The future of digital media in the Western Balkans will be the main theme of a major conference in Belgrade organised by the BBC’s Serbian service. The Balkan media market is facing serious challenges such as the proliferation of fake news, the fragmentation of the media scene and financial instability.
The Director of BBC World Service Group, Jamie Angus and senior BBC journalists will come together with leading media representatives from around the region at the one-day conference. They will discuss some of the key issues facing the region’s digital news industry, and how the BBC’s standards, experience and insights can help serve the regional audiences on digital platforms.
Jamie Angus will open the conference, the Future of digital news in the Western Balkans, at Belgrade’s Hotel Zira on Tuesday 24 April. UK Ambassador to Serbia, Denis Keefe, will join Jamie Angus to greet participants. First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Serbia, Ivica Dacic, will join Jamie for the closing of the conference.
Jamie Angus says: “Just as our newly launched service, BBC News Serbian, is establishing itself on the regional media scene, I am very happy to welcome our colleagues from Serbia, Montenegro, and Bosnia and Herzegovina to join us in a very timely conversation about reaching and serving digital audiences.”
The subjects to be discussed at the conference include:
- Rising to the global challenge: quality news in the age of fakes, fragmentation and financial uncertainty
- Future of digital news – regional voices
- The Serbian diaspora and digital news – what are they reading and why?
- The BBC Newsroom stylebook – creating a standard style for online journalism
- The business of digital news – where does the money come from?
BBC News Serbian (BBC News na srpskom) digital service was launched on 26 March 2018 and in its first week reached over 95 thousand people through its website, bbc.com/serbian and social media (Twitter and Facebook). BBC News Serbian was the last of the 12 new language services launched as part of the expansion of the BBC World Service between 2017 and 2018.