Media news digest archive for November 2004

Spy cams & cash challenge ethics (November 30)
The Sofia Echo says that the recent signing of a code of ethics by Bulgarian media has not necessarily quarantined journalists from challenging situations. The story says that, in the last week, one journo has been gaoled for using a surveillance camera in a duty free store, while others found themselves being offered envelopes containing 2000 Euro while covering a political delegation to Hungary. Click here for the report.

Shifting goal posts in media market (November 28)
From the Age newspaper: “A word of warning to Australia's media barons: you may win the political battle to relax the existing cross and foreign ownership laws, but the competition watchdog is considering whether to change the rules of engagement.” This feature (pictured right) provides a useful overview of the current cross-media state of play.

A sign for the times (November 28)
Natalia Dmitruk, a sign language presenter on Kiev television, last Thursday suddenly broke away from the usual pro-government script mid-broadcast and said she was no longer prepared to lie. Her gesture was followed by other employees, who eventually forced a change of policy at two networks. Both are now broadcasting the Ukraine post-election protests. See this story from the Globe and Mail in Canada.

Free judiciary & media are crucial (November 28)
From the Daily Times in Pakistan: “A free media and an independent judiciary should never be accountable to politicians because both serve as potent counter-forces to corruption in private and public sectors, said Jeremy Pope, the co-director of Tiri Network, an anti-corruption institute set up by a former Transparency International executive, on Friday.” Click here for the story.

Anti-vulgarity or anti-media? (November 26)
Big News Network reports Venezuela has passed a law forbidding television and radio broadcasting material that has vulgar language, violence of sex from 7.00am to 7.00pm. “President Hugo Chavez says the law protects children from being exposed to adult themes; but his critics say the leftist leader is just trying to silence the opposition and wrest control of the media. Human rights groups are concerned Chavez could use the vague lettering of the law to impose his personal will on TV outlets,” the report says.

Wurld Media tries new p2p model (November 26)
Software developer Wurld Media has convinced Sony, Universal and Warner to join in an online commercial music peer-to-peer network. According to the story in PC Pro, “The network, to be known Peer Impact, is a closed service that allows people to share music tracks. When a track is transferred, the downloader is billed for the music as with a familiar downloads service such as iTunes.” However the writer warns that, given some of the risks involved with p2p networks (such as poor quality tracks, inaccurate indexing and viruses) customers may be difficult to convince of the merits of the system. Click here for the story.

Measurements create new web order (November 25)
According to Fairfax Digital, new measurement criteria for Australian websites has upset the established order of things, with ninemsn the winner and News Ltd the loser. The story says, in part: “Preliminary figures for September put news.ninemsn.com.au at 1.7 million unique browsers – the new term for visitors – followed by Fairfax's smh.com.au and theage.com.au at 1.5 million and 1.1 million respectively, with news.com.au at 930,000.”

Net ads influence trad media (November 24)
Business Week online has produced a wide ranging report on the influence of internet advertising. On the subject of accountability, it says, “The importance of Internet advertising extends far beyond the numbers. Now that advertisers have their hands on a tool that measures an ad's effectiveness, they're starting to press other media for similar accountability.” Click here for the story.

China wants partnerships (November 23)
From the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation: “China announced Thursday that it will allow foreign companies to form joint ventures or strike co-production deals with domestic TV production companies, allowing international media greater access to the world's largest market.” Click here for the story.

Internet time share rises (November 18)
DM Europe.com claims the amount of time people spend using internet, as a total share of their media consumption hours, has risen. “The study places the internet above both magazines (eight per cent) and newspapers (11 per cent) in terms of media consumption, and not far behind radio (30 per cent). TV continues to represent the largest share of people's media time at 33 per cent but over a third (35 per cent) of those online watch less TV as a result of using the internet. Among the increasing number of European internet consumers, 42 per cent are online every single day and one in ten spend at least 25 hours a week surfing the web,” the report says.

UN demands end to hate media (November 18)
The BBC reports the United Nations has demanded the government of the troubled Ivory Coast stops using the media to incite violence. The report says, in part, “United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan demanded what he called 'hate media' be stopped immediately. Monday's UN Security Council decision to impose sanctions on Ivory Coast was even more explicit. It demanded 'that the Ivorian authorities stop all radio and television broadcasting hatred, intolerance and violence'. It also announced that anyone 'who incites publicly hatred and violence' will have their bank accounts frozen and will be stopped from leaving the country.”

Deadly occupation (November 16)
The International Federation of Journalists says media employees are having a bad year, with over 100 killed so far. According to the organization, “Three killings of journalists in separate instances on three continents has brought the death toll of media employees in 2004 to more than 100 – already higher than for last year and more than 30 more than 2002.” Not surprisingly, Iraq is the most dangerous spot to report from, with 62 deaths. Click here for the report.

Shanghai eyes English broadcasting (November 13)
Forbes magazine online reports the Shanghai Media Group (SMG) is hoping to establish a second English language free-to-air TV station, to compete with the state-owned CCTV network. Interestingly, CCTV9 also broadcasts its service into the USA and SMG is also eyeing this market. Click here for the story.

No license, no liberty (November 11)
Voice of America reports that Zimbabwe has further tightened media laws, with new rules requiring journalists to register with a government authority. “The amendment was passed Tuesday in parliament despite strong opposition by the members of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change. Under the new law, journalists who work without a government license could be subject to a jail term not exceeding two years, a fine or both,” the story says.

The right Stuff (November 9)
New Zealand website Stuff has an interesting take on what might happen if or when Australia’s cross-media ownership laws are relaxed. It benefits from being written at a relatively safe distance. See this link.

TV rings a profit (November 9)
Business Wire reports that a USA interactive TV company has contracted to provide services in China. The business model gains revenue not from the provision of television programs, but from the mobile phone calls the shows are designed to generate. Here’s what the release says: “The Mobile Media Company today announced, that in association with the Shanghai PuDi Technology Company, it will provide interactive television programming and technical solutions to Yunnan Television, a leading television station in southwest China. Within the agreement, Yunnan Television will broadcast Mobile Media's popular interactive TV format, The Exam to its 20 million subscribers and utilize the company's popular Viz/Response interactive TV platform to generate profitable mobile transactions via cost effective enabling technology. Andy AuYeung, Vice President, Commercial Development for Mobile Media Asia Pacific, said, ‘China represents a huge growth opportunity for interactive TV. Over the next 24 months, I believe such interactive services will cause a dramatic increase in phone-to-screen transactions.’"

Sleeping Sensis to awake? (November 9)
Departing Sensis chief Andrew Day has told The Age newspaper recently that the Telstra-owned directory business is potentially the sleeping giant in the Australian media landscape. According to the report: “Day says the Telstra-owned Sensis is aiming to aggressively grow in the classified advertising market and is well positioned to play a role in any future media shake-up.” Telstra currently has some interesting cross-media interests, including pay TV, internet and print. Click here for the story.

What’s second prize? (November 8)
The ABC reports media from all countries – including America – has been invited by a coalition of leaders inside Fallujah (Iraq) to become ‘embedded’ on the opposite side of the lines to the expected USA offensive. The journalists who remain in the town are said to be mostly Iraqi, some of whom work for foreign agencies. While it could be an interesting career move, they will no doubt be mindful of the several journos so far killed in the conflict, the most recent of which was reported to be a Reuters cameraman shot by a USA sniper last week. Click here for the story.

USA election post-mortem echoes Oz (November 6)
In what feels very similar to local post election experience, American commentators are now castigating that country’s media for failing to predict George Bush’s second victory, and for concentrating on the wrong issues. “The media overplayed the importance of the failures in the Iraq war as a defining issue in the campaign. And they completely ignored the value of Bush's opposition to abortion and his support of a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage – positions more in step with the conservative tilt of the electorate,” writes Gerald Boyd at Yahoo News. Click here for the story.

In praise of Brazilians (November 6)
From the ABC’s Radio National: Media commentator Professor Noam Chomsky regards Brazil as a good example of democratic media at work. The election of a popular president from the wrong side of the ‘railway tracks’ is seen as an outcome of a media on the people’s side. But is this the case? Critics say that there is some doubt about the sources Brazilian journalists use for their allegations against government departments and ministers. Click here for the story.

Media lifestyles to be surveyed (November 4)
International media networking site Mediabuddies.com has announced a survey into the lifestyle of media personnel. According to a story at Scotsman.com: “As an industry, journalists, broadcasters, advertising and public relations executives are often involved in talking about and commenting on the lifestyles of other people. But there is very little information about the people in our own media industry,“ says David Davis, the former Times journalist and founder of Mediabuddies. Click here for the story.

Yahoo googles its way into the black (November 4)
From the fortnightly Online Publishers Association report: “Google and Yahoo might appear to be sworn enemies in the battle for paid search advertising revenues. But it hasn't always been that way. In fact, Yahoo was one of the first investors in Google, and only recently started selling off shares in the company. So while Google announced a bang-up quarter, with profits doubling to $52 million, Yahoo had net income of $253 million, half of which came from its sale of 25 percent of the Google stock it owned. But even without those gains, Yahoo's revenues from paid search and online ads was up 212 percent year-over-year, with paid content gaining 31 percent, thanks to a 90 percent boost in fantasy sports fees.” Related links: Google doubles profit (News.com), Yahoo nets sharp surge in profits (BBC).

Mobile multimedia gets dedicated network (November 3)
USA company Qualcomm is confident enough about the future of multimedia content for mobile devices to build a dedicated transmission network worth US$800m. According to the report at Computerworld.com, “Cellular operators expect mobile multimedia to be a key driver of 3G (third-generation mobile phone) use. Qualcomm aims to save them the trouble and expense of building their own infrastructures for delivering those multimedia services.” Click here for the story and here for the Qualcomm statement.

Copping a blogging (November 2)
Following on from the Media & the irony of politics story on October 26 is this piece in the Sydney Morning Herald & New York Times by Jim Rutenberg. He says, “Practising cheap and dirty politics, playing fast and loose with facts and even lying: these accusations, and worse, have been nonstop this year. The accused are not the candidates, but the mainstream news media. And the accusers are an ever growing army of internet writers, many of them partisans, who reach hundreds of thousands of people a day.” Click here for the complete article.

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