Monthly Archives: October 2008
Who should enjoy journalistic privilege?
The question of who should enjoy journalistic privilege - the legal right to protect sources - these days is not an easy one to answer given that it's no longer simple to define who is and who is not a journalist. A related question is who should be given access to cover court proceedings and political conferences given that only so many journalists can be accommodated in a courtroom or catered for at a news or political conference. Clay Shirky provides some food for thought on privilege and the definition of a journalist.
Posted in Journalism Tagged clay shirky, definition of journalist, Journalism, law, privilege 1 Comment
The email ‘pebble pile’ effect
A nice observation about email expectations from Merlin Mann, a software usability expert quoted in Clay Shirky's Here Comes Everybody: Email is such a funny thing. People hand you these single little messages that are no heavier than a river pebble. But it doesn't take long until you have acquired a pile of pebbles that's taller than you and heavier than you could ever hope to move, even if you wanted to do it over a few dozen trips.
Country Calendar still hits the mark
Country Calendar must be one of the few New Zealand media institutions that truly count as 'iconic'. The weekly programme, which casts light on NZ farming, hasn't looked back since its launch in 1966 and the current theme tune must be one of the most readily identifiable sounds for any Kiwi. This clip gives a glimpse of what the programme used to look, and sound, like.
UK news group recruits 1,000 citizen journalists
Trinity Mirror's Teesside Evening Gazette is recruiting 1,000 citizen journalists over the next 12 months to boost content on its network of hyperlocal news sites, according to journalism.co.uk: The postcode-based community websites, which were rolled out from January last year as 'cousins' to the paper's Gazette Live website, feature content written and posted directly by a combination of non-journalists and the Gazette's editorial team.
Journalistic privilege – a NZ postscript