One man’s meat …
It’s all very well – and probably necessary – to expect the peddlers of hate to bear some responsibility for Saturday’s multiple murders in Pima, Arizona, if only because of the atmosphere of hatred their rantings helped to create. It is too early yet to say what drove 22-year-old Jared Lee Loughner to kill or wound 20 people, including a US Congresswoman, a Federal Court judge and a nine-year-old girl. Was it partly the crass ravings … Read entire article »
Filed under: General, Journalism, Media, Society
2010: That was the year that wasn’t
Had it not been for WikiLeaks, 2010 might have gone down as another forgettable year for the media in Australia and around the world. There were few outstanding examples of great journalism,[i] no breathtaking, game-changing technical innovations, not even any great “end-of-an-era” events at which we could pause and take stock. Admittedly, the human inclination to see the start or end of decades as somehow symbolically significant is irrational and therefore it shouldn’t surprise us when years … Read entire article »
Filed under: General, Journalism, Media
Cable leaks war on News Corp: Hold the front page!
If the first casualty in war is truth – even a war involving News Corporation – then the second casualty is Vince Cable. Ironically, they were both hit by the same bombshell. The British Government’s Business Secretary is yet another victim of a current outbreak of honesty. Perhaps it’s just his small ‘l’ liberal-democratic naivety or perhaps collateral damage from several months of WikiLeakage – 2010 will forever be known as the Year of WikiLeaks – but Cable … Read entire article »
Don’t try this at home, children
The release by WikiLeaks of tens of thousands of confidential US government emails has turned the spotlight on some serious and long-submerged issues about honesty in public life. The US Government and many others mentioned in these supposedly secret emails are genuinely embarrassed and understandably angry that they have been made public. They and their supporters outside government – including sections of the media – say it is impossible to undertake sophisticated modern diplomacy if everything one … Read entire article »
Australia failed to score – so what?
Losing the bid to host the 2022 World Cup may seem like the end of the world to Australian soccer fans, but as the teeth grinding and recriminations slowly fade, the rest of the nation issues a collective sigh of relief. Those uninterested in football – Australia still doesn’t know what to call “the world game” – will be relieved on several fronts. Of course many will tut-tut at the unfairness of the process and the insult … Read entire article »
Cuts in news send strange signals from SBS
It was never going to be easy putting the good ship SBS back on course. Following hard on cuts to the multicultural broadcaster’s world famous subtitling unit, the axe is falling on the TV network’s other claim to fame: its news service. News Director Paul Cutler sent an email to all his staff asking for a show of hands of those willing to take voluntary redundancy. He said numbers would be small and blamed the need to pump more … Read entire article »
The many voices of one Australia – just not inside the building please!
On its own, the shedding of more than 10 jobs in SBS’s relatively small Subtitling Unit could simply be a sad necessity, a realistic remedy for straitened economic times. SBS has limited funds, is not immune to economic downturns and must adapt to changing demands for subtitling foreign programs. SBS managing director Shaun Brown gave a Senate Estimates committee on Monday the reasons for what he called “surplus capacity” in Subtitling: “Firstly, technology has changed and consequently there … Read entire article »
Too little too late for SBS?
After years of downplaying SBS’s multicultural credentials, managing director Shaun Brown now wants to be besties with the ethnic lobby. It might be too little, too late. Speaking at a recent symposium at Murdoch University entitled “Racism Revisited”, SBS managing director Shaun Brown made a case for allocating more funds for multicultural broadcasting at Australia’s second national network. Many in the audience would have been a little taken aback. Was this the same Shaun Brown who, in … Read entire article »
Filed under: Media
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