this one, whose Canada-based author, Craig Silverman, is the author of a recently published book by the same name as his blog, are entirely reassuring: at least there’s one place to go where it’s easy to check up on the writers and reporters who ladle out the daily bulletins.
(read more)
The Hub
This autumn, an international advocacy group launched the Hub, which has become an award-winning portal to that two-way street called participatory journalism – an avenue whose founders hope will increase the ability of the everyman to document human rights abuses.
Available in English, French and Spanish, the Hub allows users to create an account and upload video. It does not act as a gatekeeper or editor – and as such cannot guarantee the authenticity of any material on its site – but allows the users of the site to rank and rate the videos it hosts.
The top-rated video at this time depicts police officers in Egypt slapping a man in their custody. The same video was submitted to YouTube, which initially took it down. (read more)
Mogulus
Since BBC, MSNBC and CNN are often simultaneously airing the same stories anyway: a more personal 24-hour programming choice.
The idea of continuously live television channels becomes far more democratic at Mogulus, an online television studio that makes it possible for those of us who are not Oprah or a BBC broadcaster to create and produce our own television station.
The site, which launched its beta version earlier this year, allows anyone to start and manage their own television channel. Users can alternate between third-party clips hosted at elsewhere (platforms like YouTube or Google Video), and live streaming. (read more)
Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting
October has been a good month at the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting: The non-profit grant foundation saw reporters it sent to China and Iraq publish extensive reporting projects that gained attention across the United States. It also won an honourable mention from the Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism.
The Pulitzer Center not only addresses the dearth of foreign reporting in American media with its travel stipend program for reporters. It is also trying to create more demand for quality international coverage with its Global Gateway initiative.
The Center awards travel stipends to experienced freelance or staff reporters so they can report from around the world on stories which have been under-reported or inaccurately reported in the American press. The Centre is funded primarily by the Pulitzer family, former owners of the St. Louis Post Dispatch - for which the Center's director, Jon Sawyer, used to report from Washington, D.C., and around the world.
(read more)
AfricaNews
Europe and the world are turning an eye on Africa, looking for genuine news and images from the continent. Increasingly, Western media companies covet any news local African people can capture with a telephone mobile or a small video camera. They are building multimedia platforms to offer webloggers, photographers and citizen journalists who have access to these Internet and mobile technologies a place to contribute to the news from the continent.
Netherlands-based media company Africa Interactive has started AfricaNews to feature user-generated content coming from Africa. The website is sectioned traditionally, with business, society, culture, microcredits and travel pieces. Everything is published in English – and also in Dutch, at AfricaNieuws.
(read more)
Mizzima News
The military junta in Myanmar may have blocked the Internet, but it has not been able to stop Mizzima News.
The 9-year-old news site is operated from New Delhi, India, where its exiled Burmese editors reside. It relies on a small network of professional journalists – and a mass of citizen journalists who send information and photos via telephone, text messages, and, when possible, e-mail.
Starting during the September protests, when threats to foreign journalists began to escalate, Mizzima News reports and photographs have provided information picked up by Reuters, the Financial Times, BBC, Washington Post, AFP and The Wall Street Journal, among others. (read more)
Knight Citizen News Network
There is much hand wringing on the part of classically-trained reporters and publishers now confronted with the notion of being complimented - replaced? - by citizens wielding camera phones who voluntarily submit multimedia content to newsgathering operations.
The Knight Citizen News Network seeks to educate skeptics and enthusiasts alike in the art of citizen journalism. (read more)
Global Politician
Global Politician is a serious journal about politics and world affairs. It was started in 2004, with the objective of providing news, analysis and views not covered by mainstream media.
Editor-in-Chief David Storobin says that Global Politician doesn’t follow party lines, but instead publishes stories written from all points of view: left, right, Islamist, Zionist, radical, mainstream, centrist. (read more)
RealTravel
The travel logs at Real Travel.com are sure to energise holiday plans and daydreams alike.
Whichever needs a bit of inspiration, the travel diaries and photographs created by people who have been where you want to go – or to places you haven’t yet heard about – won’t disappoint.
(read more)
Off The Bus
OffTheBus is Jay Rosen and Arianna Huffington’s new project, one that will allow ‘the crowd’ to cover the 2008 presidential campaign. The campaign has already been characterized by new media experiments, such as the CNN/YouTube debates.
The project was announced on March 2007 at Press Think. Jay Rosen said it would consist of “campaign reporting by a great many more people than would ever fit on the bus,” the same bus that reporters “have famously gotten on and off every four years, as they try to cover the race for president.” (read more)
Newser
The recent proliferation of online news aggregators – like the recently-launched Newser – has infused morning headline perusals with a distinctly Web 2.0 flavour.
Newser, which launched earlier this summer, has essentially animated the role of your local news editor in an attempt to “deliver the best information in concise, efficient summaries, together with photos, video and audio and links to original stories.”
Each section of Neweser – which is divided like a traditional newspaper, with “News” “Business” “Sports” and “Culture” tabs – consists of a web page featuring nine squares. Each square features a headline, news photo and one-sentence summary. (read more)
Boing Boing
You don’t need a tetanus shot to sift through the bric-a-brac stockpiled at Boing Boing.
Instead of rusty antiques, this virtual street market offers a bevy of cultural curiosities and interesting technologies. Or, as the creators call it: “A directory of wonderful things.”
At the popular search engine for user-generated media Technorati, Boing Boing is ranked as the most popular blog, with statistics saying it is visited by 1.75 million people every day. (read more)
Center for citizen media
The author of 'We the media' says journalists need to unshackle themselves from growing media empires.
“We’re on the road,” Dan Gillmor said. “But we have a long, long way to go.” Gillmor’s book addresses the role of Internet in helping independent journalists function within large media conglomerates. In July, he delivered the keynote speech at the OhmyNews International Citizen Reporters’ Forum. On that occasion, he was inspired to make an assessment of the current state of citizen journalism. (read more)
Eyes on Darfur
In a time where media are accused of enhancing voyeurism, like in the Big Brother case, and that the latest Google’s map service "Street view" raises privacy fears, Amnesty International and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) developed a virtual eye to look over and protect the population of Darfur. The project "Eyes on Darfur" was funded by the Save Darfur Coalition (SDC), an organization which fights to raise public awareness about the ongoing genocide in the region. (read more)
BBC On This Day
"I was 30 years old, and was watching TV while my wife was at work. All of the sudden, a news bulletin came up. It said "one of the Beatles has been shot and killed." I remember thinking "Please let it not be John." But it was. I still think to this day that John Lennon's death marked the end of the 60's. It marked the end of a generation." The BBC website includes a section called On this Day, an archived site that offers a choice of reports drawn from the years 1950-2005 and 1939-45 and "some of the quirkier stories broadcast by BBC News since 1950". (read more)
6 Billion Others
“My parents didn’t teach me anything except how to be a shepard”, a man from Algeria reckons in front of the video, laughing after he finishes his sentence. For an old man the biggest dream today is “to succeed in growing, in our freezing Siberia, delicious tomatoes and garlic as big as my fist”…and looking at global warming reports he may see his dream fulfilled before he dies. 6 Billion Others is a project by French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand. (read more)
Bill Moyers Journal
It takes two to party. “Four years ago this spring the Bush administration took leave of reality and plunged our country into a war so poorly planned it soon turned into a disaster. The story of how high officials misled the country has been told. But they couldn't have done it on their own; they needed a compliant press, to pass on their propaganda as news and cheer them on”, reckons Bill Moyers.
(read more)
Creative Commons
First, it was the music industry that witnessed an incredible amount of illegal usage of traditionally copyrighted materials. Kazaa and similar file-sharing networks have made sure that millions of mp3 music files have been exchanged "uncommercially" on the internet. That has supposedly led to the demise of the previously very lucrative music industry. But all efforts at copyrighting materials seem to have failed.
(read more)
Press Under Surveillance
The World Association of Newspapers has launched a website dedicated to its annual campaign for the World Press Freedom Day. This year the theme is “Press Under Surveillance”. The movement seeks to inform the public on the implications of governmental measures against terrorism and other security regulations that can affect the ability of the press to inform. (read more)
Innovation Journalism Blog
The Innovation Journalism Blog “comments on the development of the concept and the community of Innovation Journalism”. Innovation Journalism is a concept coined in 2003 by David Nordfors. It identifies and reports on key issues in the innovation ecosystems, such as the most important emerging concepts, the interaction between the main actors, or what is happening in innovation value chains. Instead of focusing on certain aspects of innovation processes, it covers innovation itself. (read more)
The State of the News Media 2007
The news business is entering a phase of limited ambition, according to the annual report "The State of the News Media 2007", as news organizations are basing their appeal less on how they cover the news and more on what they cover. Branding and targeting are highlighted as the main trends in the study that the Project for Excellence in Journalism released on March 12. (read more)
The Journalist’s Toolbox
The American Press Institute offers an online research tool for reporters. The Toolbox helps covering news, business, sports, science, technology, crime, etc. and provides links to journalism job sites, online discussion groups and databases. Its sections contain a variety of useful sites for inspiration and reference when writing a story. (read more)
Newsroom Barometer
In September 2006 a front-page story by The Economist asking “Who killed the newspaper?” inspired an initiative of the World Editors Forum and Reuters to gain an insiders view of this forecast. A Newsroom Barometer was set up by the WEF with Reuters and Zogby International, focusing on the perception of editors in chief and senior news executives toward free papers, online media, citizen journalism and the future of news. (read more)
Frontline’s News War
Frontline's News War is a four-part series examining the news media today and the future of journalism in the age of media convergence and the internet revolution. The last part of the series starts on March 27 on Frontline's World edition, Stories from a Small Planet, and examines media around the globe to see how international news influences American journalism, focusing on Al Jazeera TV. (read more)