Robin Hamman: Why I’m joining Edelman as digital director

University of Westminster gets ready to discuss ‘Journalism’s Next Top Model’

June 4th, 2010 | 1 Comment | Posted by Judith Townend in Events, Journalism, Newspapers, Training

The University of Westminster has chosen a more upbeat theme for its 2010 journalism event. Whereas we discussed ‘journalism in crisis’ this time last year, delegates from around the world will gather next week to find ‘Journalism’s Next Top Model’, a conference held by Westminster’s department of journalism in association with the British Journalism Review.

News media all over the world are failing as the traditional revenue from advertising bleeds to the web. Free news websites are discouraging the young from buying newspapers. So who will pay for what sort of journalism in the future?

The academic-oriented discussions take place on Tuesday 8 June; including presentations by Francois Nel from the University of Central Lancashire; Rasmus Kleis Nielsen and David Levy from the Reuters Institute; and Professor Steven Barnett from University of Westminster, who will be joined by speakers from all over the world – Sweden, Turkey, Norway and Macedonia, for example.

On the Wednesday, industry panellists will include: Jane Moore (the Sun); Peter Oborne (the Mail/ Channel 4); Roger Parry (former chair, Johnston Press); William Perrin (activist and blogger); and Claire Enders (Enders Analysis).

The conference concludes with the presentation of the British Journalism Review’s Outstanding Contribution to Broadcast Journalism prize; and a memorial lecture by Boris Johnson.

The conference will take place 8 June 2010 – 9 June 2010 at 309 Regent Street, London W1. Registration is via this form (download at this link) and we’re told applications will still be accepted on Monday.

Tags: journalism's next top model, university of westminster

Mapping stories and historical images on Google Street View

June 4th, 2010 | 1 Comment | Posted by Laura Oliver in Multimedia

Historypin, a site that overlays historical images and related stories on Google Street View, describes itself as “like a digital time machine”:

It uses Google Maps and Street View technology and hopes to become the largest user-generated archive of the world’s historical images and stories.

Historypin asks the public to dig out, upload and pin their own old photos, as well as the stories behind them, onto the Historypin map. Uniquely, Historypin lets you layer old images onto modern Street View scenes, giving a series of peaks into the past.

It has been developed by We Are What We Do, the “social movement” and campaign that was behind the book ‘Teach your Granny to Text and Other Ways to Change the World’, in partnership with Google.

If the technology behind it were opened up, this would be a fascinating way to publishing ‘nostalgia’ pictures from local newspapers, news archives or map historic stories.

(via Mapperz)

Tags: google, google maps, Google Street View, Historypin, Mapping, maps, online archive, Street View technology, we are what we do

#fong: New business bootcamps for journalists from Adam Westbrook

June 4th, 2010 | 1 Comment | Posted by Laura Oliver in Business, Events

Freelance multimedia journalist Adam Westbrook – author of this book and this blog, is planning a series of ‘bootcamps’ to come up with new business ideas for journalism. The idea for the meetings, which Westbrook will host in his own London flat, follows the success of the Future of News Group – a network and series of events set up by Westbrook to discuss, debate and find new ideas for journalism and journalists.

The first Future of News Business Bootcamp will focus on making money from reporting on the developing world and human rights and will run on Tuesday 22 June. The group is limited to six people and the deadline to apply for a place is 11 June. To secure a spot, you need to email a pitch to Adam Westbrook explaining why you need to be at this bootcamp, what your interest in this niche is and (in one line) give an idea for how the niche might be made into business.

“The meet-ups have been running for about six months now and the group has more than 300 members so it’s been going really well. When I set it up I wanted it to be a forum for actual new ideas to emerge, rather than more talk about the future of journalism. The individual meet-ups have been great but I got the sense they’d reverted back to the speaker/Q&A format we see at all the other conferences. I thought of ways I could bring them back to the main mission of the group and realised smaller groups are often better for brainstorming and ideas. They’re going to be really focused sessions, diving straight into what the business models could be and how to package them into profitable products. Fingers crossed one of the bootcamps will bring up a gem,” Westbrook told Journalism.co.uk.

If the first session goes well, Westbrook says he’ll look into holding other ‘bootcamps’ for travel journalism, sport journalism, environmental journalism, local journalism and more.

Tags: #fong, Adam Westbrook, business models, future of news, future of news business bootcamp

Headline headghgh-ache

June 4th, 2010 | 5 Comments | Posted by Judith Townend in Editors' pick, Journalism, Newspapers

Front page of yesterday’s Johnston Press Bedfordshire title, the Times & Citizen, courtesy of @citizenbb on Twitpic:

@Deathknocking also posted it, with this comment: “Dear John Fry, this is what happens when you get rid of all the sub editors. Yours faithfully, the journalists of Great Britain”.

As we have previously reported, new content management system, Atex, has been causing embarrassment for JP journalists, resulting in misaligned pictures, or even missing pictures. They have difficulties with formatting the content properly.

But was Atex to blame here? If you know what happened, do let us know…

Tags: bedfordtoday, Johnston Press, times & citizen

Mediating Conflict: Looking at the media ‘stealing’ stories from blogs

June 4th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Judith Townend in Editors' pick, Press freedom and ethics, Social media and blogging

If you haven’t spotted it already, read Danny Sullivan’s blog post about the mainstream media ‘stealing’ his scoop – the story about a woman suing Google, alleging that bad directions had resulted in her getting hit by a car.

Sullivan documents the various ways his story for Search Engine Land was picked up by mainstream titles, and raises complaint with the way material was used.

…News is messy. But we should all try to do better attribution.

Following on from the post, the UK-based blogger and PhD student, Daniel Bennett, broadens the discussion to one of methodology: how to monitor the way mainstream media uses blog content, if they don’t attribute it?

…If blogs and indeed other sources of other news are written out of media reports how can we accurately measure their influence? It seems to me that relying solely on content analyses to assess the impact of blogs on the traditional news media is highly unreliable.

Tags: Daniel Bennett, Danny Sullivan, google

RCFP: Texas court finds links in e-mail can be defamatory

June 4th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Judith Townend in Editors' pick, Legal, Press freedom and ethics

I’ve been wondering about how ‘linking’ fits into defamation law for a while, and I’ve just stumbled across this story by the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press (RCFP):

A federal bankruptcy court in Texas became one of the first to find that individuals can be held liable for linking to defamatory blog posts earlier this year.

The court in In re Perry held that an individual’s e-mail opened him up to a defamation claim even though he did not author any of the inflammatory postings himself.

Full story at this link…

Tags: defamation law, rcfp, Texas

#followjourn: @jonfildes/BBC technology index manager

June 4th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Joel Gunter in Recommended journalists

#followjourn: Jonathan Fildes

Who? Technology index manager at the BBC

Where? Fildes, who recently returned from a 10-month sabbatical at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, runs the BBC technology site, as well as working as a science journalist on a freelance basis. He has also worked for BBC Radio and BBC News television.

Contact? @jonfildes

Just as we like to supply you with fresh and innovative tips every day, we’re recommending journalists to follow online too. They might be from any sector of the industry: please send suggestions (you can nominate yourself) to judith or laura at journalism.co.uk; or to @journalismnews.

Tags: #followjourn, BBC, jonathan fildes

William Bennett on libel reform: ‘The real crux of the problem is not the law but the excessive costs of deploying it’

June 4th, 2010 | 2 Comments | Posted by Judith Townend in Editors' pick, Journalism, Legal

As promised earlier this week, the Inforrm blog continues to offer challenging discussion around the arguments posed by the Libel Reform campaign. Here, it reproduces an article by William Bennett, barrister at 5RB, that originally appeared in the Solicitor’s Journal.

“Think again: the recent campaign for libel reform is not based on careful consideration,” he argues.

The real crux of the problem is not the law but the excessive costs of deploying it – and Parliament should abolish the right to jury trials in defamation. Such reform, particularly if implemented in conjunction with the proposals set out in Lord Justice Jackson’s recent review of civil litigation costs, would dramatically cut the cost of defamation litigation. In turn this would promote freedom of speech in a way which would not compromise the rights of those defamed.

Disclaimer: Journalism.co.uk has pledged its support to the Libel Reform campaign and is listed as a supporter.

Tags: inforrm blog, libel reform, william bennett

#Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – tracking local MPs

June 4th, 2010 | 1 Comment | Posted by Laura Oliver in Top tips for journalists

Track your local MP using TheyWorkForYou.com. Its database allows you to monitor registered interests, expenses and voting record. You can also sign up for email alerts everytime your MP speaks. Tipster: Judith Townend.

To submit a tip to Journalism.co.uk, use this link – we will pay a fiver for the best ones published.