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"On the Internet, everybody is a millenarian. Internet journalism, according to those who produce manifestos on its behalf, represents a world-historical development-not so much because of the expressive power of the new medium as because of its accessibility to producers and consumers. That permits it to break the long-standing choke hold on public information and discussion that the traditional media-usually known, when this argument is made, as "gatekeepers" or "the priesthood"-have supposedly been able to maintain up to now. "Millions of Americans who were once in awe of the punditocracy now realize that anyone can do this stuff-and that many unknowns can do it better than the lords of the profession," Glenn Reynolds, a University of Tennessee law professor who operates one of the leading blogs, Instapundit, writes, typically, in his new book, "An Army of Davids: How Markets and Technology Empower Ordinary People to Beat Big Media, Big Government and Other Goliaths." The rhetoric about Internet journalism produced by Reynolds and many others is plausible only because it conflates several distinct categories of material that are widely available online and didn't use to be. One is pure opinion, especially political opinion, which the Internet has made infinitely easy to purvey. Another is information originally published in other media-everything from Chilean newspaper stories and entries in German encyclopedias to papers presented at Micronesian conferences on accounting methods-which one can find instantly on search and aggregation sites. Lately, grand journalistic claims have been made on behalf of material produced specifically for Web sites by people who don't have jobs with news organizations. According to a study published last month by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, there are twelve million bloggers in the United States, and thirty-four per cent of them consider blogging to be a form of journalism. That would add

"Corentin Wauters: Gamma is one of the most famous photojournalism agencies. Some even call it legendary. How important has it been for photojournalism? Michiel Munneke: I think Gamma - but also others like Magnum, for instance - played an extremely important role from early years on, especially in documenting crucial news events around the world. It's important to realise that in those days you had magazines like Life and the Picture Post who very generously allocated tens of pages to events like the war in Vietnam, for example. Those publications and photographs made a huge impact on their readerships. I think it's fair to say that the founders of Gamma, like Raymond Depardon - although he moved to Magnum at the end of the '70s - and Gilles Corron, who died in 1970 in Cambodia, can be classified as legendary. They played a very important role in news documenting in those years. Raymond Depardon said that in 1966 you only had to travel far away and take three shots to get published in magazines Paris Match or Le Nouvel Observateur. How has the profession of photojournalism changed since Gamma was founded? If Depardon was saying that competition for space in publications like Paris Match or Le Nouvel Observateur is stronger, then he's absolutely right. Competition is far more severe. Circulations are going down, advertising revenues are shrinking, and consequently budgets for journalism and for photography are being cut. image Nowadays its very rare that publications send photographers for assignments overseas. Take a renowned magazine like Time. They still have photographers on staff but they very rarely get assignments to go overseas. It's a sign of the times. Gamma, but also other big photojournalism agencies like Sipa, were founded in Paris. The city had a big name as a centre for photojournalism. To what extent is that true today? I think for those years it was really true. But now, in the era of globalisation and digitisation, it doesnâ

Twitter Literacy (I refuse to make up a Twittery name for it) Post-Oprah and apres-Ashton, Twittermania is definitely sliding down the backlash slope of the hype cycle. It's not just the predictable wave of naysaying after the predictable waves of sliced-breadism and bandwagon-chasing. We're beginning to see some data. Nielsen, the same people who do TV ratings, recently noted that more than 60% of new Twitter users fail to return the following month. To me, this represents a perfect example of a media literacy issue: Twitter is one of a growing breed of part-technological, part-social communication media that require some skills to use productively. Sure, Twitter is banal and trivial, full of self-promotion and outright spam. So is the Internet. The difference between seeing Twitter as a waste of time or as a powerful new community amplifier depends entirely on how you look at it - on knowing how to look at it. When I started requiring digital journalism students to learn how to use Twitter, I didn't have the list of journalistic uses for Twitter that I have compiled by now. So I logged onto the service and broadcast a request. "I have a classroom full of graduate students in journalism who don't know who to follow. Does anybody have a suggestion?" Within ten minutes, we had a list of journalists to follow, including one who was boarding Air Force One at that moment, joining the White House press corps accompanying the President to Africa.

Twitter Literacy (I refuse to make up a Twittery name for it) Post-Oprah and apres-Ashton, Twittermania is definitely sliding down the backlash slope of the hype cycle. It's not just the predictable wave of naysaying after the predictable waves of sliced-breadism and bandwagon-chasing. We're beginning to see some data. Nielsen, the same people who do TV ratings, recently noted that more than 60% of new Twitter users fail to return the following month. To me, this represents a perfect example of a media literacy issue: Twitter is one of a growing breed of part-technological, part-social communication media that require some skills to use productively. Sure, Twitter is banal and trivial, full of self-promotion and outright spam. So is the Internet. The difference between seeing Twitter as a waste of time or as a powerful new community amplifier depends entirely on how you look at it - on knowing how to look at it. When I started requiring digital journalism students to learn how to use Twitter, I didn't have the list of journalistic uses for Twitter that I have compiled by now. So I logged onto the service and broadcast a request. "I have a classroom full of graduate students in journalism who don't know who to follow. Does anybody have a suggestion?" Within ten minutes, we had a list of journalists to follow, including one who was boarding Air Force One at that moment, joining the White House press corps accompanying the President to Africa.

Aims & Scope Visual Resources: An International Journal of Documentation is devoted to the study of images and their uses. While images of architecture and works of art constitute its main focus, it also includes other subjects and contexts in a wide range of formats. Its scope delves into the past and looks toward the future, revealing how images have influenced the perception of art and how the interpretation of images conditions and enhances academic disciplines such as archaeology, history, and particularly art and architectural history. Visual Resources explores how visual language is structured and visual meaning communicated and also illustrates how picture collections are acquired, organized, indexed, and preserved. VR examines early attempts to document the visual, reports on the state of visual resources, assesses the effect of electronic technology on current and future uses, and provides a platform for reporting innovative ways to organize and access visual information - while aiming to increase the recognition and appreciation of visual documentation. Over the years, VR has published articles about verbal descriptions of art and architecture; copies, casts, and facsimiles; drawings, paintings, and prints; photography; library, archive, and museum collections; iconography; and computers and electronic imagery - and how these have functioned as documents of art and culture. Disclaimer for scientific, technical and social science publications: Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the "Content") contained in its publications. However, Taylor & Francis and its agents and licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness or suitability for any purpose of the Content and disclaim all such representations and warranties whether express or implied to the maximum extent permitted by law. Any views expressed in this publication are the views of the authors and are no

How to Teach Yourself About Social Media When J-Schools Fail Roland Legrand by Roland Legrand, April 14, 2009 Tagged: communities of practice, connectivism, journalism school, learning, networked learning, social media Journalism is changing rapidly due to social media, and these changes can be bewildering as people wonder how to keep up. I recently gave a social media workshop for journalism students, and I soon realized that many students were still unaware of social media other than Facebook. They were shocked to hear about feed readers, blogs, or micro-blogging and asked how they could learn about all those developments. It seems that we should rethink not only journalism, but also journalism education: Tomorrow's journalists will need to take the initiative to teach themselves about rapidly changing technology. To that end, here are some ways that students can become their own teachers in regards to social media. Bewilderment

"Get Started With Google Wave From Wired How-To Wiki Jump to: navigation, search Let's just say this up front: Google Wave doesn't make sense at first glance. It kinda looks like e-mail because you send messages to friends, but it's also like chat because the messages you send to friends can be received and responded to in real time. It's also a little like Google Docs, because the messages you send are rich in display features. However, if you look at Google Wave as a mishmash of Web 2.0 technology, you're missing the point. Google Wave is a communication device all its own. It allows you to communicate online as if you're in the same room, and it makes your communication with large groups of people more powerful and useful. If you really want to conceptualize Google Wave, you're going to have to use it. Here's how. "

Photojournalism and ethics - How far would you go for a photo? Duckrabbit takes Pulitzer Center to task over ethics Posted on April 21, 2010 by mirandagavin| 4 Comments Benjamin Chesterton from duckrabbit alerted me to the following story. He has just published his views on A Developing Story with quotes from his letter to the Pulitzer Centre. Briefly, and according to Chesterton: "The Center has recently funded the photographer Macro Venaschi to do a story on child sacrifice in Uganda. His highly stylized black and white photographs are deeply disturbing on a number of levels. One of the pictures shows an abused boy with a catheter protruding from where his penis has been cut off. I believe that if published in the UK, this picture would be illegal on the basis of indecency. Beyond that, there is an account on the Pulitzer website of how Vernashi persuaded grieving parents to have their murdered child's body exhumed so that he could take photographs of the body. A payment was then made to those present.

The Ethics of Mixing Music and Videojournalism Regina McCombs, a Poynter Institute visual journalism instructor, has created a powerful illustration of how soundtracks can affect a video story -- illuminating the debate as to whether they have a proper place in videojournalism. In her article, "See How Music Changes a Story," she shows three versions of the same video story, "Mom Goes to War" (featuring a pilot preparing for her second Iraq deployment and her young son). The first is with natural sound. The second adds a slow, somber keyboard track. The third features an upbeat guitar/percussion track. (Both scores are GarageBand loops -- demonstrating how easy and accessible it is for even someone with a tin ear to provide professional sounding music background.) McCombs poses the all-important question: how do the alternate versions change the way you react to, and feel about, the story?

Sunday, March 19, 2006 Lighting 101 Intimidated by the idea of off-camera lighting? Don't be. We are pretty much starting from scratch, so no worries. The first posts will be about what kind of gear you will need to do the minimalist strobe thing. When we are done having our way with your wallet (remembering that light gives you far more bang-for-the-buck than does fast glass or the latest digital camera or 300/2.8) we'll move into basic technique. And after that, we'll keep it going with periodical essays and ideas on how to improve (or refresh) your lighting ability. When you've worked your way through the basics of designing your light kit and learning how to use it, make a point to browse some of the examples in the "On Assignment" section. Those will be updated constantly, too. So keep checking back. You will likely have some questions along the way. Sadly, it is not possible for me to take the time to personally answer all of the one-to-one lighting questions that pop up. So try to resist asking them in the comments section. The only people reading this behind you are the people who are, well, behind you. You will find the one-to-one knowledge bank you seek in the Strobist Group on Flickr. There, you can ask away and get the diversity of response that you need. These are the lighting grad students, so to speak. They know this stuff, and are very enthusiastic about sharing their knowledge.

About Welcome to my site. Here you will find summaries of my work, videos to watch, papers to download, images to study and links to pursue. I have three areas of interest - photography, multimedia and politics. I am particularly concerned with (1) how documentary photography, photojournalism and satellite imaging visually enact our world; (2) how multimedia technologies are transforming the capacity of photography to tell stories about our hybrid world; and (3) how issues of identity and representation help structure international politics. A full CV/resume is available here. As professor of cultural and political geography at Durham University in the UK, I am associated with the Durham Centre for Advanced Photography Studies. In 2009 I have a fellowship at Durham's Institute for Advanced Study to work on photographs from the Sudan archive for my 'Geopolitics and Visuality' project.

A New Website for a Changing World SocialDocumentary.net is a new website that features documentary photography from around the world-images and words that explore the human condition. Easily Create Documentary Websites About Critical Issues Facing Our World Today Professional and amateur photographers, journalists, NGOs, students-anyone with a story to tell and a collection of good photographs-can easily and affordably begin creating websites on SocialDocumentary.net. Global warming, international justice, post-conflict reconstruction, HIV/AIDS, or life in Afghanistan or suburban America are just a few of the themes that you can find on SocialDocumentary.net. The goal of this website is to make our lives richer and more informed about issues affecting us and our world today. Powerful photographs can also lead to meaningful change in the lives of ordinary people. SocialDocumentary. net provides tools for photographer to inform viewers how to take action-either by supporting NGOs doing work on the issues, or by engaging in direct political action. Not all documentary photographers are concerned with action. Many photographers featured on SocialDocumentary.net are concerned with subtleties of the human experience and exploring personal themes. Photographs on SocialDocumentary.net-whether of struggling farmers in Africa or of suburban teenagers in Philadelphia-offer a fresh way to look at the world and a greater understanding of humanity. The secondary goal is to create an online image bank of quality photographs documenting all aspects of the world created by an international collection of photographers. This will enable students, college professors, journalists, and anyone else to easily see any part of the world in quality digital imagery and gain valuable information about the subjects they are viewing. We encourage all photographers, everywhere, to use this site as a tool in their own image-making and documentary exploration. We also encourage n

"Manufactured Landscapes": An Interview with Ed Burtynsky John K. Grande : What made you decide to start your photo lab, Toronto Image Works? Ed Burtynsky : When I graduated from Ryerson Polytechnic, there was no access to professional darkrooms in Toronto. After four years of working at home in the basement, I realized how inefficient my production was, and how impossible it became to realize the quality and scale of prints I envisioned. That was the original inspiration for Toronto Image Works. I decided not only to create something that would support my own creative printmaking, but also to open a facility for other artists in the city to use. J.K.G. : One often hears of an artist dealing with the sacred earth as a subject, and though that is fine, this brand of art can be diminished by its avoidance of world problems caused by production, pollution, toxic earth, global warming. Artists cannot whitewash what is something very real with purist aesthetics, no matter how beautiful, or ritual, or superficially sacred they may be. Your photos touch on that strange duality, for they attract us with beauty.

"Everybody likes to cite the Iranian protests as a great example of how the Internet and Social Media was able to bypass censorship and narrate a powerful, fast-shifting story to the world. But how much do we really know about what was happening online and how journalists outside of Iran connected to the Online information?"

Soren Gordhamer writes and consults on ways we can more creatively and effectively use the technologies of our age, including social media. He is the author of "Wisdom 2.0″ (HarperOne, 2009). You can follow him on Twitter at @SorenG. It is hard to know sometimes how our life has changed until we stop for a moment and look at how different it is from ten or even five years ago. In recent years social media, likely more than anything else, has significantly impacted most of our daily lives. Envisioning the global conversation that has developed over the past few years because of tools like Facebook (Facebook) and Twitter (Twitter) might have been unimaginable for most people at the beginning of this decade. But social media communication tools have profoundly changed our lives and how we interact with one another and the world around us. Here are the top areas that social media has affected in our daily lives.

Soren Gordhamer writes and consults on ways we can more creatively and effectively use the technologies of our age, including social media. He is the author of "Wisdom 2.0″ (HarperOne, 2009). You can follow him on Twitter at @SorenG. It is hard to know sometimes how our life has changed until we stop for a moment and look at how different it is from ten or even five years ago. In recent years social media, likely more than anything else, has significantly impacted most of our daily lives. Envisioning the global conversation that has developed over the past few years because of tools like Facebook (Facebook) and Twitter (Twitter) might have been unimaginable for most people at the beginning of this decade. But social media communication tools have profoundly changed our lives and how we interact with one another and the world around us. Here are the top areas that social media has affected in our daily lives.

Your Camera Is an Agent for Change By Qiana MestrichqianamestrichcloseAuthor: Qiana Mestrich See Author's Posts (6) Recent Posts * Braving the Sight Unseen: Interview with Blind Photographer Timothy O'Brien * Photographers on Twitter, Part 2: My Favorite Tweets * Photographers on Twitter: How They Use It * Photography Empathy: How You Feel Is What You Get * Your Camera Is an Agent for Change Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, of Panamanian and Croatian heritage, Qiana Mestrich has studied photography and its history for more than 15 years. Trained as a fine art photographer, Qiana's personal work ranges from portraiture to still life and landscapes. As a world citizen, she's also documented her travels to countries like Panama, Cuba, Trinidad & Tobago, the U.K. and more to come. View Qiana Mestrich's fine art photography on her Web site or read her blog, Dodge & Burn: Diversity in Photography. in Photojournalism on September 16th, 2008 As photographers, we often use our cameras to make money - shooting weddings, editorial, advertising, stock photography, etc. Yet the camera can do more than help us earn an income. As Dorothea Lange put it, this powerful tool can teach people "how to see without a camera."

"Keeping abreast of news in your niche can be tough. I know the feeling of being left behind, when you think you need to be checking thousands of feeds 24 hours a day. Fact is you do not need to have such a punishing regime. I have been known to follow stupidly excessive amounts of RSS feeds, plus my Twitter following got well out of hand. My feeds are now down to 300 and I am slowly trimming who I follow on Twitter. I'm down from 900 and some to hopefully approaching a manageable number below 700. This might still seem like a lot to you, how do I manage to follow so many feeds? Here are 21 tips for a more productive approach to keeping up with all the crucial developments in your niche. They will work for feeds or Twitter in most cases but I have aimed mainly at RSS:"

Photography Websites: How to design a website that image buyers will love website-montage.jpg We're releasing something special today. If you're selling photos online, displaying your portfolio to get more commercial or editorial assignments, or even designing websites for photographers, you'll want to have a look at this. Do you ever wonder, "Is my website doing its job? Am I working hard to get people there, only to have the site itself betray me?" Don't worry, you're not alone (being betrayed by your website is a growing problem). When we launched our photography website templates last fall, we picked up on this very fact - photographers and designers generally build websites based on their artists' intuition, and leave sound business reasoning aside. That's bad, of course, when you want your website to support your primary business goal - selling more of your work.

Academics and artists at London Metropolitan University worked with photographer Paul Trevor to make a selection of his images of East London digitally available to artists, students and researchers. The Collection includes 500 images (chosen from a total of 120,000) of the Spitalfields area from the 1970s to the 1990s, a period of rapid social and physical change. The Paul Trevor Collection is part of a larger archive project at London Metropolitan University, which will eventually include oral as well as visual narratives, that aims to represent aspects of the lives of local East End communities in their distinctive social, economic and political contexts. The process of producing this photographic dimension of the archive was lengthy and gave rise to challenging questions. What are the aesthetic, historical, and social dimensions of creating a photographic archive and how might these be related? Which factors contribute to the construction of a photographic archive as a relevant resource for public history and/or academic inquiry? How can aesthetic and social/political discourses work together to achieve this end?

Multimedia journalism is one of those terms often used to refer to a wide range of online content. Recently, I began a discussion with my students at the UBC Graduate School of Journalism to define exactly what the term means and how we can harness the many forms of online media to produce quality journalism. We started by first asking what a multimedia story is not. After all, go to any news website and you are certain to see stories being told using a combination of media. But just because an online story has multimedia elements does not mean that it is a multimedia story.

"Creating a Transmedia Symphony I re-read the article in Wired on transmedia today, and found it as good a read as the first time. Coming to the last paragraph I read Jeff Gomez's comment about transmedia and the birth of a new Mozart, "We are going to see visionaries who understand the value of each media platform as if it's a separate musical instrument, who'll create symphonic narratives which leverage each of these multimedia platforms in a way that will create something we haven't encountered yet." This rings true for me as an analogy of what many of us are trying to create. The question that popped up in my head was, however, "but hey, how do you create a "normal" symphony?". Lo and behold, a Google search later I found this wikihow on, yes, how to create a symphony. After reading it, the analogy rings truer still. So, to translate the creation of a "normal" symphony to the creation of a transmedia symphony, these would/could be the steps to take:"