Darren Lockyer announces his retirement at the Broncos Leagues Club, Red Hill. Picture: Nathan Richter The Courier-Mail
Friday, 9 September 2011
Darren Lockyer Retires
I'm not much for sporting stories or icons but even I cannot let the retirement of Darren Lockyer go unmentioned, especially when considering that his autobiography has been flying of my work's shelves and was our number one seller for father's day. The legend is set to retire at the end of this NRL season and after a bit of R and R, not to mention some physical therapy, Lockyer is set to host a signing at the local Victoria Point Shark's Club, curtesy of Angus and Robertson Victoria Point.
Paddington Murder-Suicide: Tragedy Hits Close To Home
My colleague at work mentioned this story to me the other night because it took place in Paddington Brisbane, making it seem a lot more real and immediate than a lot of other crimes you hear about on the news. I generally think of Brisbane as a pretty safe and rather mundane place and hearing about a murder of a young girl so near to me is quite shocking and a little hard to compute. The body of 14 year old Sidonie Thompson, was discovered on the 7th of September following the suicide of her mother who flung herself off a bridge. The mother, Kim Pattison, is suspected of murdering her child and ending her own life immediately afterwards. Investigation is still be carried out with the police choosing not to disclose intimate details of the case for the time being.
Tuesday, 6 September 2011
The News of the World Scandal Continues
The News of the World scandal resulted from a series of abuses by the Rupert Murdoch owned paper, when it was revealed that the company was guilty of hacking into the phones of Royals, celebrities and politicians and paying hush money to anyone who came close to exposing their scheme. They are also accused of tapping the phones and email accounts of intelligence officers, victims, devastated parents and police officers, which takes the breaching of ethical as well as legal boundaries to a whole other extreme. Printing stories based on the illegal obtainment of information is a serious offence and has resulted in several sackings, resignations and continued legal repercussions for the company and those involved.
Ethics exist in journalism to prevent the exploitation of individuals and communities and to ensure that the rights and laws of the public are followed. Pursuing a story at any cost is an understandable goal, especially when considering the highly competitive "do or die" nature of journalism. However, there can be serious consequences for such reckless disregard of privacy rights and engagement in criminal activities, both legally, monetarily and some would say most importantly, reputation-wise.
For a timeline of the scandal go to http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/phone-hacking/8634176/Phone-hacking-timeline-of-a-scandal.html
Ethics exist in journalism to prevent the exploitation of individuals and communities and to ensure that the rights and laws of the public are followed. Pursuing a story at any cost is an understandable goal, especially when considering the highly competitive "do or die" nature of journalism. However, there can be serious consequences for such reckless disregard of privacy rights and engagement in criminal activities, both legally, monetarily and some would say most importantly, reputation-wise.
For a timeline of the scandal go to http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/phone-hacking/8634176/Phone-hacking-timeline-of-a-scandal.html
Photo of the Week
This photo raises questions about the ethicality of some reportage and whether ti is right to display such clear moments of distress to the public. On the one hand, it is exploiting the pain and suffering of nine year old Phan Thị Kim Phúc during the Vietnam War but on the other hand, it is raising awareness about the horrific consequences of war and giving the public a face to the victims. Nick Ut took the photograph during the Vietnam War on June 8, 1972 received the pulitzer prize for it. The little girl is town running down the street naked and in obvious agony after her back was severely burned by a South Vietnamese Napalm attack.
Sunday, 4 September 2011
Lecture on Web News
This lecture was fundamentally concerned with the evolution of the Internet and the shifting forms of interaction users have experienced since its inception. The challenges of online news and the ways that companies can gain money from online outlets was also explored, as the class questioned the ethicality of paywalls and charging for previously free online services.
Before the emergence and rapid popularity of the world wide web, people relied on forms of old or traditional media for entertainment and information. The most popular forms of mass communication or legacy media were magazines, television, newspapers and the radio. We still use all of these forms today but the problem (or advantage) is that all of these forms are now available through the singular medium of the Internet.
Web 1.0 was the original Internet form and it was extremely advertising friendly with brochures and promotional material everywhere. Any content was surrounded with advertisements, mainly in the form of banners or headers that were hard to miss or jumped out at you as soon as the page loaded.
Web 2.0 is where we are now or at least is the place we are about to leave from. Also dubbed the social web, this internet form is defined by its capacity for interaction and communication. Poplar sites such as Facebook, twitter, youtube, myspace, wikipedia and linked in among others, encourage user produced content and focus on the formation of social groups and networking. Axel Bruns fro QUT coined the term "prod-users" to describe the emergence of user generated content who effectively act as their own producers.
The direction the Internet is headed towards is Web 3.0 which is known as the semantic web. Already, this is not a foreign or unheard of thing, especially considering the increasing popularity of smart phones and our amazement at the type of personalised applications available. This web form adds machine-readable meaning to packets of information. This information is particularly tailored to your own interests and needs and can be based on browser history or previously accessed material or on a simple input and answer process. This process is recognised as meta-tagging, where you can rely on web 3.0 to provide information that encompasses a wide variety of factors specifically for you, such as movie times, restaurants close-by, transportation deadlines etc.
The consequences of Web 3.0 for the news is hyper localisation that provides information specifically relevant to where you are. Advertisers readily exploit hyper localisation as it provides specific target audiences for particular types of products. The consequence of hyper localisation unfortunately, is that if we are exposing ourselves to our narrow likes and desires, we risk missing out on a lot of general knowledge and engagement with wider concerns and events.
The shift from paper journalism to online media is posing questioned for media producers, such as mad-dog Murdoch, as to how to get money out of consumers. Journalism is an occupation whose contributors require pay ( I know I sure want to get paid), so the concern is a valid one. The concept of a paywall has been proposed and has already been put into motion is some cases. The ethicality of this is questionable as issues of entitlement come into effect. Why should we now pay for something that we have always gotten for free? we expect web news to be cheap and accessible, in fact that i why a lot of users rely only on this format. How important is quality journalism compared to the simple reiteration of facts and events - can we put a price on how much it means to us - is that price more than the cost of the paywall. At least such paywall news sites are trying to offer add-ons to entice and reward subscribers, with membership privileges including discounts to popular shows, stores and events.
The direction of investigative journalism (which is a field i am particularly interested in) is not looking too good if people aren't willing to pay for quality journalism. Investigative journalism takes a lot of time, energy, research and should take fieldwork in order to write an interesting and thorough article that is fact-checked and not susceptible to lawsuit. Given my career aspirations, I hope that people will be willing to facilitate the production of quality journalism and afford journalists the resources and time needed to produce stories of a high calibre.
Before the emergence and rapid popularity of the world wide web, people relied on forms of old or traditional media for entertainment and information. The most popular forms of mass communication or legacy media were magazines, television, newspapers and the radio. We still use all of these forms today but the problem (or advantage) is that all of these forms are now available through the singular medium of the Internet.
Web 1.0 was the original Internet form and it was extremely advertising friendly with brochures and promotional material everywhere. Any content was surrounded with advertisements, mainly in the form of banners or headers that were hard to miss or jumped out at you as soon as the page loaded.
Web 2.0 is where we are now or at least is the place we are about to leave from. Also dubbed the social web, this internet form is defined by its capacity for interaction and communication. Poplar sites such as Facebook, twitter, youtube, myspace, wikipedia and linked in among others, encourage user produced content and focus on the formation of social groups and networking. Axel Bruns fro QUT coined the term "prod-users" to describe the emergence of user generated content who effectively act as their own producers.
The direction the Internet is headed towards is Web 3.0 which is known as the semantic web. Already, this is not a foreign or unheard of thing, especially considering the increasing popularity of smart phones and our amazement at the type of personalised applications available. This web form adds machine-readable meaning to packets of information. This information is particularly tailored to your own interests and needs and can be based on browser history or previously accessed material or on a simple input and answer process. This process is recognised as meta-tagging, where you can rely on web 3.0 to provide information that encompasses a wide variety of factors specifically for you, such as movie times, restaurants close-by, transportation deadlines etc.
The consequences of Web 3.0 for the news is hyper localisation that provides information specifically relevant to where you are. Advertisers readily exploit hyper localisation as it provides specific target audiences for particular types of products. The consequence of hyper localisation unfortunately, is that if we are exposing ourselves to our narrow likes and desires, we risk missing out on a lot of general knowledge and engagement with wider concerns and events.
The shift from paper journalism to online media is posing questioned for media producers, such as mad-dog Murdoch, as to how to get money out of consumers. Journalism is an occupation whose contributors require pay ( I know I sure want to get paid), so the concern is a valid one. The concept of a paywall has been proposed and has already been put into motion is some cases. The ethicality of this is questionable as issues of entitlement come into effect. Why should we now pay for something that we have always gotten for free? we expect web news to be cheap and accessible, in fact that i why a lot of users rely only on this format. How important is quality journalism compared to the simple reiteration of facts and events - can we put a price on how much it means to us - is that price more than the cost of the paywall. At least such paywall news sites are trying to offer add-ons to entice and reward subscribers, with membership privileges including discounts to popular shows, stores and events.
The direction of investigative journalism (which is a field i am particularly interested in) is not looking too good if people aren't willing to pay for quality journalism. Investigative journalism takes a lot of time, energy, research and should take fieldwork in order to write an interesting and thorough article that is fact-checked and not susceptible to lawsuit. Given my career aspirations, I hope that people will be willing to facilitate the production of quality journalism and afford journalists the resources and time needed to produce stories of a high calibre.
Thursday, 1 September 2011
Julia Gillard: Not Long for this Government
I think it has gotten to the stage where Australians are now taking bets as to how long Julia Gillard will actually stay in power. The situation has steadily gotten worse for Gillard as the Labour Party is fighting to stay afloat after failing to live up to expectations and survival personal scandal. The deal that Gillard has with the independents, Tony Windsor, Rob Oakeshott and Andrew Wilkie, is held together by a mere string that is fraying at the edges. The Labour party's failure to "stop the boats" has gendered significant controversy and uproar, especially in light of the Malaysia solution which is further stripping asylum seeker's of their right to freedom and choice. The following link provides a more detailed account of present situation: http://au.news.yahoo.com/queensland/a/-/latest/10163976/labor-powerbroker-says-gillard-finished/
Monday, 29 August 2011
Photo of the Week
This photo is really all about the capture of that amazing moment. One of my friend's who loves photography showed it to me a few years ago and I still haven't forgotten it - I still have this conflicting urge to both marvel at it and tear my gaze away whenever I see it. It is one of the World Press photos from 2007 and reveals the dangers of some sports and why they ask you to trim your nails before you play.
3rd Prize Sports Action Stories
Chris Detrick, USA, The Salt Lake Tribune
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