Journalism Technology

Donica Mensing presented an interesting paper at Future of Journalism Conference, in Cardiff, looking at how journalism schools are basically training journalists in their own image – do we create people with the skills to survive in the networked world or are we helping them socialise in the existing newsroom with training/education and internships/work placements.

She made some very interesting points about how that needs to change and highlighted projects like our tahoe, Albany Today (from her own j-school) and News Mixer as projects which require young journalists to “set up shop” and engage in the networked communities and the community on their own doorstep.

We need to rethink our own practices within the academy and make our purposes and obligations more explicit

She added that educators need to

teach students to value innovation, uncertainty and experimentation

There are issues that Mensing outnlined here regarding timetable, collaborating with disperate groups, rewarding innovation and experimentation (something tough in the traditional academic setting) and the difficulty in faculty being able to make community commitments.

One interesting thing cropping up from the plenaries at the Future of Journalism conference is the reinforcement of the idea that there is no one size all.

This was something that cropped up when I managed to blag a coffee with the editor of The Hindu a little while ago.

At the conference, Bettina Peters of the Global Forum for Media Development questioned whether it was appropriate to try and export business models from the developed world to the developing world.She went on to discuss the need for collaboration between the North and South hemisphere, getting educators and journalists involved in sharing ideas and knowledge.

She gave an example that journalists in Nigeria might be equipped to support journalists in Romania – even though the constraints they face may be very different.

Mixed models and the sharing of ideas are key ideas cropping from the plenary, should be an interesting couple of days.