RSS Feeds and Media Moguls

The media moguls we've been discussing in class looked for a while as though they would monopolize the news, ever limiting our choices. Then along came new technologies like the Internet and mobiles that could take and transmit photos. My RSS feed from Goggle News this morning just delivered a Bloomberg News article to my desktop the way newspapers used to be delivered to my door. Bloomberg started out as a financial news service, providing the latest market information electronically. Now it provides solid background stories like this one on Gaza Tunnels to Egypt for Viagra, IPods to Foil Israel Blockade, an article well worth reading. When Michael Bloomberg, now mayor of New York City, started his company, traditional journalism thought he was crazy. He used word like "information" instead of "news" and pioneered a new "delivery system." His company now advertises: superior communication platform, global markets single platform, financial data on demand, tomorrow's headlines today, customer support 24/7 --- all revolutionary concepts when Bloomberg (the company) started in 1981. For more on Bloomberg.

The World is Flat -- and All News Local

The downside of globalism and Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat can be seen in the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scandal we discussed in class the first day back after vacation. Initially, the story looked like U.S. news as investors in New York, Minnesota and Florida saw their fortunes evaporate. But yesterday the IHT headlined Vast Wall Street fraud knew no boundaries. The ripples extend right here to Abu Dhabi. The article notes that the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, which at one point had invested about $400 million through Madoff, "wound up in the same boat as Jewish charities in New York: caught in the collapse of Bernie Madoff." So when you read the news, don't think "international," think how is this story "local," how does it affect me here.

What's in a Shoe?

I bet nobody reading this blog missed seeing clips of the Iraqi reporter throwing his shoes at President Bush, but how many viewers and readers outside the Middle East knew just how great the insult was? You could do a good content-analysis research paper counting how many western news organizations had done their cultural homework. Reuters demonstrated it had in an almost congratulatory report on the reporter's choice of "the Middle East's tastiest insults." The New York Times today focuses on the tumult the shoes caused in the Iraqi Parliament as the 29-year-old reporter languished in jail, beaten and charged with "offending the head of a foreign state." But it's no crime on the Internet. Toss some shoes yourself in a flash game that originated in Norway. What do you think should be done with the Iraqi journalist who did it for real?

Risky Business

The Committee to Protect Journalists, which defends journalists worldwide, just released its 2008 prison census. This year 125 journalists are jailed, down two from last year, but for the first time online journalists represent the biggest category. Nearly half are bloggers, Web-based reporters or online editors. Journalists are imprisoned in 29 countries, the top five being China, Cuba, Burma, Eritrea and Uzbekistan. The prison census is more than numbers. It tells the stories of the people who have been arrested for being journalists.

For News Junkies NOT On Vacation

U.S. Plans to Sign Nuclear Pact With U.A.E. is the headline on the WSJ News Alert that arrived in my Goggle Mail less than 15 minutes ago. This will be the first nuclear-cooperation agreement the U.S. has signed in the Middle East. Critics worry it will fuel nuclear proliferation in the region and also because the U.A.E.'s largest trading partner is Iran. Writes the Journal reporter: The U.A.E. has served in the past as a transshipment point for technology with military applications headed to Iran. Stay turned to your various news sources to see how this story develops.

Who Owns the News?

Just when I was ready to put up an "On Vacation" sign until the end of the school holiday, Economist. com posted an article from its print edition about how Rupert Murdoch may become Arthur Sulzberger Jr.'s "puppet master" if things get any worse at The New York Tmes. The names probably don't mean much to you now, but they will after we examine the impact media ownership has on news delivered around the world. Media moguls are a fascinating crowd, often bigger-than-life figures like Murdoch, Richard Branson and Oprah Winfrey, but new technology has created a whole new cast of characters and a new definition of what's news. We'll take a look at some media moguls, old and new, after break.

Citizen Journalists of the World

A Harvard University Medical School professor had never heard of "citizen journalists," but Wednesday he became one when he chanced to be visiting Mumbai. From a terrace in south Mumbai, he used his Twitter feed to describe the gunfire and uploaded photos to his blog. "I felt I had a responsibility to share my view with the outside world," he told the New York Times in an email of course. Twitter, blogs, websites, photo-sharing sites, text messages and cellphones for voice and image are the new tools of the new journalists -- just plain folks who happen to be on the scene. As discussed in class Sunday, technology has added a new dimension to news coverage. The Times article quotes Sree Sreenivasan, a new media expert at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism: "A little bit of information is better than no information at all."

Death Hung Over Mumbai

"Death hung over Mumbai on Saturday" is the one-sentence lead of a "wrap-up" story in The New York Times on my desktop this morning. Story was posted yesterday. The last few days we've seen stories reported almost minute by minute by cellphone and Blackberry, by "citizen journalists," professional journalists and the victims themselves. Those stories conveyed the horror and the chaos, but here traditional journalism -- old media, if you will, even though we are reading the story online -- helps us try to make sense of it all.

Mumbai Attacked By Sea

India's 9/11 has dominated all news channels since late Wednesday when young men in jeans and t-shirts and AK-47 assault rifles began terrorizing Mumbai. Now that the fires have been put out, the last gunmen killed or apprehended and bodies counted, the question remains: Why Mumbai? Aljazeera points out that the terrorists reached the urban peninsula by boat -- "the first time that the sea route was exploisted for access" -- and suggests that the government's total reliance on technological intelligence-gathering may be why Indian intelligence agencies didn't anticipate an attack of this size and incredible organization. It is clear that intelligence officials across the world will have to develop better coordination to battle against such attacks, says the Aljazeera report, adding that the root causes of such assaults must be addressed. What message did the gunmen deliver?

Local News

Local news in a course about international news criticism? With the Internet, nothing is local. Everything is accessible everywhere. Well, almost. Internet social networks have put a new spin on what's news and who reports it. Just consider Facebook to which some of you belong. I typed in "Abu Dhabi" to search for groups and came up with over 500 possibilities, including commercial establishments, alumni organizations and sports and music fan clubs. I stopped browsing on Screen 52 with the Abu Dhabi Mar Dragon Boat Team. No, I didn't join any groups, but I can see how useful they could be for journalists or researchers wanting to get a feel for what goes on here or looking for sources. In fact, I used Face Book earlier this fall in interviews for my conference paper on the virtual community of the Coptic diaspora.

There's a ZU-related global group on Facebook, by the way: I was in Abu Dhabi with GlobCom 2008 where memories and photos are being shared.

Mumbai

Access this article from The Wall Street Journal, one of the few "old media" companies that has a model for making money online. You have to be a paid subscriber to read online. As a subscriber, I can email stories to people for only a brief period of access. Looks as though I can share with you WSJ. Are you surprised that India has the largest Muslim population after Indonesia and Pakistan? Good background in this piece and an opportunity for you to see how yet another news organization covers international news. This story has all sorts of local ramifications. Which ones come to your mind?

Why Where Matters, Part II

The Somalian pirate story we have been following all semester gets more global each day. Yet at the same time closer to home. A Reuters news analysis in the IHT yesterday says the surge in piracy raises concern about terrorism in the sea lanes, which are even more vulnerable than air transport. Terrorists could raise money by holding ships for ransom or turn one into a floating bomb to send into a port just like in the pirate movies. "And an attack aimed at shutting down a major port like Singapore or disrupting a key shipping lane like the Strait of Hormuz, though which as much as 40 percent of the world's traded oil passes, could do real economic damage," the writer suggests. I suspect you know where the Strait of Hormuz is. Not so sure the same could be said of your peers in the U.S. In reading international news, you don't have to have an atlas at hand, but do goggle to brush up on your geography to understand the significance of what's happening.

Reinventing The Guardian

Mark Potter, Guardian Creative Director,on newspaper and website redesigns

Readers Have Their Say

This week we're exploring the Guardian website, which underwent a massive redesign in February, generating plenty of discussion among designers -- and readers. When Emily Bell, director of digital content for Guardian News and Media, blogged news of the transformation, 362 readers zapped back just what they thought. One reader raised the issue of navigability vrs eye-catching design. In a print edition, readers "navigate" by turning pages. Not so simple on the web. So how do we go directly to the football news was the first comment, which generated an extensive exchange among readers and Ms Bell. Overall, the comments were positive, but there's always someone who likes it the old way. Grumbled one reader: "Why on earth does the Guardian do this every now & then? We just get use to the site & then--out of the blue -- it is changed causing much chaos." How easy do you find navigating the site?

Hassan Fattah Talks to Columbia J-school Students

Hear what Hassan Fattah, former New York Times Middle East correspondent and now deputy editor of The National, had to say to students at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York City. Hassan Fattah and I received master's degrees from the school. The international news criticism class will be at The National today.

Indian Navy 2; Pirates O

This just in (63 minutes ago) on the NYTimes website: Indian Navy Sinks Pirate Ships. One of my friends Mark McDonald is credited with reporting from Hong Kong where he works as an editor for the IHT, so I will email him to see how he is covering the story from there and report back. I don't know how fast other news organizations are posting on this story, but you might check that on on your RSS feeds. Note that it isn't the UN, NATO, the US or French commandos reacting. It's India with a financial rather than geopolitical stake. Is this exciting or what?

Why Where Matters

News doesn't just happen out there somewhere. It happens somewhere on this globe of ours. In our increasingly interconnected world, where it happens makes a difference to how it will affect us right here in Abu Dhabi. When I called your attention in class early this semester to the pirates off the Somalian coast, the story seemed far distant. With the seizure of the Saudi oil tanker this week -- the world's biggest ship hijacking, according to the Gulf News-- the story just got closer. And any Louis Vuitton fans among my dear readers may find the price of their next handbag going up if cargo ships start avoiding the Suez Canal and going by way of the Cape of Good Hope. Read today's front page story headlined "Pirates spark global alarm" in both online and print editions. Check out the print edition to see the excellent use of a locator map and ship diagram on p. 14. The story is now important regionally as well as internationally.

Video: RSS in Plain English

First Italian Type

Just when I was thinking about posting an "on vacation" sign here until after Tuesday's mid-term, I bumped into a blog that reminded me of the Gutenberg Revolution in communication. The German didn't "invent" the printing press or ink or printing on paper or even movable type, which had already been used in China and Korea. His genius was in putting it all together into a system that worked. A goldsmith, he figured out how to cast little letters out of metal (a combination of lead, tin and antimony still used today) and then move them around in a type tray to form words, reusing them after each print job.

That was only the beginning of the revolution. Printers in Venice, Italy, soon established a vibrant and -- for the times--international center of book production. As discussed in class, a fellow named Aldus came up with the idea of making smaller books and a new "typeface," lighter and thinner than the bold and heavy "roman" then in use. It allowed him to get more words on the page and make books small enough to carry around and read anywhere.

The blog I just discovered is called I Love Typography . As I nosed around the blog, I found an old posting about the history of type terminology, which included this little notation about the first Italic type:

And, as we're on the topic of dramatic changes, during this period we see the very first italic type in 1501. They were first created, not as an accompaniment to the roman but as a standalone typeface designed for small format or pocket books where space demanded a more condense type

We thank you Aldus Pius Manutius and so do book publishers everywhere.

Where in the world.....

Now that the U.S. Presidential Election, with all of its global implications, is out of the way, where is the focus of international news going to move? The economic crisis is still with us, but that's a much tougher story to convey because it has more numbers than narratives. As you surf sites for international news, see how the media is telling the economic story in ways to connect with readers/viewers around the world. Let us know if you find anything that helps you make sense of it all.

Back to "Desperate Housewives" re-runs?

Compelling narratives are what pull readers and viewers into any news story, international and nation. As The Wall Street Journal points out in an online item just in, the U.S. Presidential Election created "election junkies" because it offered so many great stories. So here's a perfect example of the Libertarian Press System at work: a press free from government controls offering content that helps find truth, inform, interpret -- and entertain.

Excerpt from Journal article:

The end of the most-followed presidential campaign in recent years will leave many Americans feeling lost, even if their candidate won. The 2008 race provided drama and suspense to a nation hooked on reality television, mystery novels and Hollywood epics.

Arin N. Reeves, a Chicago-based diversity consultant, says she lost hours of sleep to late-night cravings for new campaign developments. For her, the vice-presidential picks were among the many suspenseful episodes -- with the emergence of Gov. Sarah Palin deliciously surprising. "Week after week after week the story just kept getting better," she says.

Seldom in American history has a presidential campaign offered such compelling narratives: The rise and fall of former first lady Sen. Hillary Clinton. The come-from-behind primary performance of war-hero Sen. John McCain. The emergence of Barack Obama, the biracial Harvard Law star raised by a single mother. The moose-slaying Sarah Palin, who proudly embraced her unwed pregnant teenager. The father, Sen. Joe Biden, who raised his young sons alone following the death of his wife and daughter in a car accident.

On the morning after the election, however, it's as if "The Sopranos," "American Idol" and "Desperate Housewives" all ended on the same night.

"Flooded With News...No Information"

That's what Columbia Journalism Review says is going on in coverage of battles between Pakistan's army and tribal insurgents in that wild, wild west of northwestern Pakistan.

...we are flooded with news but get no information. When all that's on hand are official sources, and when those sources are notoriously unreliable, it's hard to know what to believe. It doesn't mean these things didn't happen, just that we can't be sure they happened the way the government describes it, writes Joshua Foust, a defense consultant and a blogger on Central Asia and the Caucasus.

Don't believe everything you read if the only sources are "senior government officials," he cautions. What's needed in balanced reporting by journalists independently confirming casualty reports without becoming casualties themselves. In such a violent part of the world, verifiable stories are hard to come by.

Columbia Journalism Review, established at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1961, considers itself "both a watchdog and a friend of the press in all its forms" with the mission "to encourage and stimulate excellence in journalism in the service of a free society."

Economist endorses a Socialist?

I came across this blog item when adding RSS feeds to my Google Reader (more on this in a subsequent post). Given the high global interest in Tuesday's election, I wanted to share how a blogger for The Nation, America's oldest weekly and self-described "flagship of the left and now most widely journal of opinion," reacted to the Obama endorsement by the British weekly he calls "the journal of monied elites." Whether left or right, both The Nation and The Economist are well-respected magazines (and websites!) among readers who want an inside track to what's going on in the world.

D planet needz u

When I logged on to my Yahoo account this morning, I found a message from the Sierra Club, an international environmental non-profit, inviting me to go to txtoutthevote.com to have free text messages sent to friends, reminding them to vote Tuesday in the U.S. presidential election.

New research shows that texting is a particularly good way of reaching the young. Image how "txting" could be used in international campaigns for causes or products. Of course it doesn't do much for the English language.

"...perfect representative of the emirate"

One reason to follow international news is to see what the rest of the world thinks about you. And not just out of curiosity. What the world thinks affects investment, trade, tourism and a nation's influence in the global arena.

So what's the world think about Abu Dhabi? We had a glimpse this week in an IHT business article headlined (in the print edition) "With little bluster, Abu Dhabi takes the stage." Reporter Landon Thomas Jr. says Abu Dhabi "is looking for attention --just not the kind of flash-and-dash that Dubai is known for." The reporter suggests that "the suave aplomb" of Khaldoon al-Mubarak, the 32-year-old director of Mubadala, Abu Dhabi's development fund, makes him "the perfect representative of the emirate."

Dubai = flash-and-dash? Abu Dhabi = suave aplomb?

Based on what you see and read in the international media, what do you think the image of Abu Dhabi is?

And Infomercial Winner Is.....

The A+ offered in the last post goes to Athra and Sara Saleh, who didn't waste any time after class in finding Obama's 30-minute infomercial on YouTube. And the informercial got a big A+ from American viewers. The New York Times called it "a smashing ratings succcess." It was even more popular than the last game of this month's World Series (baseball, America's national sport) and last year's American Idol finale!

Leslie Moonves, CBS chairman and the man who brought reality shows to TV, said, "I was shocked by the number Obama was able to draw. It's just a stunning number."

Sample the informercial on YouTube. What images do you think cut across cultures?

PS:
Athra and Sara Salem each will be awarded an A+.

If a picture is worth 1000 words......

....then what is a 30-minute campaign "spot" worth? Maybe we won't know until after the U.S. election results are in next Tuesday. But Obama just made television commercial history by launching an unprecedented infomercial running 30 minutes. Goodbye 30-second sound bite! He will be running three different 30-minute commercials each costing a cool US$1 million. Lots of Internet press on this, including a World News report from ChannelNewsAsia, a MediaCorp News operation.

First class member to post a link to viewing the commercial online, gets a big A+. Share your findings under comments for this post.

Widening the Community of Knowledge

Earlier in the semester we talked about how Gutenberg and his movable-type printing press literally unchained the book, giving more people access to information. Before the Gutenberg Revolution, the only books common folk saw were the huge, hand-copied Bibles chained to church pulpits though who could have spirited one away? In less than a century, Venetian printers had shrunk the book almost to pocket size. Soon books of all kinds were being carried everywhere.

And it happened again today. IHT headline: "Google reaches 'historic' deal to settle copyright lawsuits." Story says the deal will "allow readers to search, buy and read millions of books online and accelerate the shift of the printed word onto the Internet." The Christian Science Monitor, a small but well-respected newspaper, just announced it is going all digital in April. The move to Internet-only will allow it to cut costs without cutting its eight foreign bureaus.

Yes, My Good Lady, What News May I Serve You Today?

It occurred to me that by starting this blog, I have become your news butler, serving up tasty little tidbits of news to please you. That’s just what Nicholas Negroponte predicted would happen, but he was thinking of a robot, not a professor. “Don’t squirt more bits at me,” said the M.I.T. computer scientist and Internet visionary way back in the 90s. You gobble up millions of bits every day, by the way. Bits are the basic unit of information in this digital age.

Negroponte could already see that we would all soon be overwhelmed by the information coming at us through the Internet. What he wanted was not more bandwidth but “intelligence in the network and in my receiver to filter and extract relevant information.” That’s where the news butler or “interface agent” would come in. “Image a future where your interface agent can read every newspaper and catch every broadcast on the planet, and then, from this, construct a personalized summary.”

Writing inWired magazine, he contended that we really don’t want more “info grazing” and “channel surfing.” We want help, help in making sense of it all. Maybe he’s not talking about a news butler but a blogger.

PS: Squirt me some more bits.

I WANT YOU!!!!

Last week the U.S. Embassy came to class to talk about political cartoons (see earlier post). Naturally the presentation included the famous poster of a bearded Uncle Sam with the message I Want You for the U.S. Army . The poster such a hit in WWI that popular demand brought it back in WWII. Its creator James Montgomery Flagg (1877-1960) claimed it was “the most famous political poster in the world” and he may have been right. But the image originated not as a poster but as a magazine cover. He drew it for Leslie’s Weekly in 1916, which featured Uncle Sam asking “What Are You Doing for Preparedness?” Full Story

The image just inspired the September 27-October 3 Economist cover, which featured a bald Secretary of Treasury Paulson in Uncle Sam clothing pointing out of the frame with this entreaty: “I Want Your Money.” Images in the media are powerful. Why do you think Flagg’s Uncle Sam has been so much copied for over a century?

Brain on Blog/Blog on the Brain

I'm hanging out in the office long after everyone else has departed for the weekend, because I am seduced by a broader, faster bandwidth than I have at home. But even here it was something of a Zen exercise to connect to Your Brain on Blog, the podcast that The Atlantic packaged with Andrew Sullivan's "Why I Blog" piece from the November issue. The promo promised two guys -- Sullivan and an Atlantic associate editor who blogs the presidential campaign-- reflecting on "the narcotic appeal of blogging and the occupational hazards of thinking quickly." Made me wonder if bloggers have time to think at all. Where's the line between blogging and babbling?

Calling All Fashionistas

We all know that fashion makes international news. Just look at the photo spreads generated by the catwalks of Paris, New York and Milan. But one of the biggest political stories of the last 24 hours is about how much the Republican Party paid for Sarah Palin's new wardrobe. The New York Times reports this morning on its website that the Republican National Committee dropped about US$150,000 at luxury stores like Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus. The editor in chief of Glamour says she could have done it for lots less. Expect more political fallout.

Additional fashion coverage at politico.com , an American political journalism organization that usually leaves such slide shows to Glamour and Vogue.

Fashion note: Will the Carrie Bradshaw crowd flock to Cole Haan boots even if the ladies vote for Obama? Check out the prices -- around US$600 -- online at Zappo's. Wonder what Joe the Plumber would say if he had to foot just the boot bill.

The Public Pulse

I can't open up my desktop these days without getting the results of yet another political poll. I just read on Yahoo!News that polls indicate Sarah Palin is a drag on John McCain's ticket, big time. Public opinion seems to be shooting up that Palin is unqualified to serve as president. Was it the Saturday Night Live rap that did her in? Please note: if it weren't for the Wonderful Web World, I wouldn't have seen the Saturday Night Live segment here in Abu Dhabi. And I'm getting the poll results not from a traditional news source like The New York Times but from The Yahoo!Newsroom with the tag "Blog of the #1 News Site." Can international news junkies trust the polls is another question. Maybe Saturday Night Live has a better finger on the public pulse.

Why Blog?

Me? I want to see if all this talk about collaborative learning might lead to perking up the classroom. Maybe there's something to it. If I hadn't checked my Facebook, I wouldn't have known about Andrew Sullivan's Why I Blog in the November Atlantic. New friend Phillip Blanchard, who joined The National here in Abu Dhabi a few months back, had posted a comment about the article on his wall: "Psst. If anyone ever cared, Andrew, they don't anymore." I clicked on the link Phil had provided and added the piece to the class readings. Sullivan contends blogging is evolving into a literary form, a postmodern idiom, an unprecedented interaction between writer and reader. Hmmm. What's more, he says blogging "heralds a golden era for journalism." So who's right? Phil or Andrew?

What Would Happen if Newspapers Divorce AP?

Now here’s an essay exam question if ever I tripped over one. But maybe Dr. J’s students in international news criticism were snoozing – it was after lunch -- when we discussed the 1846 founding of the Associated Press cooperative wire service and the impact of the 19th century telegraph on newsgathering.

Rick Edmonds, Poynter media business analyst, posted the divorce question on PoynterOnline after the Chicago Tribune and Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch gave AP notice last week. He asked AP Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll what she thought newspapers would miss most. Her reply: sports coverage and AP’s “fast, steady diet of multimedia news for the newspaper’s Web site.” What has Morse wrought? Telegraph to multimedia!

Techology aside, what about the international news supplied by news editors and correspondents in more than 90 AP bureaus around the world? Will newpaper readers miss that?

Sampling Political Cartoons

Here in Abu Dhabi, we're having a guest speaker from the U.S. embassy in class tomorrow. This being a presidential election year, we're going to hear about how the electoral system works (or doesn't) and what role political cartoons play. I just ran across a great source for browsing how political cartoonists see our world. Go here and scroll down to see what they make of Colin Powell's Obama endorsement.

Welcome to My Wonderful Web World

The center of my universe is Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, but that's just the starting point of this blog. From here I hope to take my students at Zayed University on a high-speed adventure in my wonderful web world -- or as high speed as our much-too-popular bandwidth allows. Let the journey begin!