Those challenges, and strategies to meet them, are the topic of a new report by the renowned American think-tank, the Brookings Institution. In the report, Darrell West, founding director of the organization’s Center for Technology Innovation, analyzes why some 4.3 billion people on the planet are still locked out of the digital revolution. onMedia put a few questions to West about what the divide is as wide as it is and what might be done about increasing connectivity in the developing world.
Is there one primary factor behind the divide? Or is it a combination of issues?
One of the largest barriers to internet access in the developing world is the high cost of devices and internet services. For many people, smartphones and tablets remain far beyond their financial means. And even if they can pay for a device, they cannot afford the telecommunications and data usage charges that are required to access the internet. Some governments also are worsening the cost situation by imposing new taxes on mobile devices or telecommunications fees. That makes it even more difficult to solve the affordability crisis in internet usage.
The biggest problem of the digital divide is all the people who are not reaping the benefits of the digital revolution. Increasingly, people are applying for jobs, getting educated, and accessing health information online. Those without internet connections are not able to do these things and this puts them at a disadvantage compared to others who are connected. That widens inequality and access to new digital tools.
You say it is especially important to make progress on digital access in the cases of India and China. Why?
Half of the world’s unconnected (2.2 of the 4.3 billion) live in China or India. This means that in order to solve the digital access problem, we have to pay particular attention to those countries. Each has a large number of people outside the technology revolution. Internet service providers and website operators need to provide content in the local languages common in those places and undertake steps that encourage a diverse and uncensored internet. In conjunction with addressing cost barriers, these steps will bring more people into the digital world and provide economic opportunities for those who go online.
Data charges are often cited as contributing to the digital divide. You’ve said zero-rating programs are effective ways to expand access. Can you explain?
Zero-rating programs help those who are poor in the developing world get access to services and information that otherwise would be too expensive. Telecommunications firms waive data caps for a range of basic services and this encourages greater internet usage. In combination with free wi-fi services, this can open up a range of websites and encourage them to become more active online.
You point to a diversification of content as key to bringing more people into the internet fold. What kind of content would be more appealing to those who are not online now?
People want to use the basic content that other people are accessing. They want to be able to apply online for jobs, check the weather, use social media and find necessary information. If they are in remote rural areas, internet access helps them broaden the marketplace and buy products outside their local village. Anything that broadens their horizons and gives them access to more diverse content is useful from their standpoint.
Problems of digital literacy and a fear of the internet, especially among older people, are cited as stumbling blocks. How can these problems be tackled?
Many elderly people in the developing world don’t know how to use computers or worry about the security of their online activities. They hear stories about hackers and think they may be victimized. We need educational programs that reach these individuals and give them the digital skills necessary to encourage safe, online participation. Older people want to use the internet to stay in touch with their children and grandchildren so that provides a means to get them to learn how to go online for basic information and services.
Darrell M. West is vice president and director of Governance Studies at Brookings and the founding director of the Center for Technology Innovation. He is also the editor-in-chief of the technology policy blog TechTank. His current research focuses on educational technology, health information technology, and mobile technology. He is the author or co-author of 20 books, including including Going Mobile: How Wireless Technology is Reshaping Our Lives, Digital Schools: How Technology Can Transform Education, and The Next Wave: Using Digital Technology to Further Social and Political Innovation. You can follow him on Twitter here.
Interview conducted by Kyle James, edited by Kate Hairsine
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]]>Geojournalism.org builds on the online Geojournalism Handbook, which was released back in 2013. The original eleven tutorials from the Handbook are included on the site – as well as others which have been added along the way.
The tutorials are organized under Tracks where similar topics are grouped together – although many headings only have one or two tutorials. They are also rated according to how difficult they are – for example, Tips for Using Color in Maps is ‘easy’, Cleaning Data with Refine is ‘medium’ and How to Map Photos Using OpenStreetMap and TileMill is ‘hard’.
A visualization is worth a thousand words
The idea behind geojournalism.org is to give environmental journalists (as well as designers and developers working in the field) the resources to “dive into data visualization,” explained Willie Shubert, Senior Project Coordinator at the Earth Journalism Network, one of the platform sponsors.
“Our main goal is to help people understand the global transformation that is happening to our environment,” Shubert told onMedia, “and one of the best ways to do this is when journalists give their stories more context by using maps and data visualizations.”
For Shubert, it was important that the tutorials are written specifically for journalists and show how journalists are using these tools to solve problems that they face in their reporting.
For example, although there’s masses of information on the internet about how to use FrontlineSMS (a mobile messaging tool), geojournalism.org has a blow-by-blow account of how the Philippine Network of Environmental Journalists set up FrontlineSMS to create a mobile newsroom for disaster reporting.
Geojournalism.org wants you!
Geojournalism.org is open to people contributing their own tutorials and case studies and updating existing ones. If you have something you want to share with the environmental journalism community, you can get in touch with them through the website or via Twitter: @GeoJournalism.
Written by Kate Hairsine, edited by Nik Martin
You might also be interested in reading these onMedia’s posts: Reporting on climate change: Part I and Part II
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By June 17 this year, many African countries are supposed to have completed so-called “digital migration.” This is the process of switching from the analog network traditionally used to broadcast TV to a digital network, and then turning the analog network off.
The benefits of digital TV signals are many. Up to ten digital channels can be carried on the bandwidth that it takes to carry just one analog channel, potentially offering much more choice in programming. The TV picture quality itself if brighter and sharper; sound quality is better. And the freeing up of the spectrum allows the possibility of using frequencies for broadband internet or other wireless services.
The switchover deadline for Africa was set back in 2006 by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a UN agency. But even with that nine-year lead time, most African countries are nowhere near ready.
“The migration is a daunting task for any country,” Meredith Beal, technology adviser for the African Media Initiative, the continent’s largest umbrella group of media owners and operators, told onMedia. On the side of TV operators and governments, he said, there are costs related to new infrastructure, digital transmission equipment, the disposal of old analog equipment, training and consumer education – among other issues.
But in some countries, Beal thinks broadcasters have acted in bad faith.
“In my opinion, it is a combination of greed, arrogance, lack of vision and a sense of entitlement on the part of the big boys, which reminds me of how the record industry resisted the progress of online distribution of music,” he said.
Upgrading TV sets
For consumers to watch TV on the new digital system, they will need to either buy a set-top converter box, buy a new digital TV, or subscribe to a pay-TV service with a cable or satellite provider.
“That may be challenging for many citizens,” Beal said.
Tom Jackson, a journalist who writes on African business and technology and co-founded Disrupt Africa, a news portal about Africa’s tech startup and investment scene, also hasn’t minced words on the issue. He’s written that Africa is “woefully unprepared” for the switchover from analog to digital signals and that the word “chaos” might best describe the current situation.
“African countries had nine years to prepare, sensitize their people, and make a smooth switchover,” he told onMedia. “However, there was no urgency, [and] many African countries only really got going in 2010 and 2011.”
According to Jackson, education campaigns to inform people about the digital migration have been inadequate and there haven’t been many efforts on the part of governments to subsidize them for poor households.
“Then,” he added, “the process in a number of places ended up in fights, many of which led to court.”
Blank screens
The biggest dust-up over digital migration has been Kenya. For 19 days, many citizens in the country, one of the largest TV markets in Africa, were staring at blank screens after four of Kenya’s main free-to-air TV stations turned off their signal due to a row with the government over the switchover.
The ITU has exempted 30 African countries from having to switch to digital in June. Those countries include northern Africa nations such as Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Egypt as well as several in or near the Horn of Africa – Ethiopia, Somalia, Eritrea and Sudan. But according to Jackson, these exemptions were agreed upon back in 2006, and those countries that signed up to the June 2015 deadline will have to abide by it.
That’s led to something of a panic as a few countries have rushed through the migration process before they’re ready.
Tanzania turned off its analog broadcasting last year, even though only about 500,000 of the necessary digital signal decoders were in use in a country of some three million TV sets. In Rwanda, more than a quarter of people with televisions hadn’t gotten a decoder when the nation switched off its analog broadcasts on July 31, 2014.
“Now people are denied access to often their only source of information,” Jackson said.
Even South Africa, one of the continents most developed countries, has fallen behind in its preparations – its expected not to meet the deadline although there are contradictory accounts of when the switchover might happen.
The reason the deadline matters is because after June 17, the ITU will no longer protect analog signals from interference. So if one country stays analog but broadcasters in neighboring countries begins transmitting using a digital signal, it could make the analog signal unwatchable. This is of particular concern in border areas.
Digital dividend, delayed
Another issue is that when a country’s broadcasters delay switching from analog to digital, they continue to occupy valuable bandwidth that could otherwise be used to roll out broadband internet, badly needed in Africa. This potential for better internet as a result of digital TV migration is known as the ‘digital dividend.’
Tom Jackson believes it’s a “lose-lose” situation for Africa. “The main issue is in what doesn’t happen, i.e. no better TV, no digital dividend,” he said.
But while Africa is lagging, it’s certainly not the only place the digital migration is hitting hurdles.
“Countries in Asia and Latin America have had similar challenges of financing infrastructure and equipment, training, and educating law-makers and regulators of the implications of the technology,” said Meredith Beal from the African Media Initiative.
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]]>The list of ethical challenges facing journalism today is a long one. How can we get at the truth when flooded by unverified information? How do we maintain integrity as new business models and partnerships become necessary for survival? How should journalists behave on social media platforms?
onMedia put a few questions on changing journalism ethics to Steve Buttry, an American journalist, editor and educator who writes and speaks frequently on the topic.
Should ethical standards in journalism evolve along with changes in the profession or are they immutable?
Some values are certainly immutable, but ethical standards are more specific than the underlying values. And even values change over time. For instance, objectivity didn’t start as an important value of journalism, but was an economic response to serving news organizations of varying political views in a time when having a viewpoint was regarded as important. So the notion that all of our values are timeless is exaggerated anyway.
Take the general underlying value that journalists should attribute our sources of information. Perhaps that is immutable. But the specific standards of how we apply the value need to be updated to respond to such matters as technology (the ability to link to our sources of information) and practice (excessive use of unnamed sources and weak explanations of why reporters grant confidentiality to sources).
What is driving this need for change?
Technology certainly is driving some of the change. In addition to the linking issue I’ve cited, public discussions on social media have presented ethical issues we need to address. The government’s ability to snoop has created ethical issues relating to unnamed sources and our ability to keep promises of confidentiality. The news cycle raises new issues relating to our long-held principles of fairness: Allegation and response often come in separate updates of a running story, for instance. The marketplace also presents new twists to old issues: The value of independence is a long-held value in journalism ethics, and new developments such as native advertising present new situations in which to apply that value.
We also can update our standards as people develop better practices independently of technology. A checklist is not a technological development, but it is the best system ever developed to prevent errors, so effective that it is required for such high-pressure professionals as surgeons and pilots. Well, when Craig Silverman [of the corrections blog Regret the Error] started advocating accuracy checklists for journalists, that wasn’t a technological development or a marketplace change. It was just a smart journalist calling us to raise our standards in a way we hadn’t thought of before. But he’s right, and we should require and teach the consistent use of checklists.
Can you give an example of how ethics should evolve in the context of technological developments?
Linking is a perfect example. Attribution has never been a value that journalists practiced consistently. Some attributed vaguely, especially if the competition had beaten them, either attributing to “media reports” or using passive voice, such as “was reported.” So the very fact that we can link now presents ethical choices and debates: Should we require linking in ethics codes or just encourage it in practice? My view is that ethical codes should say that journalists should link to their digital sources. I was pleased to see the New York Times address this, even if they did it as a matter of style, rather than ethics. And you should embed actual original materials (tweets, videos, documents) when possible, rather than merely quoting from them.
While you can’t link to your unnamed sources, technology presents important issues there, too. Ethics codes say we should keep promises of confidentiality, but that’s a technology issue today, too. If you grant confidentiality to a source, how do you protect that? Using encryption software, “burner” cellphones and other technology measures?
Are considerations like objectivity and fairness now considered outdated?
The journalist who is practicing objectivity still exercises opinions several times on every story. You decide that this story is more worthy of your time. Then you decide on the sources you will interview for the story. Then you decide which facts you gather belong in the story and which won’t make the story. And which fact(s) will lead the story, and which words you use to tell the story. We think of ourselves as being objective throughout the process, and we call these “news judgments,” rather than opinions.
Fairness has its flaws, too, because we started equating fairness with balance, which sometimes abdicated our obligation to seek the truth and report it. Instead of actually reporting the truth, we balanced conflicting statements in the name of fairness, sometimes publishing statements we knew were lies and failing to debunk them sufficiently or at all.
I don’t dismiss the value of neutrality (which I prefer to “objectivity,” because we aren’t objects; we’re people). And I do think we should be fair. But I think some of our practices in the name of these old values need re-examination, and I’m pleased that we are discussing these values and how to apply them.
What has the rise of social media had on thinking about journalistic ethics?
Let’s take two examples of ways that social media has presented ethical challenges: Verification of facts and expression of personal opinions.
Verifying information we heard from the community has always been an important challenge for journalists. You get an anonymous tip over the phone or you get a tip from a trusted source and you don’t publish it right away; you get to work trying to learn whether it’s true. Social media is another important source of tips for journalists. But the tips are right out there in public (as many rumors we chase have always been), and they have this retweet button that lets us add our credibility to the tips and rumors. So we need to learn how to join the social media conversation and still apply our standards of verification and accuracy.
Opinions have never been inherently bad journalism. As I noted, journalism was largely opinionated before the ethic of objectivity developed. And even in the era of objectivity, we had editorial writers, cartoonists and columnists who were still expected to express their opinions. And, of course, in our newsrooms and in bars and private conversations, even the so-called objective journalists were pretty free with their personal opinions, even about matters they covered. Sometimes journalists got in trouble for expressing these opinions, but usually the conversations were private, among colleagues, family and friends, so no one got in trouble. Social media feel like a similar conversation, but the setting is more public.
I don’t think news organizations are in agreement in how to address these social media issues, but I think we’re having some good conversations about the issues, and providing better guidance than we were a few years ago.
How do you ensure good journalism ethics are actually followed by journalists? Publish a code?
I think ethics codes are helpful, but good conversations about journalism are more helpful and more important. I have been involved in six notable efforts to improve ethical guidance for journalists. I think they show the variety of both the issues we face and the guidance we need.
Two were efforts to provide overall codes for journalists to follow, the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics and Poynter’s Guiding Principles for the Journalist. I think both updates were helpful, but neither went as far as I would have liked (both, for instance, failed to address linking). The Radio Television Digital News Association also is working to update its ethics code.
Three other efforts took narrow slices of journalism ethics, rather than trying to update a whole code, and provided detailed advice in that particular area:
In addition the Online News Association is working on a project to produce building blocks for news organizations to produce their own ethics codes, reflecting their values and standards. We expect that project to be finished later this spring.
In general, how do you feel that the profession is doing these days when it comes to ethics?
I’m pleased that we have such a robust discussion of ethics in journalism, and I think the conversation will result in more ethical journalism. We have honest disagreements about some topics, and I don’t think that means the people who disagree with me are unethical. While I am pleased with this attention to ethics, the frequency with which we see shameful practices such as plagiarism and fabrication is discouraging. I was discouraged that [CNN host and Washington Post columnist] Fareed Zakaria’s employers were not more responsive to the thorough documentation of his extensive plagiarism.
All in all, I’d say journalists care a lot about ethics and generally make good ethical decisions. But I’d still like us to do better.
Steve Buttry has more than 40 years’ experience in the news business. He has been a reporter, editor and educator. He was formerly the Digital Transformation Editor for Digital First Media and today is the a visiting scholar at the Manship School of Mass Communication at Louisiana State University. He blogs extensively on the media at The Buttry Diary. You can find him on Twitter at @stevebuttry.
Photo credits: flickr/Dan Mason CC:BY-NC-SA; Steve Buttry; flickr/Toban B. CC:BY-NC)
Interview by Kyle James, post edited by Kate Hairsine
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As journalists, we always strive to tell the truth in an accurate manner and realize the words we choose affect the impression we leave on our readers, viewers or listeners. Being as fair and accurate as possible is particularly important when it comes to reporting on sexual abuse.
OnMedia’s Sean Sinico looks at responsible ways to report on rape and other forms of intimate partner violence and sexual abuse.
Journalists are used to dealing with a new topic every day when they go to work. Today it’s the city council, tomorrow it’s local business, and who knows what it’ll be the day after that. But when the task is reporting on sexual abuse and the people who’ve suffered it, journalists shouldn’t treat it like any other day at the office.
It’s easy to revictimize a person by making them relive terrible experiences for an interview and then see their lives presented in the media in a manner they didn’t want. Media reports also often make it sound like the crimes committed against the people who experienced abuse were the result of something the survivor or victim did – who they were or were not with, what they said or wore – and some reports can even imply that violent sexual abuse was actually an act of consensual sex or permissible for cultural or societal reasons.
These factors all make reporting on sexual abuse difficult, but they aren’t reasons to ignore a widespread and important issue – the World Health Organization estimates that 35 percent of women worldwide have experienced either intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence. Under such circumstances, truthful and accurate reporting showing the devastating effects of rape and other forms of sexual abuse can promote positive social change at the local, national and even international level.
Here’s how you can make sure your work with survivors of intimate partner violence and sexual abuse doesn’t make a too-common problem even worse for the people already living with it.
The interview
Before starting your interview, be clear with the interviewees how what they say will be used, what type of media they will appear in, and ask if their identities need to be protected.
Listen closely to what interviewees say. You don’t want to make sexual assault victims repeat what happened to them unnecessarily. Also make sure you have a good list of open-ended questions that will allow your interviewees to share as much as they are comfortable with. Respect your interviewee’s decision not to answer questions.
The majority of females who have experienced sexual violence tend to be more comfortable with a female interviewer. If that is impossible, it is a good idea to have a female colleague present at the interview.
Never say you know how they feel – even if you have suffered from sexual violence yourself. It is impossible to completely understand another person’s feelings about the violence committed against them.
Extra info: The human rights organization Witness has compiled an excellent guide and set of checklists for interviewing survivors of sexual and gender-based violence. It is also available as a printable and easier-to-read PDF.
The report
Getting it wrong when writing about survivors of violent sexual abuse is easy, and it happens too often. No matter what a person’s previous choices in life, no one deserves to be abused and nothing serves as justification for sexual abuse.
As you write, make sure to keep the following points in in mind:
Rape, intimate partner violence and sexual abuse are always crimes. In your writing, be sure to make it clear who was responsible for the criminal behavior by avoiding the passive voice, which put the focus on the victim. Clearly describe what happened. Instead of “she was abused,” you can write: “an unknown man raped her.”
You’ll need to decide how much detail of your interviewee’s experience to include in your report. It’s up to you to find the balance between providing too detailed a picture and not making the gravity of your interviewee’s experiences clear to readers.
If, during your writing, you find words like “alleged,” “admits,” “confesses,” “was raped,” “was abused,” “unharmed” or “had sex,” then you should double-check to make sure your report is clear about who the victim and who the perpetrator of the crime are. The US-based Chicago Taskforce on Violence Against Girls & Young Women has a PDF toolkit addressing exactly these phrases and what makes them inaccurate. New England Law also maintains a lengthy list of problematic language used in court documents and serves as an excellent resource of terms you should not use in your writing and suggests better alternatives that focus on the victim’s experience.
Provide context for the crime you’re reporting. Definitions of rape and sexual abuse vary around the world and reliable statistics are often hard to find because victims often do not officially press charges against perpetrators. To get a wider view of the issues, talk to health experts and NGOs to find out how widespread sexual assault is where you are, how people react to it, and how survivors cope. Painting the individual case you’re working as part of a broader social issue can help create greater awareness for sexual assault and also serve to support public health and preventative measures.
If you promised anonymity to your interviewees, make sure that there are no details in your report that allow anyone to identify them.
Consider including steps other victims of intimate personal violence or sexual abuse can take to find help coping with the crimes committed against them. Links to local NGOs and other resources offering support to survivors can help people find assistance they might not have known about.
Consider letting your interviewee read your report before it’s published or broadcast. This will help the interviewee know what to expect when the report is made public and can bring any inaccuracies to light.
More information
This is the place where I’d generally give you links to excellent reporting on sexual abuse. Such examples, however, are difficult to find. In a 2013 interview, Claudia Garcia-Rojas, an editor of the Chicago Taskforce media toolkit linked to above, said she looked at hundreds of articles about rape and sexual assault for positive example and found two, which “weren’t even about rape, they were stories about covering rape.”
My own searches were equally unsatisfying, so instead of positive examples, I’ll ask you to read through the links above – even if you don’t think rape or sexual violence is a topic you’ll have to cover. The tragic spread of sexual violence means at some point in your career – whether you expect it or not – you’re certain to come in contact with a victim of sexual violence, and you owe it to that person to have an idea of how to handle the situation.
If, in addition to the links above, if you’d like more in-depth information on reporting on sexual abuse, check out the Poynter News University course Reporting on Sexual Violence and its 2009 webinar Covering Sexual Assault. The Scottish charity Zero Tolerance has created a PDF document covering in more detail many of the topics addressed in this post.
** For information on where victims of intimate partner violence or sexual abuse can turn to, the HotPeachPages website maintains an international list of abuse and crisis hotlines.
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