July 2004 Archives

Have you seen the site newsdesigner.com? It's a great little blog, well written and perfectly designed (of course), all about news design and photojournalism. Useful postings show how multiple front pages approach the same story (ex; Lance Armstrong's Tour de France victory).

From cnet.com: Microsoft's Newsbot aggregator entered its test period today. The site is a competitor to Google News and runs on MSN's newly developed web search technology. Check out Newsbot and let us know what you think - I think the design is terrible, with the huge MSNBC logo running down the left-hand side. When I arrived at the home page, I didn't even see the search query box until I scrolled down the page and back up again.

Source: cnet.com

From cnet.com: Microsoft's Newsbot aggregator entered its test period today. The site is a competitor to Google News and runs on MSN's newly developed web search technology. Check out Newsbot and let us know what you think - I think the design is terrible, with the huge MSNBC logo running down the left-hand side. When I arrived at the home page, I didn't even see the search query box until I scrolled down the page and back up again.

Source: cnet.com

Just because I was in their offices ten days ago: according to New York Post, "Al-Jazeera, the Arab news network, will cover both the Republican and Democratic national conventions alongside other major TV networks for the first time. "They will be treated the same as all other media," RNC spokesman Lenny Alcivar told The Post yesterday, adding the Qatar-based satellite channel will be issued press credentials and a skybox just like CBS, NBC, ABC, Fox and CNN for the late August convention at Madison Square Garden. Al-Jazeera will have similar access in Boston next week at the Democratic convention, according to the Boston Herald. It will be fun to watch how American media will cover Al Jazeera covering the conventions...

Source: New York Post

Axel Springer, Germany's biggest newspaper publisher, wants to expand the formula of the Polish newspaper "Fakt" to other countries, such as Hungary, Romania and the Czech Republic. "Fakt" is the Polish version of the German newspaper "Bild" and was launched eight months ago. Within two months the paper became Poland's best selling daily, with 500,000 copies. Its editor, Grzegorz Jankowski, was invited as a speaker for the 11th World Editors Forum in Istanbul on 1 June 2004.

Source: - Financial Times via Libération/ Villamedia (Belgium) and the European Journalism Centre

Englishman Andrew Jaspan is the new editor-in-chief of The Age. Mr Jaspan, 52, will quit as editor of the Sunday Herald in Scotland to move to Melbourne. Fred Hilmer, chief executive of Fairfax, owner of The Age, told Age staff this afternoon that Mr Jaspan will take up his role in October. "We have appointed a world class editor for a world class newspaper," said Mr Hilmer. Mr Jaspan's appointment ends a three-month search for a successor to current editor-in-chief Michael Gawenda, who will take up a senior correspondent role in the United States for The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. Mr Jaspan's newspaper philosophy has been described as liberal, but also "pro-enterprise and in favour of wealth creation", according to him. Mr Jaspan becomes the 21st editor of The Age, which is celebrating its 150th year in operation.

Source: The Age

New York Times.com has expanded its Really Simple Syndication (RSS) offerings to 27 categories, including new feeds such as Most E-mailed Articles, Multimedia and Week in Review. You can find all of the Times's RSS feeds at NYTimes.com/rss

Source: cyberjournalist.net

Through mediabistro: "In a surprise announcement, the Tribune Company yesterday replaced its publishers at the two newspapers, Newsday and Hoy, both of which are reeling from circulation scandals (see former posting).

Source: Editor & Publisher

According to New York Times, "There will be roughly 15,000 news media representatives in New York - more than three times the number of delegates - at the Republican convention... The press center at the convention, which is scheduled to take place Aug. 30 to Sept. 2, is being set up in the general post office in Midtown, an imposing fortress of a building that sprawls across two city blocks. The center has been connected to the convention site at Madison Square Garden by a $1 million temporary covered bridge over Eighth Avenue. Organizers are already comparing the complex to the Olympic village for the athletes competing in Athens this summer.

Source: New York Times

From Dagblad van het Noorden and the Dutch Commissariaat voor de Media (PDF file): In Britain and other European countries, the "compact revolution" refers to the trend of quality newspapers adopting the tabloid format, but that's not to say that all newly launched tabloids are in this genre. Dutch newspaper Dagblad van het Noorden reports that newspaper group Noordelijke Dagblad Combinatie (NDC) is planning to bring a tabloid to the market that will feature entertainment, action news and celebrities. The paper, tentatively titled NL NWS, borrows from the more traditional British tabloid model, featuring a "page 3 girl." Another tidbit from the Netherlands: did you know media consolidation there exceeds that in other European countries, with two groups, PCM and De Telegraaf, sharing 95.5% of the newspaper market? This report, in PDF format, examines the phenomenon.

Source: Dagblad van het Noorden and the Dutch Commissariaat voor de Media (PDF file)

From Dagblad van het Noorden and the Dutch Commissariaat voor de Media (PDF file): In Britain and other European countries, the "compact revolution" refers to the trend of quality newspapers adopting the tabloid format, but that's not to say that all newly launched tabloids are in this genre. Dutch newspaper Dagblad van het Noorden reports that newspaper group Noordelijke Dagblad Combinatie (NDC) is planning to bring a tabloid to the market that will feature entertainment, action news and celebrities. The paper, tentatively titled NL NWS, borrows from the more traditional British tabloid model, featuring a "page 3 girl." Another tidbit from the Netherlands: did you know media consolidation there exceeds that in other European countries, with two groups, PCM and De Telegraaf, sharing 95.5% of the newspaper market? This report, in PDF format, examines the phenomenon.

Source: Dagblad van het Noorden and the Dutch Commissariaat voor de Media (PDF file)

Seen on CBSmarketwatch: "An online bidder has offered $150,000 to buy the Web address KerryEdwards.com, according to a German firm hired to sell the politically-charged domain name. Matt Bentley, chief executive of Sedo, declined to reveal details about the bid, but said he expects additional, higher offers to be received during the scheduled two-week auction, which began Monday. KerryEdwards.com is owned by a 34-year-old man named Kerry Edwards, a part-time bail bondsman in Indianapolis. He registered KerryEdwards.com two years ago as a personal site for family and friends. "He's sitting on a lottery ticket," Bentley said. Last week, Sen. John Kerry's presidential campaign said it had considered buying KerryEdwards.com, but it balked at the price. "We're very happy with our site, JohnKerry.com," a campaign spokeswoman said."

Source: CBSmarketwatch / Franck Barnabo

According to Jemima Kiss, dotjournalism.co.uk, "Africa's male-dominated media organisations often leave female journalists without adequate training and support, according to the African Women's Media Centre (AWMC), which has launched a new online resource. Under the slogan 'no press is truly free unless women share an equal voice', the first edition of the site provides information on training, networking groups and professional support, with a forum for discussion and advice. The site also includes information on awards, scholarship schemes and press freedom issues. The AWMC was founded in 1997 by the International Women's Media Foundation (IWMF) and is believed to be the only organisation working for African women in the media."

Sources: dotjournalism.co.uk and AWMC

In a long article dedicated to the UK broadcast industry, The Guardian reveals that "The BBC board of governors approved the strengthening of producer guidelines for journalists - including a new rule designed to prevent a repeat of the calamitous Radio 4 broadcast by Andrew Gilligan, in which he claimed the government had knowingly exaggerated intelligence on Iraq's weapons. In the new guidelines, reporters will be obliged to alert their department head if they do not intend to give the subject of the stories adequate time to respond to their allegations... In the new guidelines, journalists will be forced to refer upwards "if it is intended to broadcast an allegation in the public interest which we believe to be true, but where we do not propose to put the allegation to the persons or organisation concerned by the programme in time for a considered response before transmission in order to get the report into the public domain". There is also a mandatory referral if the reporter does not intend to alert a subject of an investigation as to the real purpose of their programme. These two rules are designed to reinforce the BBC's right to continue to make controversial investigative documentaries... The new guidelines also stipulate that programme makers also refer decisions to broadcast films where the central allegations are not put to third parties in time for a "considered response".

Source: MediaGuardian

For abcnews "The American editor of the Russian edition of Forbes said he believed the troubled country was entering a new era where businesses would not be run like mafia crime families, but when he was gunned down outside his Moscow office, the killing had all the signs of a mob hit. Paul Klebnikov, 41, who opened the Russian edition of Forbes this spring, was gunned down Friday as he was leaving work. The professional-style slaying of a journalist is all too common in Russia, where by some counts as many as 200 reporters have been killed since the collapse of the Soviet Union 13 years ago. In just a handful of those cases has anyone been convicted, a failure that human and journalists' rights groups say is a result of a combination of police and governmental corruption and an antipathy among officials toward journalists, especially those doing investigative work. "There is a problem that those in power don't want a free press," said Oleg Panfilov, director of the Center for Journalists in Extreme Situations, a Moscow-based group that works to promote the development of free, independent media in Russia.

Source: abcnews. See also Moscow News and former posting.