From the BBC: A soaring glass and steel cone on top of BBC Broadcasting House in London, England, will shine a beam of light into the sky every night at 10 p.m., as a memorial to journalists and assistants killed on the job. The light sculpture, called Breathing, was created by Spanish artist Jaume Plensa…
“Copy editors are more powerful than proofreaders. They untangle twisted prose. They are surgeons, removing growths of error and irrelevance.” Nice. Most copy editors never see elegant sentences like this published under their own bylines. Copy editor Lawrence Downes represents his kind well, in an op-ed in the New York Times. Too bad he does…
The Associated Press is trying “to define clear standards as to how much of its articles and broadcasts bloggers and Web sites can excerpt without infringing on The A.P.’s copyright,” reports the New York Times. Fair Use of articles, and how much can be quoted, is a hot topic in the blogosphere, and on this…
Journalists in Gaza staged a boycott of news about Israelis in Gaza on June 16. The reason was sound: journalists want to hold Israel to account for its apparent slaughter of Reuters camerman Fadel Shana this spring. But boycotting the reporting of news strikes me as bizarre, at least. Perhaps someone can convince me that…
Writers’ unions are among the few contrary voices in a storm of protest over Canada’s proposed new copyright legislation. “Everyone says it is complicated — but the anti-copyright community hasn’t let that stop it from unleashing a torrent of abuse,” the Creators Copyright Coalition, whose members include PWAC and the Writers Union of Canada, states…
The average Internet-connected Canadian spends about 2.3 hours a day consuming news and information from a variety of sources, including television and newspapers, according to a new study by the Canadian Media Research Consortium (pdf) based on 1,000 interviews. Asked about “top-of-mind” stories, most respondents reported first learning about them on television. But most who wanted…
Montreal radio station 940 AM will lay off 18 employees and switch to an oldies/greatest hits format from an news-talk format, reports CBC, because “owner Corus Entertainment announced the station’s news format was not profitable enough to stay on air.” A response from the Canadian Media Guild demands that the CRTC “ensure that local news…
American journalist Tim Russert has died at age 58. The Washington anchor of the U.S. NBC network and host of “Meet the Press” was “a towering figure in American journalism,” said the New York Times, who “revolutionized Sunday morning television and infused journalism with his passion for politics,” said the Washington Post. The NBC report…
Coverage of Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid has renewed debate in the U.S. about how journalists deal with women. A piece in the New York Times looks at the issue, and how most media organizations contend their coverage was fair. An excerpt from the New York Times piece: Angered by what they consider sexist news coverage…
Colette Brin, ProjetJ | Les modifications proposées à la loi du droit d’auteur, un document passablement complexe comme on peut l’imaginer, soulèvent déjà des réactions variées parmi les acteurs concernés. Les principaux enjeux discutés concernent le téléchargement de contenus de divertissement (musique, films, etc.). Mais cela concerne également l’échange d’idées et d’informations, et les critiques…