Results matching “new media 07 n”

The New York Observer decides to launch a new fashion publication, following in the footsteps of the Wall Street Journal, which recently launched a magazine supplement. The semiannual Observer Style will be released on November 16 and would focus on the local fashion scene.

Online video platform Brightcove Inc. announces a deal with OMS, Germany's Web-based sales and marketing network for regional newspaper titles, which will permit the latter to establish an online video network for member titles. Video content would be taken from international and national media outlets as well as from which is produced by local newspapers.

Sun-Times News Group reports a deal with social media firm Pluck which will offer readers discussion forums blogs, photo and video sharing as well as other community tools on SunTimes.com, PioneerLocal.com, SuburbanChicagoNews.com, SouthtownStar.com and Post-Trib.com. The venture is meant to increase audience interactivity, according to Catherine Lanucha, the group's director of content.

The Society of Editors' Executive Director, Bob Satchwell, says that contempt of court legislation in the UK needs to be updated. Legislation in the UK currently restricts the reporting of trials during proceedings to prevent undue influence from the media affecting a case.

However, Journalism.co.uk's Judith Townend reports that, "even if something is reported prior to a case becoming active - namely, after an arrest has been made - the content is still 'live' and easily accessible by jurors online during a trial."

The Society of Editors (SoE) has appealed to two different Attorney-Generals for a review, and in July petitioned secretary of state for justice, Jack Straw, to start the process.

Satchwell says, "There is a need for, "a general review of contempt so everyone knows where we stand." Satchwell is concerned that the UK will get to the stage where the media will be told, "you just can't report anything", which would be "quite ridiculous". He goes on to say, ""The public has a right to know these things and the public must be kept informed. What must be done is a review of the rules."

The Editors Weblog spoke to Ian Cobain, senior reporter and investigative reporter at the Guardian, and he echoed these concerns about contempt of court legislation. Cobain says, "There are so many matters where we feel that we cannot report on them because someone is about to go on trial."

Source: Journalism.co.uk

The New York Times International Weekly supplement, offered in 31 newspapers from 28 countries, announces a re-launch that aims to boost readership for the "flagship" New York Times, reports Brand Republic.

Lowell Bergmann is a ground breaking investigative reporter, a producer/correspondent for the PBS documentary series "Frontline" in the US and spent 14 years as a producer with CBS's "60 Minutes".

Bergman shared a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service with The New York Times in 2004 for "A Dangerous Business," (which detailed a record of egregious worker safety violations coupled with the systematic violation of environmental laws in the iron sewer and water pipe industry) and is a Professor at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. Furthermore, he is a co-founder of the Centre for Investigative Journalism and a consultant at ProPublica, an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest.

The story of Bergman's investigation of the tobacco industry for 60 Minutes was chronicled in the 1999 Academy Award-nominated feature film "The Insider", in which Bergman was portrayed by Al Pacino (below left).

The Editors Weblog contacted Lowell Bergman - who was an early adopter and advocate of the multimedia model - to discover his views on the key issues facing investigative reporting and its future.

EW: What do you see in the future for investigative journalism? Do you still see it as having a home at newspapers?

LB: Investigative journalism in America has always been done by magazines and in books as well as in newspaper. For many years newspapers were not doing much of it. It was a 'freelance' occupation usually with writers like I.F. Stone and others who left newspapers because they were too restrictive. Personally, I have been using the web and been 'online' for more than a decade.

But it remains true that it is newspapers and traditional news organizations that produce almost all the new information everyday.

Pure web based operations with a few new exceptions recycle information they get from those organizations. We will see web based sites becoming the providers of more and more news and quality information in the future, but the transition will take time.

EB: What do you see as the key issue facing your profession?

LB: I am not sure it is a 'profession' in the traditional sense. In this country it is open to everyone. It is not licensed. Right now the transformation of the media endangers the collective experience of news people who chose to make gathering, investigating and presenting quality information their life work. That is why non-profits and educational institutions [Universities] will become more and more important. They do not have the same pressures. Its a time of transition, a kind of "Middle Age", that will not see a resurgence of real reporting until the economic questions are resolved.

EW: How has new media changed the way you work?

LB: Obviously, the availability of databases, newspaper archives and all sorts of information on the Web makes many things easier. But the old techniques and standards have not been replaced. To do investigative or in depth reporting you have take the time to meet people, and not meet them in a chat room.

Confidentiality on the internet is virtually impossible. It depends on trust. And trust is the weakest link in terms of the reliability of information offered up on the Web by so called 'new media'.

EW: Do you think there is more pressure from editors with the advent of the 24-hour news culture? Are investigative journalists getting the time and resources necessary?

LB: At a certain point you are a stenographer, if you don't have enough time to do the kind of reporting that advances what we know. This is not just true of 'investigative' reporters.

All good reporting involves asking some skeptical questions and not assuming what you are told is true. When I think of 'investigative reporting' I mean reporting in the public interest that looks deeply into a subject or story. Often it involves developing sources or hunting for documents or both and having the time to explore what they mean. At the same time in the best of all world's your editor is happy if you come back and say there is no story, or the story you originally went in pursuit of changed.

So, in answer to your question the pressure of a failing economic model by definition means there is less time. Prior to the decline of newspapers, broadcasters in the U.S. freed from the strictures around licensing that once forced them to present programming in the public interest along with operating with the threat of punishment created worldwide news gathering organizations. They had the incentive to do documentaries and present them even if the ratings were far below those of entertainment. That is no longer the case so you have less in depth reporting on the air as well.

EW: Is the law now having an impact on your profession? Is the law becoming more restrictive for journalists in general, and investigative journalists in particular?

LB: Not really. There has been a squeeze on the confidential source privilege, but it appears that Congress and a new President will sign a federal 'shield law'. The issues surrounding what is called national security reporting and/or criminal cases where a prosecutor or defendant has no where else to turn for information are unlikely to be resolved by the legislation. It is more of a question of the attitude/discretion of the prosecutors.

EW: Do you feel protected by the law?

LB: I never expect 'protection'. My sources do.

EW: How do you think an editor should best manage an investigative reporting team or reporter?

LB: Briefly, they should provide insight, encouragement and support, especially when the going gets tough.

EW: Who are the main competition to newspaper investigative reporters now? What are your thoughts on groups such as ProPublica?

This work is non profit. I have even called it 'anti-profit' by its very nature. So ProPublica, I am a consultant, or the Center for Investigative Reporting, I am one of the founders, are non profits working the public interest. Basically, that is what a very good newspaper newsroom does: report stories without fear or favor, and without considering the resources needed to do that. It is at its root a non-profit activity.

Newspaper Direct Inc's PressDisplay, an online "kiosk" that carries content from more than 700 mainstream newspapers, announces that it now lets registered users comment on any story. This move may help publishers employ social media features for their titles, allowing the readers to be a "part of the story", reports PR Web.

Demotix, a website that tries to link citizen reporters with mainstream media and their "professional" equivalents, was launched yesterday, reports the European Journalism Centre. The site will allow mainstream news outlets to buy content like video clips and images created by both professional and amateur worldwide correspondents.

Rupert Murdoch's biographer, Michael Wolff, reveals in his forthcoming book on the News Corp chairman that the media magnate has some surprising viewpoints on new media.

Despite what News Corp report in press releases, Murdoch has little interest or time for the prevailing converged, multimedia theory.

Wolff reports, "He's really not interested in all this talk about newspapers as the basis of new information franchises...blah blah. That's maybe what they say at News Corp to gull Wall Street. But Rupert Murdoch wants the physical thing."

He goes on to say, "He pokes the paper, slashes at it - move this, reduce that, enlarge this. It may be the ultimate fantasy, his continuing, contrary belief in newspapers."

Furthermore, Murdoch would like to acquire the New York Times. According to Wolff its, "Irresistible to him. I've watched him go through the numbers, plot out a merger with the Journal's backroom operations, and fantasize about the staff's quitting en masse as soon as he entered the scared temple."

Murdoch also reportedly would like Barack Obama to win the forthcoming US Presidential election as, "he'll sell more papers".

Wolff has unparalled access to the media tycoon over a nine-month period. Wolff told the New York Observer that the book should be out in December.

Source: Press Gazette

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation announces its third annual Knight News Challenge, a contest that will grant up to US$5 million for ideas that transform local community news with the help of digital tools like social media, Web 2.0 or multimedia content. A new "incubator" site, the News Challenge Garage, was created in order to offer online criticism and advice for applicants.

Ukrainian daily newspaper Gazeta Po Kievski has announced that throughout September it will be distributing special issues throughout September for free in nearly 100 locations around the Kiev region. The free issue promotion will have an initial circulation of 220,000 copies.

The special editions of the paper will include coverage of events that may be "worrying" Kiev inhabitants as well as information about leisure activities and shopping, reported Marketing Media Review.

The first "special" issue, published on August 28, included announcements about upcoming concerts, the theatre, foreign recipes and finance articles.

The daily issue of the paper will continue to be published regularly and distributed at newsstands.

Source: Marketing Media Review

The New York Times (NYT) Moscow bureau has created a Russian-language blog whose title reads "Tell the Americans and the entire world about Russia", reported Marketing Media Review.

The viewpoints featured on the blogs are translated into English and will be published on the newspaper's official site, even if the tone of the content is negative. The issues discussed in the blogs are suggested by NYT journalists and include translated NYT news stories about Russia.

 Russian bloggers had the chance to pose questions to one of Barack Obama's advisor, who answered the inquiries and studied the nearly 500 comments left on the blog.

Source: Marketing Media Review

Casa Ed. El Tiempo (CEET) will launch a free daily in Bogotá, Medellín, Barranquilla and Cali on 15 September.

The new paper will have an initial circulation of 300,000 - this will make it the widest circulated paper in Colombia. Paid paper El Tiempo currently has the highest circulation: 240,000 daily copies.

Columbian media group CEET will increase its grip on the Colombian market with the launch of this new paper, as it also publishes dailies El Tiempo, Hoy, Portafolio (business) and other regional newspapers.

The Colombian paper will have a similar design as Spainish free daily ADN. Spanish publisher Planeta owns a 55% stake in CEET. Planeta is the publisher of ADN.

The new paper, which has no title as yet, is the second free daily to be launched in Colombia. In 2006, Diario Occidente (Cali) was converted to a free daily.

Source: Newspaper Innovation

The Daily Telegraph today relaunched in full colour. The new design features colour-coded pages, expanded comment and features, and redesigned sports and business section.

A colour-coded bar now appears at the top of each page: blue-green for news; maroon for comment and features; and dark blue for business.

The paper has also revamped its 20-page sports section and the 12-page business section, with data spread across the top of all business news pages. It has increased the coverage in its back-page weather section with over 250 separate reports from the UK and overseas.

The Daily Telegraph debuted a new crossword, called the Toughie. The Toughie will run Tuesday to Friday.

This makeover is a bit of good news for the newspaper, which has been struggling under a raft of negative headlines following its announcement that it was shedding casual staff,and athe resulting National Union of Journalists strike ballot. As part of its plan to shed casual staffers, the paper plans to appoint around 18 "content editors", hire 40 new workers and change the working conditions of some employees (editorial employees fare being moved from a nine-day to a 10-day working fortnight).

Source: Guardian.co.uk

Referring to the Internet, Russian Minister of Communications Igor Shegolev says that there is an "illusion" that anyone can become a journalist, reports Lenta.ru.

Legislation covering the media may be updated and authorities are currently looking into the ramifications to this, according to Shegolev. However, he says that the government doesn't plan on introducing any legislation obliging the media to edit content and neither would it "heavily"