UPDATE: Readers of this blog can now get a 20% discount off the book by using the code ME1211 when ordering on the Routledge site. Magazine Editing is one of those books that I’ve used for years in my teaching. Unlike most books in the field, it has a healthy focus on the less glamorous aspects of running magazines, such
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There are two Cabinet Office consultations taking place at the moment around open data: one around data policy for the new Public Data Corporation (PDC), and another around the government’s policy around transparency and open data strategy. This should be of enormous interest to any media organisation – a key opportunity to influence the availability of information of public interest.
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Various commentators over the past year have made the observation that “Data is the new oil“. If that’s the case, journalists should be following the money. But they’re not. Instead it’s falling to the likes of Tony Hirst (an Open University academic), Dan Herbert (an Oxford Brookes academic) and Chris Taggart (a developer who used to be a magazine publisher)
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If you read the literature on journalism’s professional ideology – or just follow any argument about journalists-versus-the-rest-of-the-world – you’ll notice particular themes recurring. Like any profession, journalism separates itself from other fields of work through articulating how it is different. Reading Mark Deuze’s book Media Work recently I was struck by how a similar, parallel, ideology is increasingly articulated by bloggers.
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The following is cross-posted from a guest post I wrote for Wannabe Hacks. Objectivity is one of the key pillars of journalistic identity: it is one of the ways in which we identify ourselves as a profession. But for the past decade it has been subject to increasing criticism from those (and I include myself here) who suggest that sustaining
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A welcome window of clarity on the issue of whether bloggers can record public council meetings today: Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles has weighed in to say that public meetings should be open to bloggers and that they should “routinely allow online filming of public discussions as part of increasing their transparency” It’s an issue that I’ve been investigating for
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It’s been a good week for followers of that endangered beast objectivity. On Friday Glenn Greenwald reported on factual inaccuracies in Time’s Wikileaks article, and the ‘correction’ that was then posted (reproduced above). Greenwald writes: “The most they’re willing to do now is convert it into a “they-said/he-said” dispute. But what they won’t do — under any circumstances — is
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This week a new nail was driven into the coffin of the notion of journalistic objectivity. The culprit? The Washington Post’s leaked social media policy. The policy is aimed at preserving the appearance of objectivity rather than its actual existence. It focuses on what journalists are perceived to be, rather than what they actually do. And in doing so, it hits
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Following the tone set so succinctly by Glyn Moody, I thought I would add my own thoughts on what Sir Tim should say to the government when he bends their ear on transparency. Firstly, I would second everything that Glyn says. But I’m going to be cynical and strategic, and urge Sir Tim to emphasise the importance of open data
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Blogs and investigative journalism: publishing
Part four of this draft book chapter looks at how blogs have changed the publishing of journalism through its possibilities for transparency, potential permanence over time, limitless space, and digital distribution systems (part one is here; part two here; part three here) . I would welcome any corrections, extra information or comments. Publishing Traditionally, news has always been subject to
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online journalism, twitter • Tags: BAE, civil rights, comments, crowdsourcing, ethics, Firedoglake, flickr, Guardian, Habermas, Hurricane Katrina, interactivity, investigative journalism, online video, public sphere, RSS, Scooter trial, social networking, transparency, Trent Lott, twitter, Vaughan Smith, web 2.0, Wikileaks, wikis, youtube • Comment feed RSS 2.0 - Read this post