Tag Archives: journalists

CNN to air documentary offering ‘unfiltered look at reporting from Syria’

Image: CNN

On Friday CNN will air a one-hour documentary which looks at the “challenges and dangers” its team encountered while reporting from the Syrian city of Homs.

The broadcasting of the documentary, called ‘72 Hours Under Fire‘, comes two weeks after two Western journalists – Sunday Times correspondent Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik – were killed in the same city, after a building they were in was shelled.

According to a release, in the CNN documentary the broadcaster’s journalists who reported from Homs and the news executives “tasked with keeping them safe” will discuss the dangers taken as part of their aim of “getting the story out of Syria”.

The experienced team CNN sent into Homs included Beirut-based correspondent Arwa Damon, photojournalist Neil Hallsworth and security risk advisor Tim Crockett. 72 Hours Under Fire chronicles their journey into and out of Homs, the dangers they faced while newsgathering and reporting there and why this assignment was different than previous ones.

Below are two videos which have been published online by CNN ahead of the documentary:

Google+ users can now share circles – help us create and share a UK journalists circle

Google+ users can now share their circles, one of the key features of the social network which launched in private beta three months ago and is now open to all.

Users create their own circles and give them a name, such as ‘journalists’, ‘city councillors’ or ‘PRs’. They can then read news from members of a particular circle and share updates with one or more specific groups.

A link now appears when you hover over a circle that allows you to share it with a contact. Your circle remains hidden and confidential from others and is not updated in your contact’s account when you add more individuals.

The video below explains more.

Help us create a master list of UK-based journalists on Google+

Journalism.co.uk will now create a master list of UK-based journalists on Google+. When we have built the circle we will share it with those who request our circle.

We will be doing this from John Thompson, owner and managing director of Journalism.co.uk’s account as Google+ does not yet allow news sites or brands to create an account. You can connect with John at gplus.to/JohnCThompson and fill in the form to let us know you would like us to share the Journalism.co.uk master list with you.

#UKjourn: Growing master list of all UK journalists on Twitter

Journalism.co.uk is building a master list of UK-based journalists who are regular Twitter users.

We have started to pull together a list using PeerIndex, which measures and ranks the online influence of anyone with a Twitter account. You also have the option to make your PeerIndex score more accurate by linking your LinkedIn, Facebook, Tumblr and Quora accounts.

Some Twitter accounts are not yet analysed by PeerIndex. If your is not, let us know at @journalismnews using the hashtag #UKjourn, we will send your Twitter handle to PeerIndex and tell them you are not linked.

If you are not on the list and are a UK-based journalist who should be, you can let us know in the same way.

This is a work in process – so do bear with us.

CPJ: 141 attacks on journalists and news facilities in Egypt since 30 Jan

The Committee to Protect Journalists claims to have documented at least 141 “direct attacks” on journalists and news facilities in Egypt since 30 January.

The CPJ, which says it is also investigating “numerous other reports” has compiled a link list of its daily coverage of the anti-government protests detailing the cases.

“The authorities say everything is being done to protect journalists, but reports of harassment and intimidation continue,” said Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator. “Shifting from a tactic of outright violence against journalists to one of erecting bureaucratic obstacles is not fooling anybody. Cairo must allow all journalists to report unhindered.”

Full post on the CPJ site at this link.

European Commission launches 18th annual Lorenzo Natali Prize

Journalists are invited to take part in the annual Lorenzo Natali Prize, organised by the European Commission.

The international contest, now in its 18th year, will reward the work of print, radio and television journalists from the following regions: Africa;  Asia and Pacific;  Latin America and the Caribbean; Europe; and the Arab World and Middle East.

Entrants must submit one extract or entire journalistic work tackling issues in development, democracy and human rights in the developing world. The work must have been printed or aired between 1 July 2009 and 30 June 2010.

There will be a grand prize of €5000 for the overall winner, and runner-up prizes of €2500 and €1500

An awards ceremony will be organised for the winners by the European Commission in Brussels in December.

See the full guidelines for the contest at this link.

See guidelines for entering the contest at this link.

Deadline for submissions is August 31.

Dan Nguyen: Coding for journalists – four online tutorials

Dan Nguyen, a developer/journalist for ProPublica, the  non-profit investigative news organisation, has shared four tutorials that would:

…guide the non-coding-but-computer-savvy journalist through enough programming fundamentals so that he/she could write a web scraper to collect data from public websites.

Four-part series at this link…

Bill Lucey: Ways for laid-off journalists to reinvent their careers

Bill Lucey shares some ideas from the US on reinventing redundant journalists’ careers, over on the Huffington Post. Even if you’re older, forget about age and stay young at heart, he says.

[B]efore raising the white flag and crying uncle, there are plenty of resources available online, offering video tutorials, webinars, and career tips to those out of work newspaper employees; trying to acquire new skills and become more marketable.

Full post at this link….

Buzz links for journalists

We’ll be back with a fuller report on Buzz for journalists once we’ve played with it a bit more and had some of our questions answered by Google. In the meantime, here’s a small selection of the good and not-so good buzz around Google’s latest launch.

[You can follow Journalism.co.uk on Buzz here: http://www.google.com/profiles/journalism.co.uk]

On the positive side:

And on the negative:

TM Birmingham chapels’ motion of no confidence

The National Union of Journalists announced today that its members at Trinity Mirror in Birmingham have ‘unanimously passed a motion of no confidence in the company’s management of its regional titles.’

The motion was agreed by the chapels from the Birmingham Post, Mail, Sunday Mercury and Midlands Weekly Media, it said in a release.

“The big newspaper companies are following a policy of slash and burn – and the people who work there have had enough,” said Chris Morley, NUJ Northern organiser and a former father of the Post and Mail chapel.

“Trinity Mirror would rather close titles than put them up for sale – giving them the chance to survive under another owner.

“The Walsall Observer used to sell more than 30,000 copies a week. It is a much-loved local institution.”

NUJ members at the Birmingham titles are currently balloting for action, following the announcement of  job cuts and closure of weekly titles.

At the weekend, the Financial Times reported that the Birmingham post might soon cease daily publication.

Here’s the statement in full.

The chapels sent this letter to Trinity Mirror chief executive Sly Bailey:

Dear Ms Bailey,

The Birmingham and Midlands NUJ Chapels find ourselves in dispute with the company over cuts and redundancies.

Regretfully the unanimous view of members is that while some difficulties are expected in a recession, the successive assaults on this business goes way beyond that and in fact continue a trend of cutbacks which began long before the economic downturn.

Therefore the BPM Media and Midlands Weekly Media chapels have unanimously backed a proposal from the floor for a vote of no confidence in Trinity Mirror’s management of its regional titles.

The motion, which will be issued to the newspaper trade media, states:

“Journalists, already having recently suffered a major round of redundancies. massive structural change and being the testing ground for new, unproven IT systems, have responded to these greater workloads and longer hours, with professionalism and much good will to ensure deadlines are met and quality is maintained.

“This has been thrown back in their faces and they have been betrayed by a management with a single aim – the pursuit of short term profit through cost reduction, asset sale and redundancy. This one-trick pony has no plan for the future and no concept of how to grow the local news, advertising and publishing business.

“Under this management we fear that within a few years there will be no Birmingham Post, Mail, Mercury and weeklies. Titles which have served communities and made profits for decades in the face of recession, depression, war, the advent of radio, television and recently the internet, are either being closed now or are in immediate danger if the present policy of cut, cut, cut continues.

“The company has accused the union of ignoring the disputes procedure in immediately calling a ballot for industrial action in the face of these cuts. However, the company broke its agreements with the recognised unions in imposing a pay freeze without negotiation or consultation at the start of this year.

“We believe closing titles such as the Walsall Observer, which has been published for more than 150 years, and proposals we believe are being considered to cut publication of the Birmingham Post and stop same day publication of the Birmingham Mail are reckless and negligent as it sends out the message that this company is failing and will scare advertisers away.”