Mediastudiesblog

Mozilla, Hacks/Hackers, Medill School at Northwestern University, and The Media Consortium are collaborating to run a free online course for journalists and programmers on the Peer-to-peer University platform. This is an experimental six-week course exploring the ways that technology is changing news production and how professional journalists & programmers can work together to innovate around these changes.

 The topics that are currently in development are:

1. The fundamentals of journalism and coding: to help hacks and hackers understand each others' principles, processes, lexicons, etc. From your first "Hello, World" program to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests -- participants will work together, to learn together. 
2. Project management: How do you take an idea from the concept to launch? What are the processes that teams use to meet deadlines & project goals? Learn about project management from real-world examples of it in action.
3. Edit it. Fork it. The art of collaboration and journalism: What does collaboration mean in the context of digital journalism? What are the tools that can support collaboration online, i.e., programming collaboratively, collaborative video editing, collaborative funding, etc.
4. Big Ugly Datasets For Thumb-Fingered Journalists:  Somewhere out there is a file that ends in three letters: CSV. It will probably be so big, in fact, that it will be nearly impossible to navigate in Excel and not much easier in Access. But it has all kinds of useful information that will help you cover your beat -- if only you could load the file, get the data you want from it, and do analysis. (Or, you know what a CSV is and you can rock a database -- but where's the story in this data?). This course will try to answer these questions and more with hands-on assignments.
5. Maps. Maps. Everywhere: From Google Maps to Grassroots Mapping and back again. What are the different ways that maps are being used to provide context and information, etc. 
6. Data journalism and government: Exploring open sources: how to find them, how to work with them, etc. Timely topic given the recent release of data by Wikileaks.  

Spotted on BoingBoing.

The Cape Argus (24/08/2010) published a 1977 parliamentary speech made by Connie Mulder, the then Minister of Information.  Déjà vu?

Idasa has expressed concern that the Protection of Information Bill and the proposed Media Appeals Tribunal are not the same,  as their interchangeable use in the media has led many to believe. 

PIMS manager Judith February says: “The Protection of Information Bill will, if passed in its current form, have serious consequences for all ordinary citizens, not only journalists.”

Here's the link to the media statement.

 

The latest issue (Vol 36 No 2) is now available.   It is a special issue with the theme  "Journalism in the global South: South Africa and Brazil".    

The Table of Contents appears below.   Contributors include our own Tanja Bosch of CFMS. 

Editorial
Special issue: Journalism in the global South: South Africa and Brazil	Pages 143 - 147
Authors: Herman Wasserman; Arnold S. de Beer
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485361
Original Articles
The past, present and future of South African journalism research, or: In search of a metatheory for South African journalism research	Pages 148 - 171
Author: Pieter J. Fourie
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485362
Tendencies in the development and consolidation of journalism research in Brazil	Pages 172 - 184
Author: Carlos Eduardo Franciscato
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485364
Journalism education in South Africa: Shifts and dilemmas	Pages 185 - 199
Author: Jeanne Prinsloo
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485365
Journalism/Communication graduate education in Brazil	Pages 200 - 212
Author: Sérgio Mattos
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485366
Looking for journalism education scholarship in some unusual places: The case of Africa	Pages 213 - 226
Author: Arnold S. de Beer
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485367
Challenges for the consolidation of Brazilian scientific journals in the journalism and communication areas	Pages 227 - 239
Author: Elias Machado
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485368
Political journalism in South Africa as a developing democracy - understanding media freedom and responsibility	Pages 240 - 251
Author: Herman Wasserman
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485369
Political journalism in Brazil as a developing democracy: The relationship between government and the media	Pages 252 - 264
Author: Antonio Hohlfeldt
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485372
Digital journalism and online public spheres in South Africa	Pages 265 - 275
Author: Tanja Bosch
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485374
Positioning yet another idea under the glocalisation umbrella: Reader participation and audience communities as market strategies in globalised online journalism	Pages 276 - 287
Author: Marcos Palacios
DOI: 10.1080/02500167.2010.485377

 

The Harold Wolpe Memorial Trust takes pleasure in announcing its 91st Open Dialogue.

  The aim of these dialogues is to create a space for open and informed dialogue and debate around key local and global political, social and economic issues facing South Africa.

  Everyone is welcome and entrance is free. Please feel free to circulate this notice.



MEDIA CENSORSHIP

Speaker:

Prof Pierre de Vos
University of Cape Town
Respondent:

Dr. Laurie Nathan
University of Cape Town

Tuesday 17 August 2010
17h30 for 18h00
Venue: Zoology, LT2, UCT

RSVP: wolpeforums at mweb.co.za / 021-6740361

The Trust acknowledges the support of our donors, particularly the
Rosa Luxemburg Foundation and the National Lottery Distribution Trust
Fund

A link to an article posted on IOL which is an overview of the Protection of Information Bill, which as the article points out, has tended to get conflated with the proposed Media Appeals Tribunal.   

Here's a round up of editorials from various newspapers as coverage on Media in South Africa from bizcommunity.com.

A presentation for students doing the "Online Media Production course" was created by Travis Noakes,  aimed at the importance of students using their practical internet work to improve their online reputation.    He has amended the presentation for a wider audience.   This is not only important for those students, but all of us who have an online presence.