links for 2007-10-31
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ANtony M on the BBC Trust bloggers outreach...
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Video of Euan Semple's BiF talk. Next stop, TED?!
« September 2007 | Main | November 2007 »
October 2007
October 31, 2007
October 30, 2007
blah blah blog
A BBC blogging seminar organised by Robin Hamman. Guests included Jeff Jarvis, Graham Holliday, Adriana Lukas and the fine people from Headshift. Lots of grappling with very practical problems and frustrations.
Closing the day, I mentioned a colleague who loftily declared that anyone who blogs is merely engaged in an act of narcissism. Some truth in that of course. But it overlooks some more interesting reasons.
There's no better way to understand the huge changes sweeping the media than getting your hands dirty online. It's fallen to us to reinvent the industry and we won't do it with heads in either the sand or the clouds...
Live and wireless
Three signs that the wireless revolution is almost upon us.
First, I got hold of an Apple Ipod Touch. Yes, it looks beautiful, the screen is great quality, it makes watching video on the move a pleasure. But for me the real breakthrough is wireless connectivity that simply works. It picks up networks in a moment, and the zoom function on the screen means for the first time web on the move is easy and a pleasure.
John Naughton agrees.
Then, the BBC announced its "free wifi content" deal with The Cloud - the wireless hotspot provider. At any Cloud hotspot you can get BBC content - including video and audio - without paying for access. Just go straight to the BBC site. We'll see more "free access" deals - with commercial sites - I am sure.
Finally listening to Digital Planet on the BBC World Service I heard an interview with Padmasree Warrior, Motorola’s chief technology officer, about Wi-max. It's been promised for a long time, but it now appears to be arriving with 17 cities in Pakistan already connected....
Bring it on...
What are YOU listening to?
Lunch with Lloyd Shepherd last week - we discussed our regular podcast listens. The discussion turned to the difference between time-shifted radio (ie what the BBC or NPR offers) amateur content and the "semi-professional" content - shows that havn't or couldn't get a broadcast airing and wouldnt exist if it wasn't for podcasting, but are high quality. This last category, we agreed, is the most interesting.
He swapped me Jodcast (news of the Universe from Jodrell Bank) for Coverville (weekly compilation of great cover versions). We both agree it was a fair swap....
So what are you listening to?
October 29, 2007
links for 2007-10-29
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JN says Facebook is overvalued and waxes lyrical about the iPod Touch. Rightly. It makes mobile web and video a pleasure
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Future of news - making the sterile human
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More musing about Facebook
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A remarkable interview with a monk who escaped. The IHT ison top form these days...
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The Jeff/Jay Rosen model..
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News River - how the web changes choices
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Kevin and Suw dismantle the NUJ Web 2.0 attack...
More from NewsXchange 2007
Broadcasters rise to the challenge of the YouTube age
Report by Duncan Stanworth of BBC Monitoring at the News Xchange 2007 conference in Berlin on 26 October
The mushrooming of open-source internet video provides a bottomless well of programme material, particularly in the political sphere, but it poses key challenges for mainstream media, the News Xchange 2007 conference in Berlin has heard.
Patrick Walker, head of video partnerships at the Google search engine and leading video-sharing site YouTube, said the site's founders could not have foreseen its potential. More than 100,000 years' worth of video has been posted since 2005 (correction) People have watched more than 100,000 years worth of YouTube videos since the company was founded in 2005. Footage has documented political upheaval, natural disasters and human rights abuses - including street protests in Burma, wildfires in California, and the beating of civilians by police in Egypt.
Internet video has increased public participation in politics, and has forced politicians to be accountable for their words and deeds, Walker said. It has introduced a new, young audience to the political process. But Andrew Keen, author of "Cult of the Amateur" and a critic of the trivialization of politics, said online video has put politicians on the defensive. In particular, US politicians are "vulnerable every second, and saying less and less". He dubbed the forthcoming US presidential poll the "YouTube election", saying it will be less open, and less spontaneous, as a consequence.
"Editorial integrity"
Speakers saw an ongoing role for "traditional" media. Julien Pain, editor of user-generated content (UGC) at France 24 TV, said it was crucial to check the provenance of open-source internet video: "It is our job as journalists, not YouTube's problem." Keen said Google and YouTube were media companies, with moral and other responsibilities for managing content. He urged open-source video providers to bring in traditional media, "to help it to grow up". "You need gatekeepers, editors and fact checkers.
This is the big problem with the Web 2.0 business premise. Mainstream media needs to defend its editorial integrity in the face of this," he said. Sam Feist, political editor at CNN, said his network was "peacefully co-existing" with YouTube and its ilk, but was becoming dependent on open source video. Traditional media and UGC have different roles: "The public gets it - you don't watch YouTube for the news."
Journalism has embraced open-source video as a transmission mechanism, but is "ever more important in the YouTube age". The "coin of the realm" for CNN is trust, he said. But former Canadian Broadcasting Corporation boss Tony Burman questioned how a "trust and verifier" role can be maintained in the face of massive downsizing at traditional media outlets, including newspapers and the BBC.
Media freedom
Sami Ben Gharbia, from blog aggregator Global Voices, said online video has a great impact in countries with limited media freedom. UGC has pushed mainstream media in parts of the Arab world towards addressing previously-taboo topics. However, it is vulnerable to the whims of officials; for instance, the Moroccan authorities blocked internet access after Polisario supporters posted online video material. Julien Pain noted that by cracking down on a few video posters, security forces are able to deter many potential contributors.
Al-Jazeera English's Richard Gizbert raised the issue of moral accountability. Yahoo!, he said, "had a lot to answer for over its performance in China", where it had handed over information about political dissidents' emails to the authorities. Walker conceded that the Chinese Google site "does have an accommodation for government policy", but added that the servers are based outside the country "so that the government cannot get personal information from us".
"Narcissistic generation"
The rise of online video and UGC indicates a hostlity towards traditional media outlets, some speakers noted. Robert Freeman, from the Guardian newspaper in the UK, said YouTube was popular precisely because it was not mainstream. He identified a generation of media consumers who eschewed TV and radio and saw the world solely from the point of view of what their peers were looking at on the internet. Keen echoed this, noting that social networking site Facebook was a "next-generation TV channel". But, citing a recent CNN debate in which US presidential candidates fielded questions submitted by YouTube posters, he bemoaned the fact that the user was becoming the "star". "A narcissistic generation wants to make politics about itself," he said. The challenge for the mainstream media is to find a way to create "good citizens" and to educate a generation that focuses on itself.
Looking ahead, YouTube's Patrick Walker told delegates to expect better tools and greater accessibility. The disparate nature of media is here to stay, he said. But Keen saw a future in which the smart money would gravitate towards experience and professionalism. "The experts are going to fight back", he predicted.
Source: BBC Monitoring research 29 Oct 07
October 28, 2007
links for 2007-10-28
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`Ron Rosenbaum on how to deal with abusive blog comments. I have a few candidates.
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The New Yorker reviews Arcade Fire
October 27, 2007
links for 2007-10-27
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cats and pigeons?
October 26, 2007
Iran and the lessons of Iraq
Report by Duncan Stanworth from the News Xchange 2007 conference in Berlin on 25 October
There are echoes of the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq in the media's coverage of Iran, with "drumbeats" being sounded over Tehran's nuclear policies, the News Xchange 2007 conference in Berlin has heard. Delegates were asked whether journalists had learned the "lessons" from Iraq, including the reporting of claims about weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq and alleged links between the Saddam Husayn regime and Al-Qa'idah. Moreover, grave concerns were raised about the current coverage of Iran in the Western media. Robert Greenwald, the US-based documentary maker whose internet video "Fox Attacks Iran" presents apparent parallels between US TV news coverage of Iran today, and Iraq in the run-up to the 2003 invasion, said the scenario was being relived. The US administration had a "laid-out plan, trying to scare us, seeking to put it [the Iran issue] in an emotional context". But conservative commentator Michael Ledeen, author of "Iranian Timebomb", said he detected no plan to attack Iran, adding that bellicose speeches were nothing new. Martha Raddatz, chief White House correspondent of US network ABC News, said the media had to look at its pre-Iraq War behaviour: "We have to raise our eyebrows about anything regarding WMD."
Lack of backbone
The media had displayed a lack of backbone over Iraq, said former BBC journalist and current Fox News presenter Anita McNaught. "The shock was to discover that we knew just what the US and British governments knew. They drew different conclusions. We lacked the courage to call their bluff." Fox had had a "hotline to the White House", she added, and would trumpet apparent successes in the search for WMD. The BBC ran with these stories, before "learning restraint". Other speakers bemoaned what they saw as a lack of context and perspective in coverage of Iran. Jon Snow, from the UK's Channel Four News, said the media had to deconstruct the "monolith" that was Iran. He asked why there had been no mention that 40 per cent of foreign insurgents in Iraq were Saudi, not Iranian. The theme was echoed by Greenwald. He said the "framework" for discussing Iran was limited to "when to bomb, how to bomb".
Politicians "setting the agenda"
Europe-based Iranian blogger Hossein Derakshan went further, saying the preamble to war had started in the media. The "propaganda" was not limited to Fox, but came too from the likes of the New York Times and Boston Globe newspapers. He questioned the frequent use of the phrase "nuclear ambition", which, he said, was employed alongside the "demonization" of Iranian President Ahmadinezhad. Al-Jazeera head Wadah Khanfar said politicians were setting the agenda. Money was needed in order to present the context. But this presented difficulties. Martha Raddatz said it was difficult to get in and out of the country, and that it was hard to get answers. Networks were already stretched by the need to cover Iraq, and resources were finite. With more chest-beating over Iran on the cards, some speakers urged the News Xchange journalists not to repeat the recent past. "Don't let our country lead us into another tragedy," Greenwald pleaded. "Covering Iran properly is one of our greatest obligations to humanity," Snow added.
Source: BBC Monitoring research 25 Oct 07
October 25, 2007
links for 2007-10-25
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moblogging goes mainstream
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Errol Morris investigates two Crimean was photographs - which one was faked?
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Sidney Blumenthal says Walter Lippmann is as relevant today as 90 years ago -
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