Weekly new and digital media 2

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/nov/12/local-papers-cautious-bbc-free-content

Local papers cautious as BBC courts them with free content

Offer from head of news comes in wake of home secretary’s criticism that corporation is ‘destroying’ local journalism

James Harding, the BBC’s director of news and current affairs, has looked to build bridges with beleaguered editors with the offer of free licence fee-funded content and the prospect of the corporation picking up the tab for local court reporting.

His speech at the Society of Editors conference on Tuesday followed the home secretary Theresa May’s accusation that the BBC was “destroying” local papers with the might of its online news operation

Largely through pilots and proposals at this stage, the BBC will look to ease the financial burden on local newspapers by sharing more of its content, as it did with video footage of this year’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

An early sign of this new partnership came with the BBC’s Price of Football survey last month, about the soaring cost of football tickets was shared in advance with other news organisations and used by more than 100 newspapers and websites.

Just over 100 local and regional titles have closed since the economic downturn in 2008, out of a total free and paid-for market of around 1,300.

Sales have been in long-term decline and were down by an average of 13.5% year on year in the first half of 2014..

In my opinion I feel that even if the BBC did provide local newspapers with content and provide some financial aid it would be inaffective in the long term as it would not change the fact that people are not reading traditional media and the funding from the BBC is certainly not going to be enough to keep newspapers running if it is relying on them. Even if the money went towards better content and journalism,  I feel that people have moved on and it is impossible to revive traditional newspapers. Even with the funds their content could not compete with the BBC's.

Weekly new and digital media story 1

Vine star Dapper Laughs is not laughing any more after ITV turn-off

Controversy over vlogger shows that online popularity is no guarantee that talent will flourish in the mainstream

ITV2 show Dapper Laughs: On the Pull had already attracted criticism – “the same old misogynistic shit for a new generation of teenage boys,”said one reviewer – before footage emerged last week of a stand-up gig in which he said a female audience member was “gagging for a rape”. ITV had previously stood by its man (“comedy is subjective,” it said) but a 60,000-strong online petition and Dapper’s “guide to rape” at the same gig (“go down the shops, get some rope, bit of duct tape, rape the bitch”) was no laughing matter.

• 60,000-strong online petition to get the show off the air

• O’Reilly’s fanbase of nearly 600,000 followers on Vine and 370,000 on Twitter generated a modest TV audience, ending with 262,000 viewers on 3 November.

• Media regulator Ofcom received 37 complaints from viewers that it was degrading to women and is considering whether to launch a formal investigation

• ITV recieved around 29 complaints

I think that this story again highlights the power of new and digital media as it was the online criticism on social networks such as twitter, as well as online petitions to get the show taken down that eventually made it happen. The video footage of his "guide to rape" recorded at one of his live gigs again shows the power of new and digital media as it was recorded citizen journalism that was posted online that was the final straw before ending the show. 

Therefore had it not been for new and digital media the show may not have been taken down as there would not be a place for people to express their anger and offence at the show, and the footage from his gig that got his show off the air would not have been filmed.

Web 2.0: Participation or Hegemony?

1) Research the Ian Tomlinson case. What would the traditional, hegemonic view of the police be in a case like this? How did new and digital media create a different story? What does the police officer's subsequent aquittal suggest about the power of new and digital media?

A traditional hegemonic view on the Ian Tomlinson case would be that the upper, ruling classes are using forces such as the police to oppress the lower classes. By doing this they consolidate their position at the top of the social hierarchy as all that challenge them are put down by forces such as the police and are subsequently too scared to voice their contrasting opinions, proven by the factb that the incident took place at  a G20 protest.

New and digital media played a massive role in the case as it was citizen journalism created by someone filming the incident on his phone that made it a headline news story. Had this video evidence not been submitted then the police officer could have easily made an excuse such as he felt threatened and got a way with it. This highlights the power of new and digital media in that it can now expose us to things that could have previously been covered up and unknown, but thanks to new digital media such as smartphones we can record footage and post it online anywhere.

The police officers acquittal however would follow a hegemonic view as the police officer got away without a prison sentence despite the video evidence against him, suggesting that similar ruling classes in the law helped him out because of their determination to keep the ruling classes ruling.

2) What does the author argue regarding whether hegemony is being challenged by Web 2.0? 

The author argues both points of view in terms of web 2.0's relation to hegemony. One one hand web 2.0 and user generated content such as blogs have freed us from the ruling classes as everyone now has a platform on the internet to share and voice their opinions on whatever they choose. With new media we are also able to expose injustices in society such as with the video footage in the Ian Tomlinson case

However despite this the other argument put forward is that despite the many opinions now available to us, many of them are amateurish on the internet. As well as this when people may point out that new celebrities are formed on the internet such as youtube stars, they are limited to fame within this area. They can only become truly famous once brought to people's attention by traditional media and major ruling institutions. 

3) In your opinion, does new and digital media reinforce dominant hegemonic views or give the audience a platform to challenge them?

In my opinion new and digital media has allowed us to challenge traditional hegemonic views as we are now given the ability to openly voice our opinion to the world without being controlled or scared by the ruling classes for doing so. But if we are abused by a ruling class for sharing our opinions, such as the Ian Tomlinson incident at the G20 protest, new and digital emdia has enabled us to expose this meaning it is almost impossible for the ruling classes to control the masses thanks to new media.

New and Digital Media Story Index

Facebook under fire from drag queens over 'real-name' rule

Minecraft studio Mojang bought by Microsoft for $2.5bn

iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus: 'Record breaking' four million units pre-ordered in 24 hours

Murdoch's Newscorp accuses Google of having "overwhelming power"

Pornhub launches record label 'Pornhub Records'

Does free speech give us the right to anonymously troll strangers?

James Murdoch attacks Google over piracy links

Spain moves to protect domestic media with new 'Google tax'

Online voting should be made mandatory, says Martha Lane Fox

new and digital media story

Online voting should be made mandatory, says Martha Lane Fox

Government’s former digital champion also says teenagers should be given right to erase online past when they reach 18

The government’s former digital champion, Martha Lane Fox, has said online voting should be made mandatory and teenagers given the right to erase their online past when they reach 18.

The lastminute.com founder said new technology should be used to bring young people into the political arena after just under two-thirds of the population voted in the 2010 general election.

“I recoil when I hear the political disenchantment statistics reeled out, no-one votes [and] political disenchantment which is of course true and right. But the young people I meet particularly are incredibly political with a big capital P and just don’t want to engage in the normal channels,” Fox told the Radio Festival in Salford on Monday.

“I would argue immediately that voting should be mandatory and it should be online. Of course we can cover for all the fraud and I don’t think it makes the procedure any less robust, in fact quite the opposite.

I agree that if voting was made able online a lot more people would vote due to the easy accessibility to the internet. However I don't think voting should be made mandatory for teenagers as some teenagers may not feel like they have good enough knowledge of politics to be able to vote and may lead to voting for the sake of it.

Weekly new and digital media story 2

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/nov/12/nuj-calls-for-inquiry-into-future-of-local-newspapers

NUJ calls for inquiry into future of local newspapers

Union raises issue with government amid concern over ability of local press to cover general election

The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) has written to the culture and digital economy minister, Ed Vaizey, calling for an inquiry into the future of local newspapers amid concern over their ability to cover the general election.

In a letter to the minister, Michelle Stanistreet, the NUJ’s general secretary, wrote: “With the general election looming, there is genuine concern that many newspapers no longer have the capacity to provide the coverage necessary in order to inform and enthuse communities about local and national politics and issues of importance in their areas.”

She said: “We need newspapers to ensure democratic scrutiny, accountability and to encourage informed and active citizenship. My concern is that we are in danger of reaching a tipping point where local journalism will not be able to fulfil this role. Reporters say they are too busy to cover council meetings and courts, [which] should be bread and butter functions of any local paper. Major newspapers such as the Liverpool Echo, Manchester Evening News and the Express & Star no longer employ staff lobby correspondents.”

Stanistreet told the meeting that the past week had seen 25 jobs cut at the Oxford Mail, around 8 jobs cut at Newsquest titles in Blackburn, 45 jobs lost following Johnston Press’s merger of the Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday and Edinburgh Evening News, and cuts to staff photographers across Johnston Press. These cuts have come after years of steady job losses across the industry.

This article shows how newspapers are becoming concerned with their ability to continue to report news, to an extent that they fear being unable to report the upcoming elections due to a lack of journalists willing to write for newspapers on low pay and people preferring to get their news online.

Weekly new and digital media story 1

http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/2014/nov/07/newspapers-not-dying-buzzfeed-new-york-times

Let’s get over the whole 'newspapers are dying' thing

Extract: So let’s get over the whole “newspapers are dying” thing. They’re certainly moving in lots of creative new directions (and eventually they may ascend out of physical world altogether - holograms, maybe?), but they’re definitely not going gently into that good night.

What’s more, all sorts of industries (including mine in particular – software) are looking at subscription-based business models for guidance and inspiration. Why? Because we’re in the midst of a broad shift from a manufacturing economy where companies sell products to strangers in isolated transactions, to a subscription-based economy where companies engage in ongoing relationships with their consumers. And newspapers have been at it this for a very long time.

Overall the article argues that although newspapers may lose their physical form we are coming into a new age where news can make a successful transition into being read through new and digital media and newspapers are certainly not "dying" because of it, in fact more and more people are reading the news and new companies are benefiting as a result. As long as their is quality journalism then quality news will still be provided online and people will continue to read it, newspapers simply need to adapt to the evolutions of news to be able to flourish in it and not be left behind.

new and digital media story

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/oct/31/spain-newspaper-google-tax

Spain moves to protect domestic media with new 'Google tax'

Newspapers in Spain will now be able to demand a monthly fee from the search engine before it can list them on Google News

The Spanish government has successfully passed a new copyright law which imposes fees for online content aggregators such as Google News, in an effort to protect its print media industry.

The new intellectual property law, known popularly as the “Google Tax” or by its initials LPI, requires services which post links and excerpts of news articles to pay a fee to the organisation representing Spanish newspapers, the Association of Editors of Spanish Dailies (known by its Spanish-language abbreviation AEDE). Failure to pay up can lead to a fine of up to €600,000.

News Values

Immediacy:

Social networking sites now allow us to find out the news instantly, this may be as you are following news accounts such as BBC or the people you are following are tweeting about these immediate events and you can then look further into this. So Twitter for e.g. lets you find out news straight away as a tweet gets sent in seconds. This means that people no longer have to wait for a newspaper to be released to find out a breaking story.

Familiarity:

New and Digital media allows us to interact with each other and discuss our views which may as a result leave us more familiar with certain stories and opinions.

Amplitude:

Due to globalisation and the reach the Internet provides we are now more frequently exposed to international events from sources such as twitter etc. and despite the size of the event we will still gain some form of information about it whereas before without new and digital media we would not.

Frequency:

If an even occurs frequently in contrast to a news story that is very rare, it is much less likely to be aired if it happens regularly as it is not new news, and people are more interested in new stories.

Unambiguity:

Articles online and blogs can often expose flaws in news stories. Often many conspiracy theories for example come from online bloggers spreading their views on an incident. If an event is clear it may also be more likely to be aired as it can be properly reported on the news

Predictability:
If an event is predictable then it is much less interesting for viewers and news institutions are likely not going to chose a main news story that everyone is expecting.

Surprise:

New and digital media allows us to instantly become notified of surprise news stories such as unexpected deaths. These surprise stories are also likely to quickly become the number one news story when it is first know due to the breaking nature of it and people like to know breaking news.

Continuity:

If a story has already been covered by the news multiple times, if not a massive story like 9/11 for example, it is not going to be covered regularly as new stories will come out and people will become disinterested if the same story is constantly reported.

Elite nations and people:

If an elite nation like the USA or UK have some kind of minor incident such as a trains crash, it is much more likely to be reported as opposed to if the same event in a smaller less powerful country. An incident or scandal with an A list celebrity or Politician is likely to become news as they are elite people, compared to it probably not even making the news if it is a normal person.

Negativity:

Bad news generally tends to gain more attention in the news that good news as it interests and grabs people's attention more if a negative story is reported. Very rarely do we see charitable actions reported on the news but crime is a regular feature.

Balance: 

A story may be pushed up in importance if it counter balances another story that has already been reported to avoid institutions being accused of bias in certain issues. For example a human survival story may be aired to balance a death story.

Citizen Journalism

1) What is meant by the term ‘citizen journalist’?

Citizen journalism is the gathering, writing, editing, production and distribution of news and information by people not trained as professional journalists.

Citizen journalists are non-professionals who collect, disseminate and analyze news on blogs, wikis and sharing websites using tablets, laptops, cell phones, digital cameras and other mobile and wireless technologies. 

Citizen journalism is the term used to describe people that have used primary content to bring some form of justice or to give their opinion on something. They have obtained the content through themselves, usually in the form of images, videos and written content.

2) What was one of the first examples of news being generated by ‘ordinary people’?

The unknown person that filmed Rodney King getting beaten by police officers. This was user generated content (primary content) that was used to bring justice to him, however as it was filmed by an ordinary person it becomes citizen journalism. 

3) List some of the formats for participation that are now offered by news organisations.

- Photos 

- Twitter 

- Blogs

- Social Media

4) What is one of the main differences between professionally shot footage and that taken 

first-hand (UGC)?

First hand footage is footage from people that are actually there when something is happening so you get to see it in real life with more emotion as you know it is real. With professional they make time to get there and may not be in time for the disaster that has happened for e.g. Another difference is the quality which is obvious but some people may see poor quality as more real as it is first hand and shows they are not being bias and are actually there. 

UGC footage - This footage gives us the first hand look at what is happening, the feeling of a hand held camera, the shaking of the footage and the slightly grainy footage puts the audience in the point of view of the person filming. 

5) What is a gatekeeper?

A gate keeper is someone that filters the content that is shown on TV, they go through content that people have sent in and they see what may be useful and what isn't. Gatekeepers are needed as a lot of the time people send in information that is unnecessary, for example  a BBC spokes person said that a lot of the images sent in were of peoples kittens.  

6)How has the role of a gatekeeper changed?

Due to online and blogs the minority now get to have a say in the news with large audiences accessing it to see what their views are. Not just broadcast news anymore, also internet.