February 2006 Archives

The widespread availability of broadband internet has upped the ante adding much variety to what internet users can view, hear, in short consume, online. In such a climate, video is set to become one of the key new requirements for newspaper websites.

UK regional daily The Hull Daily Mail began offering video news reports on its website in November after six of its journalists completed a diploma in videojournalism, comprised of three weeks of intensive practical training, organised by The Press Association and taught by David Dunkley Gyimah, senior lecturer in Digital Journalism at The University of Westminster.

The Editors Weblog interviewed David Dunkley Gyimah and Paul Hartley, assistant editor at the Hull Daily Mail, asking them about the diploma in videojournalism and the implications of online video for newspaper websites. Both agree that online video will soon be found on most newspaper websites.

Simon Waldman, director of digital publishing at The Guardian, talks about moving the newspaper's brand online in an interview with Jemima Kiss of journalism.co.uk.

Asked what has kept him at the Guardian for ten years, Waldman responded: "Whenever I've even thought about packing my bags, something fascinating has always emerged … In addition to that, there has been a long standing commitment to the net from the top of Guardian Newspapers down ... we've been able to spend most of the last decade building a fantastic online presence and business - rather than constantly having to justify our existence. Lots of organisations have been willing to chuck huge chunks of cash at the net in sporadic bursts, but few, if any, have shown the same level of steady, continuous support - and that is probably the single reason why we've been able to do so well."

The Russian city of Volgograd is to have a new newspaper after Gorodskiye Izvestia was closed down for publishing its own cartoon, showing religious figures, lampooning the row over the infamous Jyllands Posten Mohammed cartoons (see previous posting). The new paper is to be called Volgogradskaya Gazeta.

The text of an European Union statement on the Mohammed cartoons row has been contested by Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot who wished to make it "clear that we do not make an apology for the cartoons." The first paragraph of the statement currently reads "The (EU) council acknowledges and regrets that these cartoons were considered offensive and distressing by Muslims across the world."

Does God like the internet? According to geek.com and ZDnet, "Ed Callahan had trouble getting his mother a Yahoo! e-mail address with their last name, but not because it was already taken. Rather, the name was disallowed by the company's systems because it contained the consecutive letters a-l-l-a-h, the Arabic word for God.

Callahan did further investigation and discovered that other words associated with religion were okay, just not the specific letters making up "Allah." Mr. Callahan seemed to think the policy was discriminatory, telling the Associated Press, "The war on terror is becoming a war on Muslims. The word 'terrorist' now means Muslims, and it shouldn't... They disallowed 'allah' but allowed 'jesus' and 'god,' and I don't think there is a rational explanation for that.'"

The German cartel office approved David Montgomery's take-over (see former posting) of the German tabloid Hamburger Morgenpost. The newspaper is now part of the Deutsche Zeitungsholding group, owner of Berliner Zeitung and Berliner Kurier, which was bought by Montgomery and his investment partner Suhler Stevenson in October 2005 (see former posting). Montgomery said the deal was the "next step in his 'buy and build' strategy for the German newspaper market", reported The Guardian.  

Sources: Medienhandbuch.de (in German), The Guardian

The Swiss public service broadcaster SRG announced on Friday that its much criticised online portal will not include classifieds and advertising. This can be seen as a compromise offer towards the Swiss newspaper publishers, who protested against the new portal in December, because they thought it was an interference into the private sector and a competitor to portals of newspapers (see previous posting). However, the SRG will continue to run the news portal, because it offers fee-payers added information to the TV programme in a modern way.

Source: Kleinreport (in German)

A group of UK MPs have called on newspapers to invest in quality journalism, while expressing 'grave concern' at the number of newspaper job losses across the country recently. Grimsby MP Austin Mitchell, a former journalist, has lead a campaign that launched a petition asserting that news coverage will most likely suffer because of job cuts and mergers in the newspaper industry.

The British National Party (BNP) has distributed a leaflet including one of the 12 Mohammed cartoons, originally published in Danish paper Jyllands Posten, that have caused outrage amongst Muslims worldwide. In the pamphlet the cartoon was displayed next to a photograph of Muslim demonstrators calling for violent punishment of the cartoonists who authored the images.

A number of prominent US journalists have signed a petition requesting that The Newspaper Association of America to publicly recognise that its predecessor The American Newspaper Publishers Association "was wrong to turn its back on Jewish refugee journalists fleeing Hitler."

It wasn't hard to see this one coming. Dow Jones has decided to combine its print and online operations in a restructuring of the company. Where it used to be divided in print publishing, electronic publishing and community newspapers, now Dow Jones will be split between consumer media, enterprise media, and community media.

The Islamic Supreme Council of Canada plans to launch a national newspaper to be called Muslim Free Press in April. The objective of the initiative is to "better educate Canadians about Islamic issues." The paper is to be published bi-weekly in Calgary, Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver.

The famous financial daily, The Wall Street Journal, may be thinning itself from a width of 15 to 12 inches and the globetrotting newspaper designer Mario Garcia may be pushing for a compact, but it doesn't appear that the Dow Jones' flagship will be cut down to tabloid size.

Garcia is currently working on a redesign after having helped the Journal add color to its front page in 2002.

Polish newspaper Nowy Dzien, launched by publisher Agora in November 2005 (see previous posting), is to cease being published. The last edition of the paper will be published on 23, February 2006. The decision to close down the relatively new paper was made because of its declining sales. The paper would have needed to reach a sales figure of 250 000 copies daily to be profitable. It is currently at under 200 000 copies and falling.

Source: Agora SA (through the IFRA newsletter)

Three cartoonists, Dilem (Ali Dilem) of Algeria’s daily newspaper Liberty, Cabu (Jean Cabu) of France’s Charlie Hebdo and Le Canard Enchainé (both political satire weeklies) and Iran’s Nikahang Kowsar have answered questions about their own perspectives on the Mohammed cartoons and freedom of expression.

Each cartoonist has a different perspective. Dilem asserts that people should be "allowed to make cartoons of everything", while simultaneously stating that he understands how a cartoon depicting Mohammed wearing a turban shaped like a bomb has shocked some people. Kowsar criticizes the publication of the cartoons, stating: "I am critical of what they did: when you do something that you know will create hatred and annoy people who are a minority in Europe, this can be very insensitive." Finally, Cabu defends the publication of the cartoons, asserting that Nikahansuch actions are protected by freedom of expression and freedom of the press.

The Council of Europe is seeking the opinions of journalists and other citizens regarding the topic of freedom of expression in periods of crisis. To this end the organisation's Media Division has posted a series of questions on the internet for anyone interested in the topic to answer.

As a result of our former survey about the number of newspapers which published the Danish Mohammed cartoons, it appears that there were not two or three but twelve different ways to cover the story:

1) No reproduction of the cartoons but a short text describing them and no link to the cartoons in the website. It was the choice of more than 1,400 American newspapers.

2) No reproduction of the cartoons but link to the cartoons (often Wikipedia) in the website. It implies a certain sense of hypocrisy - are the online readers more clever than the usual readers? - but many English newspapers thought it was relevant.

An Islamic court in India has issued a fatwa, or religious decree, condemning to death the 12 artists who drew the controversial images of the prophet Mohammed according to News.com. "The decree was issued on behalf of the Idar-e-Sharia Darul Kaza Islamic court in northern Uttar Pradesh state by its religious head in the state capital, Lucknow.

The Los Angeles Times reports that an anonymous source has confirmed that the campaign of planting pro-US stories originating from the military in the Iraqi press, operated by Lincoln consulting and exposed in December, (see previous posting) was still in operation as recently as a week ago.

US RSS technology company Pluck is set to launch a new service called Blog Burst, which will distribute content from pre-approved blogs to newspaper websites. Blog Burst charges publishers for this service, and there are also plans for a compensation system for bloggers.

Despite their short existence, podcasts are one of the fastest growing new media of Web 2.0. Having only emerged in mid-2004, by the end of 2005 'podcast' was the New Oxford American Dictionary's word of the year. Newspapers looking to innovate have rapidly adopted podcasts as part of their everyday news production, some providing morning news summaries to which readers who may not have the time to read during their commute can listen. The Editors Weblog spoke with three editors in charge of their respective paper's daily podcasting to find out the steps they're taking in integrating podcasting into their newsrooms.

India's newspapers have reported that Mohammed Yaqoob Qureshi, a minister in northern Uttar Pradesh state government, has offered a bounty of $11.5 million to anyone who decapitates one of the Danish cartoonists who authored 12 cartoons of the prophet Mohammed, published in Jyllands Posten in September 2005.

Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard has declared that he was inspired by "terrorism - which gets its spiritual ammunition from Islam" to draw a cartoon depicting the prophet Mohammed wearing a turban shaped liked a bomb.  

The Asia News Network (ANN), an alliance of 14 newspapers from 12 Asian countries founded in 1999, launched a new weekly paper called AsiaNews. The 32-pages English language paper reports about politics, economy, lifestyle, sports and society from an Asian perspective. The paper is distributed in airplanes of fligth companies of the Star Alliance Group. An e-paper version can be downloaded from the ANN website.

Sources: ANN, werbewoche (in German, through IFRA-Newsletter)

The online edition of the Austrian newspaper Die Presse launched a music download portal, where users can download classic, jazz, rock, pop, hip-hop or electronic music. Sylvia Dellantonio, managing director of Die Presse, said that the paper is now able to offer their readers the music, that is discussed in the paper, as well as further exclusive music tips for download, reports der Standard. Prices for single songs start at 99 Cents.

Source: der Standard (in German, through IFRA-Newsletter), Die Presse Musikdownload

German publisher Axel Springer's earnings significantly improved in 2005 according to preliminary key figures the company released last Thursday. As Financial.de reports, net profit for the financial year 2005 jumped to 231 million Euro, exceeding the previous year by around 56 %. The publisher was able to grow its core business despite a difficult market environment. The complete annual results will be released in the beginning of March. More details on Financial.de.

Source: Financial.de

The editor of Norwegian Christian magazine Magazinet has apologised to Muslims for re printing, on January 10th 2006, the infamous Mohammed cartoons that have caused uproar amongst Muslims worldwide. The apology read as follows: "I personally apologize to the Muslims, and I assert that I am to blame for the insult caused for your religious feelings because of what our magazine Magazinet published on January 10, 2006. I assure that it wasn't meant to insult anyone."

Source: The Daily Star (Lebanon)

Indian artist MF Husain has been accused of "hurting sentiments of people" by the police for painting nude pictures of Hindu Gods. Asia Times asserts that "the tirade against Husain also puts into question the often-held perception that Islam is the least tolerant of all religions to any act that is perceived as blasphemy."

The Daily Mail has teamed up with Associated New Media to provide online video material, funded by advertising, on its website. The videos focus on music, celebrity, and film related news and are updated every weekday lunchtime. 

Guardian Unlimited is set to launch a mobile news service whereby readers will be able to access stories from the Guardian website on their mobile phones. The Guardian already offers text alert services and downloadable crosswords and sudokus, but this new initiative, to be launched on a trial basis for free, is innovative because for the first time people will be able to read whole news stories on their mobile phones.

After the Berlin newspaper Der Tagesspiegel published a controversial cartoon depicting four members of the Iranian soccer team dressed as suicide bombers one week ago, Germany has its own kind of cartoon row, as the Neue Zürcher Zeitung titles "Karikaturen-Streit nun auch in Deutschland" (= Cartoon row now also in Germany). German news magazine Der Spiegel described it as “One German Paper's Cartoonicide“. As the Editorsweblog reported earlier, Germany's Iranian embassy demanded an official written apology for the cartoon that is reflecting a current German debate over whether the army should assist with security at the FIFA World Cup this summer (cartoon see here). The Tagesspiegel expressed some regret at the reaction, but did not apologize.

The European Parliament today adopted a resolution stating that "freedom of expression should always be excercised with responsibility and with respect for human rights, religious feelings and beliefs." The assembly also "condemns in the strongest possible terms" the violent attacks on EU embassies that have followed the publication of the Mohammed cartoons in European newspapers and expresses solidarity with journalists in Algeria, Egypt and Jordan who reprinted the cartoons and have suffered grave consequences because of this decision.

Source: AFP (registration required) 

Metro has made the collective, unanimous editorial decision that none of its editions anywhere in the world will publish the infamous Mohammed cartoons, originally published by Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten in September 2005, that have angered Muslims worldwide.

In fear that Hamas would take control over the Palestinian media, Mahmoud Abbas, chairman of the Palestinian Authority, has placed the authority's radio and television stations under his jurisdiction. A recent report compiled by a UK based television group revealed that Hamas had begun applying social pressure on radio stations to adopt strictly Islamic programming. Radio stations are complying with Hamas's wishes in fear of retribution.

"I don’t think that a [rule] that said you shouldn’t do business in some place whose standards aren’t identical to the US would work," says Bill Gates in an interview with Richard Waters of The Financial Times.

Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and Cisco systems have appeared before the House of Representatives (see previous posting) in connection with internet censorship in China. The internet companies were accused of colluding with China's oppressive regime and of "selling out the principles of democracy and free speech for profit by bowing to China's demands to censor web content and monitor email."

Metro International has reported losses of $5.2 million in 2005, an improvement on 2004, when losses amounted to $9.5 million. Orvesto, Sweden's official national newspaper readership surveyor, reported that Dagens Nyheter (2nd largest daily circulation) was the only major daily to increase its reah in 2005, having gained 10 000 readers. Free dailies Metro and City also gained readers, while paid for dailies Dagens Industri, Göteborgs-Posten, and Svenska Dagbladet all lost readers.

Source: Media Culpa (through the IFRA newsletter) 

Metro UK is set to launch a new website aimed at young urban professionals. The website will offer a "mix of news and lifestyle features." It will be updated four times daily, content will focus on news in the morning, games and quizzes at lunchtime, restaurant and bar reviews in the afternoon, and dating and gaming at night.

Carsten Juste, the editor of Jyllands Posten, the Danish paper that first published the infamous Mohammed cartoons that have caused uproar amongst Muslims worldwide, today asserted that the press is giving Muslims special treatment as a result of the uproar that has followed the publication of the cartoons.

Amidst widespread criticism of Chinese censorship of the internet and of the US internet giants that have caved into this censorship (see previous postings here and here), the Chinese government defended its policies, claiming it complies with international norms. Liu Zhengrong, China's deputy chief of internet affairs added that Western criticism of his country's practices is hypocritical since China "is being no different from Western nations."

Valérie Decamp, managing director of Metro France, has announced that the free newspaper publisher made a profit in 2005, for the first time since the company's launch in 2002, when it reported losses of 15.8 million euros. The company declared a total revenue of 27.5 million Euros in 2005, this represents a 36% year on year increase in revenue.

Local newspaper Örnsköldsviks Allehanda has become Sweden's first daily to launch a video blog, or 'vlog'. Reporter Liva Sandra Sverker will author the blog. She describes the material that will be found on her blog as follows: "I think my video blog will be about anything. Everything that makes me mad, happy, sad or surprised will get a spot on my screen."

The newspaper also offers users the opportunity to start their own blog or vlog on its website, for free.

Source: Media Café 

 The Editors' Weblog has compiled a provisional list of the newspapers that have printed some or all of the cartoons since 30 September 2005, date of publication of 12 cartoons of the prophet Mohammed in Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten. Even provisional, this list is the most exhaustive on the internet, thanks to members of the World Editors Forum and to bloggers close to the EW.

The main conclusions are:

- to our knowledge, more than 130 national or local newspapers (excluding the student newspapers and online publications) published some or all of the 12 cartoons (sometimes just a pohtography) in approximately 50 countries . It also means that around 1,7% of the dailies around the world - 8,300 paid-for dailies according to World Press Trends 2005 - made the difficult decision to publish the cartoons.

- Europe was the continent where the most newspapers published the cartoons: at least 70 papers. It is not surprising that the Netherlands was the country most involved in the controversy (after Denmark)... a few months after the assassination of the film maker Theo Van Gogh by an Islamist activist. Same thing in France after the veil debate and the November 2005 riots.

- Within Europe, the first publications to reprint the cartoons in January-February 2006 were in general right-wing publications, for example ABC in Spain, Die Welt in Germany and Corriere della Sera in Italy. Then more leftist publications followed suit, for example Libération and Le Monde in France.

- Surprisingly, Arab and Muslim newspapers were also involved in the controversy from the very beginning, with the first reprint on 17 October 2005 (see below)! More than 12 Arab and/or Muslim newspapers published the cartoons. The decision to publish provoked terrible consequences for the editors-in-chief of these publications. Same consequences for some directors of television in Sudan and Algeria. 

- How to define the position adopted by American, British, Canadian and Australian newspapers? Media responsability, political correctness or self-censorship? The most surprising is not the position defined in many editorials (from The New York Times to The Guardian), but this strange impression of unanimity and consensus: only three regional newspapers on more than 1,400 newspapers in the States and zero newspaper, but a student daily in the UK for taking the risk...

- And what in the rest of the world? Nothing. Almost the desert for the publication of the cartoons in the Americas (apart Brazil), Africa (apart South Africa) and above all Asia (apart New Zealand). As if this controversy was only between Europe and the Arab world and if blasphemy was still relevant in regions as Asia and the Americas: not only about Mohammed, but about all religious issues.

My conclusion: the geography of the publication of the Danish cartoons tells us a lot about our democracies: what is allowed, what is forbidden... and what is taboo. In fact, it's more geopolitics than geography!

US paper The Cincinatti Enquirer has an Olympics blog up and running, authored by its reporter Dustin Dow, in Turin to cover the games. The blog provides text, photo and video updates from the Winter Olympics, and focuses of the 'behind the scenes' experience of covering the games.

Source: Cyberjournalist 

Canada's Globe and Mail (second largest circulation) has redesigned its core websites, globeandmail.com, globeinvestor.com, globefund.com and globetechnology.com, which receive an average of 3.5million unique visitors a month. The website changes consist of simpler, consistent navigation, more contemporary colours and fonts, and easier functionality for the user."

The design changes also provide new advertising opportunities. 

Source: Publicitas 

One of the biggest and most influential Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda (The Prof-Media Holding) has lost its building in the Pravda street, 24 in Moscow. It was totally destroyed yesterday during a big fire. All the staff members were rescued except a waitress form the local restaurant who died.

Germany's Iranian embassy is demanding that an official written apology be made for a cartoon, published in Berlin paper Der Tagesspiegel, depicting four members of the Iranian soccer team dressed as suicide bombers standing next to four German soldiers. The caption printed above the cartoon read as follows: "Why the German army should definitely be used during the soccer World Cup!" The Iranian embassy has threatened legal action if such an apology is not 'forthcoming'.

Australia's newspaper The Age is considering legal action after a cartoon drawn by its own cartoonist Michael Leunig was entered, without Mr. Leunig's permission, in a Holocaust cartoons competition run by Iranian newspaper Hamshari (see previous posting).

Esteemed American cartoonist Art Spiegelman emphasised, in an interview published in French regional paper Sud Ouest, the importance of "preserving a free press that has the right to insult." He added, however, that what he felt was problematic about the Danish cartoon affair was the fact that the cartoons were published in a newspaper "which is politically situated between Sarkozy and Le Pen."

Borneo's English daily Sarawak Tribune has been suspended indefinitely by the government for re-printing, on 4, February 2006, the infamous Mohammed cartoons that have caused outrage amongst Mulims worldwide. Malaysia's Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak asserted the decision to suspend the paper would send a strong message that religious mockery will not be tolerated in Malaysia, he said: "We will protect the sanctity of any religion against such irresponsible action."

Source: Borneo Bulletin (through the IFRA newsletter)  

The German daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung changed its structure. Starting last Saturday, the paper appears now Monday to Saturday in the same structure. The first section (politics) ends with two pages "Panorama". These two pages are made by a new department with 6 journalists. The new department will focus on topics such as lifestyle and societal developments.

Michael Weiss, formerly a journalist at Maariv newspaper (second highest circulation in Israel), has launched a citizen journalism website, Scoop.co.il, designed to "give a voice to those outside the mainstream press." The site has already recruited 400 citizen reporters.

Canadian photographer Finbarr O'Reilly has won 2005's World Press Photo for the photograph shown above, taken in an emergency feeding centre in Niger.  

French regional publisher L'Est Republicain is to purchase, for approximately 300 million euros, a group of Lyon newspapers (Le Progrès, Le Bien Public and Le Dauphiné Libéré) owned by Socpresse. This move will make L'Est Republicain France's biggest regional publisher and a major European publisher.

The Observer, the UK's oldest Sunday newspaper, has seen an increase in circulation of 100,000 copies to an average sales figure of 542, 075 since its Berliner re-launch on 8, January. This represents an increase of 25.94% since December 2005 and a 21.32% year on year increase.

Free paper 20 Minutos claims Spain's highest distribution; it now has a total readership of 2.3 million. José Antonio Martinez Soler explains that over the course of his paper's evolution his competitors producing paid for papers have regarded him first with "indifference and hostility", then they tried to imitate him and finally they now want a piece of the action, they want to 'seduce' him.

Illustration: "Mohammed the Prophet / The Fanatism", a tragedy written by Voltaire in 1741. Edition of the complete works of Voltaire, 1846, Société des publications illustrées (drawing by Moreau).

I love old books, but I didn't know one day I would be obliged to go to my bookcase to argue about press freedom, media responsability and the current Mohammed cartoons row. Last year in November 2005 I was already surprised that some French and Swiss Islamic organisations contested the live performance of Voltaire's play. For them, the tragedy was an insult against the Prophet and they asked - without success - that the play cease to be performed. But police had to protect the actors, the director Hervé Loichemol and the audience*...

The Chicago Sun Times is set to fill the void left by the closure of the City News Service (see previous posting) by launching a 24 hour news wire. The wire will begin service on Monday. The Sun Times News Group (STNG) wire will focus coverage on police and courts. Approximately 10 staff have been hired to run the wire, some of whom originally worked for City News.

Source: Yahoo News (through the IFRA newsletter)  

Staff at the UK's Independent and Independent on Sunday are to hold a vote on whether or not to proceed to strike action after management refused to increase an 2.5% annual pay offer. The vote will take place at a National Union of Journalists chapel meeting today.

The Associated Press is protesting the 'misleading inclusion' of one of its photographs in a pamphlet showing images offensive to Islam. The picture (see above) was taken at a small French village fair during a pig squealing contest. A black and white image of the same picture (you can see it here) was circulated  throughout the Middle East by a group of Danish Muslim leaders in a brochure aimed at creating awareness of anti-Muslim images from Europe. 

Flemming Rose, the culture editor of Jyllands Posten, the Danish paper at the centre of the Mohammed cartoons row, has been sent on indefinite leave after a disagreement with the paper's management over whether cartoons satirising the Holocaust should be printed. (see previous posting) Rose's suggestion that Jyllands Posten print Holocaust cartoons along with Iranian paper Hamshari sparked a public row with the paper's editor in chief Carsten Juste, who has been pressured to resign because of the cartoon debacle.

A spokesman for the paper made the following statement: "The editorial management and Flemming Rose have agreed that he needed a break from work until further notice."

Additionally, the paper has asserted it will not be publishing any Holocaust cartoons, the following statement was posted on its website: "Jyllands-Posten in no circumstances will publish Holocaust cartoons from an Iranian newspaper." 

Source: Guardian Unlimited Special Report, Media Guardian

Carsten Juste, editor in chief of Jyllands Posten, the Danish paper that published 12 cartoons of the prophet Mohammed in September 2005, apologised to Muslims for the hurt caused by the cartoons in a letter presented to the Algerian press.

He wrote: We apologise for the great misunderstanding caused by the publication of these cartoons representing Mohammed that have nurtured violent feelings towards Denmark ... We never recognised the extreme sensibility of Muslims living in Denmark, and indeed Muslims worldwide, in connection with this issue."

This is not the first apology that Mr. Juste has made for the cartoons (see previous posting).

Source: Le Monde (print edition) 

The New York Times Company has signed a deal with internet television producer Brightcove to enable the distribution of broadband video content across its online holdings.

Jyllands Posten, the Danish newspaper responsible for the publication of 12 cartoons of the Muslim prophet Mohammed, may publish cartoons satirising the Holocaust reports the Guardian. Fleeming Rose, culture editor of the paper confirmed that he was attempting to contact Iranian paper Hamshari, which has initiated a competition calling for cartoons of the holocaust. He announced: "My newspaper is trying to establish a contact with the Iranian newspaper, and we would run the cartoons the same day as they publish them.” Mr. Flemming asserted that he did not regret publishing the Mohammed cartoons last September.

Source: Media Guardian  

De Tijd, the Antwerp based daily with Belgium's highest online readership, will be the world's first paper to launch a digital version, for a three month trial period beginning in April 2006. The paper will take the form of a portable electronic device; a paper thin screen the size of a newspaper page. Users will connect to the internet with the device and download their newspaper. Updates will be provided throughout the day.

The Daily Telegraph reports that, in an interview with the paper, EU Commissioner for justice freedom and security Franco Frattini hinted at plans for a press charter committing the media to 'prudence' when reporting on religion. Mr. Frattini asserted that currently the EU faces the "very real problem of trying to reconcile two fundamental freedoms, the freedom of expression and the freedom of religion."

Jordanian editors Jihad Momani, of Al Shihan newspaper, and Hisham Khalidi, of Al Mihwar, are both in the custody of the state having been charged with blasphemy of the prophet after their respective newspapers reprinted some of the infamous Mohammed cartoons that have caused uproar amongst Muslims worldwide (see previous postings here and here). In case of conviction, the charge can carry a penalty of between one and three years imprisonment.

To date the only large US paper to reprint any of the 12 infamous Mohammed cartoons has been The Philadelphia Inquirer (see previous posting). The general consensus amongst US papers has been that it is unnecessary to reprint the images to tell the news story surrounding them, in particular in view of the fact that editors view them as offensive images.

Stéphane Bussard, of Swiss paper Le Temps, interviewed Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan on the issue of the Mohammed cartoons; Ramadan asserted he feels "The reaction of Muslims is ... excessive and disproportionate."

No major UK newspapers have so far published any of the infamous 12 Mohammed cartoons. The general consensus amongst UK newspapers was that while freedom of speech must exist and be preserved, simultaneously there is no need to insult and provoke people. In an opinion piece published in the Sunday Times, Simon Jenkins went as far as to say: "These cartoons don't defend free speech they threaten it."

Robin Ackroyd, the UK journalist who refused to reveal the identity of a confidential source (see previous posting), declared he felt vindicated after a judge ruled he had acted responsibly. The judge in question, Mr. Justice Tugendhat, ruled that Mr. Ackroyd is a "responsible journalist whose purpose was to act in the public interest." He also added that there is "a vital public interest" in protecting journalists' sources.

The Philadelphia Inquirer today became the first major US newspaper to publish one of the 12 controversial Mohammed cartoons originally published by Danish paper Jyllands Posten (see previous posting and here). The newspaper explained that the decision to publish the cartoon had been made in order to enable readers to judge the cartoons for themselves.

Copies of the Universtiy of Cardiff's student newspaper Gair Rhydd (free word in Welsh) have been recalled and its editor and three other journalists have been suspended after the paper reprinted one of the 12 infamous Mohammed cartoons. Gair Rhydd has a potential student readership of 21 000.

A new website called www.world-wide-newspapers.com has been launched, which aims to better advertise newspapers' online product, to this end it provides a direct link, on its home page, to each newspaper advertised. 

Hamshari Iran's best selling newspaper (according to The Guardian), owned by Teheran city council, has announced it will print cartoons satirising the Holocaust; the paper has announced an international competition is to be launched to find the most suitable cartoons. The Iranian government has also instituted a complete trade ban on Danish products in response to the publication of the infamous Mohammed cartoons in newspaper Jyllands Posten.

The Jordanian tabloid Al-Shihan has reprinted three of the infamous 12 caricatures of Mohammed originally published by Danish paper Jyllands Posten. In an editorial printed alongside the cartoons, editor in chief Jihad Momani wrote: "Muslims of the world, be reasonable."

Momani told AFP that he chose to print the cartoons "so people know what they are protesting about ... People are attacking drawings that they have not even seen."

Source: AFP (registration required)
 

BBC News Interactive is set to launch a BBC wide editors' blog, with the objective of revealing the reasoning behind editorial decisions.

Pete Clifton, head of BBC News Interactive said the blog will help the media organisation fulfil its requirement of being "open and accountable" to its readers. He added: "It's a different world: we're more open about what we do. Even if we get it wrong it's good to have the conversation about why."

Source: journalism.co.uk 

Scottish newspapers The Herald, The Sunday Herald and The Evening Times, owned by Newsquest the UK's second largest regional publisher, have announced that 65 jobs will be eliminated. Newsquest's reason for the job cuts is the downturn in advertising revenue that began in 2005 and is expected to continue this year.

France Soir, the French daily that yesterday re-printed the infamous Mohammed cartoons originally published by Danish paper Jyllands Posten in September 2005 (see previous posting and here and here), has fired its managing director Jacques Lefranc and issued an apology for the re-printing of the cartoons.

Raymond Lakah, owner of France Soir, stated he had "decided to remove Jacques Lefranc as managing director of the publication as a powerful sign of respect for the intimate beliefs and convictions of every individual .. We express our regrets to the Muslim community and all people who were shocked by the publication" of the caricatures.

French newspaper France Soir today re-published the infamous 12 caricatures of Mohammed, originally published by Danish paper Jyllands Posten, that have provoked anger amongst Muslims worldwide along with controversy over the concepts of freedom of expression, freedom of religious belief, and press freedom.
 

Covering major sporting events, such as the football World Cup to be held in Germany this summer, can present free papers with the possibility of diversifying their advertising portfolios by attracting advertisers who target male readers.

Media Channel reports on a study conducted by the US Ball State University, where the media use of 350 subjects, chosen to "roughly represent national demographics", was observed from morning until night.

68% of the time subjects spent reading the newspaper "was without competition from other activities."

A number of senior staff changes have been announced at The Guardian. An important focus of the re-shuffle is Guardian Unlimited, the paper’s website; Georgina Henry, deputy editor at the paper, will be moving to Guardian Unlimited, and Guardian Unlimited editor Emily Bell will become executive editor, responsible for overseeing “the further convergence of the site and the paper.”

German publisher Axel Springer dropped its plan (see previous posting) to acquire broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1 for 4.2 billion euros. Springer, publisher of Europe's best selling newspaper, the tabloid Bild, announced today that it reached a mutual agreement with the investor group lead by Saban Capital Group to terminate the deal, writes Forbes. The German cartel office had rejected the deal on January 23th (see previous posting), saying the takeover would give Springer a "dominating influence" on Germany's public opinion.

Denmark's largest paper, Jyllands Posten, which published political cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed that have incited an uproar in the Muslim world, received a bomb threat late yesterday afternoon. Two of the daily's offices were evacuated. The paper's editor-in-chief, Carsten Juste said, "It is an attack on the freedom of the press and against one of democracy's most important prerequisites, the free word." (background here, here and here)

Source: AFP press release (no link)