Lord Triesman and the ethics of clandestine recording
As the Mail on Sunday continues to take criticism for reporting the taped conversations of the FA chief, Brian Cathcart asks if it’s ever right to secretly record private conversations
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China to spend four billion on improving state media
The Chinese government has reportedly invested £4bn to expanding the nation’s news networks and media channels. Newspapers such as the China Daily are to be remodelled to resemble British broadsheets, and China Central Television (CCTV), the country’s largest state television network, is to increase their service to include broadcasts in Russian and Arabic in addition to its English, French and Spanish transmissions. The move comes after President Hu Jintao’s remark on the “increasingly fierce struggle in the domain of news and opinion” in the global media circuit. Click here for an in-depth look at China’s conflicting approaches to international and national news.
Estonia: world press groups condemn threat to independent reporting
The World Association of Newpapers and News Publishers, the World Editors Forum, and the European Newspaper Publishers Association have called on the government to drop a proposal that would enable courts to jail journalists who failed to reveal their sources, and impose fines on newspapers solely on the basis that they intend to publish “potentially harmful information”. In an open letter to President Thomas Hendrik, the organizations said that proposed Source Protection Act would“have a significant negative impact on investigative journalism”and was in conflict with Estonia’s international treaty obligations. On 18 March, six leading newspapers published blank pages in protest at the draft legislation.
Climate Camp criticised
Photojournalist Marc Vallée has been criticising Climate Camp’s handling saying on his blog he was forced to wear a “media badge”, and that his request for a copy of the code of conduct for journalists was refused. He argued that the camp’s policy towards journalists was comparable to the police using anti-terrorism laws to harass journalists. Read more here