26 May 2009
Deutsche WElle reports that German Family Minister Ursula von der Leyen is the latest and most prominent German child advocate to speak out against private television channel RTL’s decision to go ahead with ‘Erwachsen auf Probe’, or ‘Grown-up on Probation’. Von der Leyen urged RTL to either ‘stop the show or thoroughly re-work it.’
Yet RTL has said it will do no such thing and intends to air the first episode on June 3 as planned. The show follows four teenage couples who have said they want to become parents. The teenagers are given a borrowed baby to care for over several days and TV crews document their struggles to change diapers and quiet temper tantrums. The show poses the question: are these teenagers really ready to take on parenthood?
Criticism from child advocates has been building in recent weeks. German child advocates say the show exploits the young children who are being loaned out to inexperienced teenagers. The German parliament’s commission for children issued a statement in which it chastised RTL for using children as guinea pigs and for ‘exploiting children in an irresponsible manner.’ The commission urged RTL not to air the series. Germany’s Federation for the Protection of Children has also weighed in, saying it is ‘furious’ at the concept, which it claims puts children at ‘high risk.’ The show has cleared all necessary regulatory hurdles. RTL has pointed out that the babies are monitored around the clock by child psychologists and doctors to ensure that the inexperienced caregivers do no harm and that the parents are also just off camera.
26 May 2009
As reported by the Press Gazette, Zimbabwe’s prime minister Morgan Tsvangirai has called for a “new culture of respect” that would allow foreign journalists to report freely from the troubled southern African nation. The veteran opposition leader, who formed a coalition with president Robert Mugabe in February, said he deplored recent arrests of journalists.
In a recent news conference he said a new state media commission would be formed to “facilitate the opening up of media space”. Stringent licensing of local and foreign journalists that effectively banned most foreign news organisations from entering the country had ceased to apply under the coalition agreement, he said. Tsvangirai said journalists and media organisations are no longer legally obliged to apply for accreditation until a new media commission is in place.
While organisations including the BBC were banned from entering the country – many reporters sneak in unofficially – others have been deterred by licensing fees in the tens of the thousands of US dollars.
22 May 2009
Al Jazeera English today announced that it has won the Freesat Award for the Best Digital News Channel. The award recognizes Al Jazeera English as the station which the Freesat judges would turn to when a big story breaks. The award also honors Al Jazeera English for being a channel with a trusted viewpoint and for going beyond just reporting the headlines. Freesat judges also based the award on Al Jazeera Englishs breadth of news coverage, innovative programme formats, cutting edge coverage of the big stories, and relevance to viewers.
Al Jazeera English is honored to receive this award, which embodies one of AJEs greatest strengths our commitment to in-depth and innovative news coverage, said Tony Burman, Managing Director of Al Jazeera English. AJE is proud to be a part of Freesats great success during their inaugural year. We look forward to building on AJEs continuing achievements.
The Freesat awards, the first to be held by the free-to-air satellite TV service, took place last night in London and recognized the best in digital TV and TV-related industries.
20 May 2009
Italy’s public service broadcaster RAI says it will be investing up to Euro 750 million for digital terrestrial television by 2012.
According to RAI director general Mauro Masi, RAI will invest Euro 290 million in the transmission infrastructure, while close to Euro 100 million will be invested in content.
Commercial rival Mediaset is planning to spend an additional Euro 1 billion to complete the analogue switch off in Italy, on top of the Euro 2 billion already spent on the introduction of DTT.
Both RAI and Mediaset, together with Telecom Italia Media, are launching in June the Tivu Sat DTH platform in order to guarantee reception of the Italian DTT channels in those areas where the digital terrestrial signal does not arrive. Viewers will need a special smart-card, which will be sold jointly with the digital box from June. (Report by advanced-television.com)
20 May 2009
The latest version of Twitmatic (www.twitmatic.com), launched this week, lets you search, browse, rate, watch, and skip videos from throughout the Twitter universe – it’s simple.
When you enter a search term, Twitmatic runs it through the Twitter API, looks for links from more than 5,000 domains known to host video and imports them into the system. When other people search for the same term, the system accesses those videos faster than it did the first time, and presents the newer results.
At the same time, in the background, Twitmatic runs searches using an index of search terms, which also helps speed things up, according to ffwd co-founder and senior developer Greg Roberts. (Source: Wired)
20 May 2009
AIB is now among the ranks of the twittering classes! We’ve started a news feed that you can follow titled AIBnews. You’ll find a link below.
We’ll be using twitter to keep AIB members and others in the industry up-to-date with the AIB’s activities and the wider industry.
Follow us…it could be useful!
