Legacy media is in trouble.  Over the last ten years, ad revenue abandoned newspapers and magazines.  Hedge funds and private equity firms bought up newspapers and, with their unrelenting focus on the bottom line, cut newsroom staff even further.  Many newspapers found they could no longer cover their communities.  Despite some hopeful push-back from journalists themselves (at theDenver Post journalists are fighting backagainst their owners), the future is not bright.  Print revenue is expected to continue to decline with years of more losses.

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The Power of Podcasts

I began reporting for NPR in the 1970s, just a few years after the network was founded.  In those halcyon days, we had a lot of time to fill and so we were encouraged to do long interviews and highly produced, sound-rich stories.  Those days are gone, except when it comes to podcasts which now — to my delight — have gone global.   Especially in regions of the world with rich story-telling traditions.

Sowt,

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From Morocco, Mexico, Brazil and the United States, Round Earth Media’s dedicated directors are unsung heroes in my world.

Extraordinary journalists (Carla Baranauckas, Ron Henkoff and Peter Prengaman) are joined by business and non-profit leaders (Susan Plimpton, Ann Mond Johnson, Brad Lehrman, Steve Knaebel, and Amine Kabbaj).

For more about each of these accomplished individuals who dedicate their time, resources and expertise in guiding Round Earth, click HERE and scroll down to “Our Board.”

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As you all know by now, Round Earth Media’s focus is on important, under-reportedinternational stories. But we think local newsis just as important.  On that score, the situation is increasingly grim with disastrous consequences for our democracy. From an article published this week by Bloomberg:

America is overrun with “news deserts,” cities and towns where local coverage is lacking or altogether absent….Without journalists digging through property records or attending city council meetings,

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More than seven years ago, when Round Earth began working in collaboration with SIT Study Abroad on a program in Morocco, journalism as a profession seemed to be in such crisis that many wondered if there would be a next generation of international journalists.  I’m less fearful of that these days.

Trey Strange is a case in point.  He had never been out of the United States when he came to Morocco for our program.  That didn’t deter Trey.  I honestly don’t know when I’ve had a student who was more enthusiastic,

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We are, according to a report in Forbes:

The United States government, traditionally one of the bastions of press freedom, is about to compile a list of professional journalists and “top media influencers,” … and monitor what they’re putting out to the public.

And that’s not all.  Forbes goes on.Last October, an Indiana lawmaker proposed that journalists be licensed. Representative Jim Lucas’s bill was mostly a publicity stunt, but could this DHS action be a way for the government to keep track of American and foreign journalists as well as “citizen journalists,”

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I arrived in Morocco more than 7 years ago, poised for a grand experiment.  Could students studying at US colleges and universities, working with Moroccan student partners, produce journalism of excellence for top global media outlets?  Before that first semester was over, our students had proved that possible by publishing a story in the New York Times.  They’ve gone on to publish and broadcast countless more.  In this time of shuttered foreign news bureaus and the chaos in Washington nudging a lot of foreign coverage off the front page,

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The New York Review of Books had the best take I’ve seen on social media’s intrusion into our lives and what we can do about it.  Here’s Madeleine Bunting, formerly a journalist at The Guardian and the author of four books, including The Plot: A Biography of an English Acre(2009).

Today, as we grapple with a pervasive new digital culture, attention has become an issue of pressing social concern. Technology provides us with new tools to grab people’s attention.

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Who’s the good cop of the Internet?

It may be Wikipedia, the non profit online encyclopedia.

Conspiracy videos posted on YouTube have come under increasing attack.  Last month the company CEO announced that Wikipedia content on conspiracy theories will be posted beside videos on those subjects. You may have also noticed that, in an effort to verify news sources, Facebook is now including descriptions of those sources taken from — you guessed it — Wikipedia.

But wait a minute!

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Hello everyone from Morocco!

Please meet reporting partners Joe Held and Soukaina Zaida – just one of our amazing student pairs.  I’ve been in Morocco this week working with Joe and Soukaina — and all of our students journalism partners  —  helping shape their next 5 weeks of reporting.  I am simply astounded at their intelligence, hard work, commitment, critical thinking, and enthusiasm.

On all of our projects and programs we partner an American with his or her in-country counterpart. 

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