A eulogy for the free press in Hong Kong, the 2021 RISJ Digital News Report, and the role of stringers in Syria and elsewhere

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A eulogy for the free press. Apple Daily was a flawed symbol for media rights. But its closure marks a dark new chapter in Hong Kong.

RISJ Digital News Report 2021. This year’s report reveals new insights about digital news consumption based on a YouGov survey of over 92,000 online news consumers in 46 markets including India, Indonesia, Thailand, Nigeria, Colombia and Peru for the first time. The report looks at the impact of coronavirus on news consumption and on the economic prospects for publishers. It looks at progress on new paid online business models, trust and misinformation, local news, impartiality and fairness in news coverage.

Behind the byline: The human toll of how we (still) get news out of Syria. I covered Syria until shortly before the Baba Amr attack for AFP. Along with our colleagues and competitors, we were almost entirely reliant on stringers for some key parts of the newsmaking process. I have since studied the relationship between leading news organizations based in what is referred to as the Global North and stringers living in what is commonly called the Global South. For the past six years, I have interviewed and worked alongside stringers and their editors at newspapers, newswires, and television networks to document the newsmaking process out of crisis zones. I’ve outlined below the key internal differentiations and findings that have guided and been shaped by my dive into understanding the relationship between news organizations and stringers in Syria. The picture that emerges from this research is a complex, hierarchical ecology of newsmaking that marginalizes those it depends on for coverage. Stringers face forms of precarity that further compound the difficulties that already confront foreign freelancers.

Crushing climate impacts to hit sooner than feared: draft UN report. Climate change will fundamentally reshape life on Earth in the coming decades, even if humans can tame planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions, according to a landmark draft report from the UN’s climate science advisors obtained by AFP.

Three years of deteriorating press freedom in Nicaragua. In April of 2018, Daniel Ortega, the president of Nicaragua, announced reforms to the country’s social security benefits. Protests erupted, following years of discontent with the increasingly repressive regime. The Ortega government responded with brutal crackdowns on protesters, political opponents, and the independent press that still have not abated.

China’s state tobacco company is massive at home. now it’s ready to take over the world. It’s the biggest cigarette company you’ve never heard of.  While the China National Tobacco Corporation (CNTC) produces nearly half the world’s cigarettes, almost all of them have been consumed at home. Until recently. Investigation by OCCRP.

The Daphne Caruana Galizia Prize for Journalism – call for submission of entries. On 22 June, the European Parliament officially launched the website and the call for submissions for entries to the Daphne Caruana Galizia Prize for Journalism. The €20,000 Prize will reward on a yearly basis outstanding journalism that promotes or defends the core principles and values of the European Union such as human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, rule of law, and human rights.

Before his murder, Mexican journalist was using RSF to beg authorities for protection. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls for an overhaul of Mexico’s federal mechanism for protecting journalists after two Mexican journalists were murdered in the space of 24 hours. One of them, Gustavo Sánchez Cabrera, had repeatedly reported being threatened and was waiting to receive protection from the federal authorities.

How my focus on analytics has changed as an independent publisher. Analytics for independent publishers is always a tricky thing. We need the same high-end data-rich insights that the biggest publishers have, but we don’t have the resources, the scale, or the data to work with. So what do we do? Well, in this article, I’m going to take you through my focus on analytics here on this site, and how that has changed over the years.

Koo is selling itself as a Twitter substitute in Nigeria. The Indian microblogging app has built a partisan audience in India by supporting government restrictions on social platforms.

Image credit: screenshot from video