RSF: Russia’s public prosecutor calls for investigation into opposition website owner’s death

Russia's public prosecutor Alexander Bastrykin has asked for an 'objective and thorough' investigation into the death of Magomed Yevloyev, the owner of the Ingush news website Ingushetiya.ru. Yevloyev was shot dead last month while being held by interior ministry officials. Full story...

Tags: Alexander Bastrykin, Magomed Yevloyev, Russia

Beeb development producer blogs his way to Russia

BBC development producer Matthew Cashmore (about to leave his job for a new role at Lonely Planet) is chronicling his trip to Russia with two of this friends, using JTR video – they broadcast live from wherever they are every day at 19:00 BST from their mobile phones.

The player on the site allows followers to watch their progress, live or from previous uploads, and users can also follow their blog and podcasts.

The trip is described as ‘3 blokes, 3 bikes, 3 weeks’ and is in aid of the Everyman charity, which supports research into male cancer.

Tags: BBC, bikes, cancer, development producer, everyman, Lonely Planet, Matthew Cashmore, mobile phones, Russia

Reuters: Russian opposition news website owner fatally shot

The owner of a Russian opposition news website, www.Ingushetiya.ru, has been fatally shot, soon after being detained by police. Full story...

Tags: Ingushetiya, Russia

Wired.com: Georgian bloggers ward off Russian cyberattacks

Bloggers in Georgia are moving their sites to Google to keep communication channels open, as they face online attacks coming from Russia. Estonia is also hosting the website of Georgia's Foreign Affairs Ministry. Full story...

Tags: Estonia, Georgia, Georgia's Foreign Affairs Ministry, google, Russia

Death toll rises for journalists killed in Georgia

According to reports, four journalists have been killed in Georgia, since the country’s armed conflict with Russia began on Friday.

Dutch television cameraman Stan Storimans, 39, who was working for news channel RTL, was killed during the Russian bombing of Gori, the Associated Press has said. Storiman’s colleague Jeroen Akkermans was also injured by blasts, which killed five.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has also reported the deaths of two journalists in the South Ossetian capital Tskhinvali. Grigol Chikhladze, head of Alania TV, and Alexander Klimchuk, head of the Caucasus Press Images agency and a correspondent for Itar-Tas, were shot at a roadblock erected by Ossetian freedom-fighters, RSF said.

US reporter Winston Featherly-Bean and fellow Georgian reporter Teimuraz Kikuradze, who were travelling with Chikladze and Klimchuck, were wounded in the attack and later taken to a field hospital.

An as yet unnamed Georgian journalist has also died in the conflict, after a shell hit his car outside Gori.

The BBC’s Gavin Hewitt also claimed his crew were under fire from Russian forces (thanks to Daniel Bennett for flagging this up):

Tags: Alexander Klimchuk, Caucasus Press Images, Gavin Hewitt, Georgia, Grigol Chikhladze, Jeroen Akkermans, Russia, Stan Storimans, Teimuraz Kikuradze, Winston Featherly-Bean

TATLER launches Russian edition

CondeNast’s TATLER is to launch a Russian edition later this month.

TATLER Russia will be available from August 21 and will have an estimated print circulation of 120,000, a press release from the publisher said.

Karina Dobrotvorskaya will take up the role of managing director and editorial director for the title, while Victoria Davydova has been named as editor-in-chief.

Tags: CondeNast, Karina Dobrotvorskaya, Russia, Tatler, Victoria Davydova

Current TV’s Vanguard video journalism programme to launch in the UK

Current TV, the peer-to-peer online news and information site, will later this month launch its investigative journalism program, Vanguard, on its cable TV channel in the UK.

(watch the trailer here…)

Vanguard is a youth-orientated weekly show focusing on behind-the-headlines stories from across the globe.

The show, which already runs on Current’s US cable TV channel and online, will feature reports from China on the trade in e-waste, the rise in organised attacks on migrants in Russia and the lawlessness of the oil-rich Niger Delta, when it launches.

“Lots of news organisations are scaling back their productions of international reports that go beyond the immediate headlines,” Laura Ling, vice president of Vanguard told Journalism.co.uk.

“I think that’s unfortunate. We are trying to look beyond the headlines, trying to be out in front of events so that we can have a better understanding of what’s going on [in the world].”

This latest move is an extension of the journalism already carried on the integrated web and TV platform. Last month, Guardian reporters began submitting vlog for broadcast on its TV channel.

The Vanguard launch precedes Current TV rolling out a bilingual version of the service in Italy, in May.

Tags: Cable TV, China, e-waste, integrated web, Italy, Journalism.co.uk, Laura Ling, oil, online news, peer-to-peer, Russia, United Kingdom, United States

Innovations in Journalism - Newstin

1) Who are you and what’s it all about?

I’m Jeremy Lopez, director of business development at Newstin.

Newstin is a unique, semantic and cross-language information retrieval engine with metadata tagging and data visualization capabilities.

Newstin pulls content from more than 150,000 global sources in ten different language publications; organising this content into over 650,000 topical categories.

Major features include ‘across language navigation with integrated translation’, ‘text mining,’ and ‘semantic contextual searching’.

2) Why would this be useful to a journalist?

Our new feature ‘Across language commenting’ – coming soon. If a reporter puts out a story in English and someone from Russia translates and reads this story and then decides to comment on it in Russian, the reporter will have the tools on the page to be able to have the Russian comment translated back into English.

With our news retrieval system we have collected and organised news in such a way that you do not have to speak Russian in order to find, say, Russian news on computer and software supplies.

3) Is this it, or is there more to come?

There is a whole lot more to come.  We are currently in the process of re-designing the site for easier use and enhanced features.

A few of the major features that will be functioning by the beginning of Q2 are:

1. Social Newstin - personal accounts, editable categories
2. Commenting outside of publishing, ability to create discussion groups for editors, cross language commenting
3. Sentiment analysis - tone of the story and category will be displayed

4) Why are you doing this?

News is one of the highest growth categories on the internet but the world is stuck in cultural and linguistic silos, the reason is because there is no one source that organises it all.

If the world’s web newsreaders were to cross language and cultural borders with ease so that there were no need for these linguistic barriers then we would suddenly be all on the same page.

We have usage from 193 countries already and we are trying to put up local domains to bring more access from each of them so they don’t have to first navigate with an English site.

5) What does it cost to use it?

Newstin is a free service!  We will be implementing an upgraded version in the future with additional tools and access.  This will be a more professionally focused service with a cost.

6) How will you make it pay?

Advertising, sponsorships, premium service in the future…to name a few.

Tags: Lopez, Newstin, Russia, software supplies, text mining, web newsreaders