noodlepie

Live: Finbarr O' Reilly discusses Congo

Reuters snapper Finbarr O' Reilly will be discussing his experience in the Democratic Republic of Congo and what first took him to Africa live online today, Wednesday, Jan. 14. Finbarr will use the excellent mobile phone video broadcast tool Qik to broadcast live at 17.00 GMT / 1200 ET. You can follow Finbarr on Twitter and ask him a question. Click the image above to go direct to the broadcast channel or follow the talk on the Reuters blog,

Amid the chaos of fighting, people fleeing their homes and the demand for quick news pictures, I tried to slow things down by taking intimate portraits. By shooting with a very low depth of field, I hoped to extract my subjects from their surroundings and portray them as individuals with names and stories that matter. More than five million people have died, most from lack of access to food or basic health, during a decade of fighting in Congo. This makes Congo ’s enduring conflict the deadliest since World War Two. link

I'm cross-posting this from the Frontline blog to see how well it all goes across mutliple sites.

Voices from Kandahar

Kandahar by night, originally uploaded by alex_strick.

I'm helping out Alex, the only unembedded journalist/blogger based pretty much full-time in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan with a bid for the 2008 Knight News Challenge. Knight dishes out grants for innovative journalism projects on a yearly basis. There's $5 million up for grabs and we're hoping a wee bit of it will go to fund this local reporting project in Kandahar. If you're interested, take a look at the bid here. We'd welcome comments. The bid stage closes on November 1.

Peter Apps profiled

Bean meaning to blog a bit more about work things - just not enough time for food and what have you these days. Plenty going on that's interesting and hopefully can reveal a bit more about it over the next three months. Meanwhile, here's a piece I did for the Press Gazette a week or so back,

When Benazir Bhutto was blown up on December 27, he spoke to three analysts and had an investment analysis piece on the wire in the space of a couple of hours. “Now, that’s fast in anyone’s terms,” says Peter Apps, a reporter on the emerging markets desk at Reuters in London’s Canary Wharf. And especially when you consider this is a journalist who can’t move his arms or legs, let alone type.

Peter is paralysed. He needs help to get out of bed, to eat and to travel. But when it comes to work, things are really not that much different. “I don’t think most people expected I would get back to the stage of doing what is essentially a frontline markets reporting job where I’d be able to travel, go out and do interviews,” he says. “That wasn’t something people visualised at the time of the accident. But I visualised it.”

Peter went to Sri Lanka in October 2005, 10 months after the tsunami and about three years into the ceasefire between the government and the Tamil Tigers. He was covering general news, finance and whatever was going on until an election boycott by the Tamil Tigers led to an escalation of violence by late August 2006.

Everything changed for him in the September when the minibus he was travelling in collided with a tractor. Peter broke his neck in the accident, which also left three other people badly injured. He was helicoptered back to the Sri Lankan capital, where he stayed for two weeks.Then he was flown back to London to convalesce at King’s College Hospital and a private nursing home in Buckinghamshire.

“I got out of hospital on 4 June 2007 and I got back to work on 5 June,” explains Apps. “There was a fairly widespread view that it wasn’t going to be possible for me to get back to doing very much. The principle problem is that I can’t type.”

Specialist equipment

This is where technology helps. He uses some specialist equipment to help him in his work, and although he’s experienced a few teething troubles for the most part it’s a reliable and quick method of reporting.

“A piece of voice recognition software called Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 allows me to dictate and control all the basic functions of my laptop and a second screen I have with markets on,” he explains. “Then I have a head mouse, which is basically a webcam that scans my face and scans the dot on the end of my microphone, so wherever I turn my head to on the screen it’s where the mouse pointer goes. That is essentially it.

“The software takes dictation slowly, slower than average talking pace, which is incredibly fast. It probably makes about one mistake in 10. Once you’ve corrected that mistake I reckon I’m about the same speed as my old typing.

“I record on tape and play it back, and when I hear a good quote I use the software to transcribe that. It’s not a perfect system, but it works.”

Apps’s first job back at work was with AlertNet, a web-based platform run by the Reuters Foundation to cover humanitarian news.

In September last year he made a 10-day trip to Scandinavia to report and help market Alertnet. From that he went on to work on the commodities team, the UK bureau and then on to emerging markets.

Apps says that his new working methods are essentially the same as they ever were and that having to speak the words into print has made him a better writer: “It’s probably improved my writing style a bit. On the other hand, that was something I was trying to do before the accident. It’s probably a healthy thing in that respect. It’s more difficult to write a nonsensical sentence.”

In an era of less staff, more deadlines, and more demand for words, Apps adheres to an old-school approach. He makes sure he gets out of the office several times a week and insists that face-to-face contact can’t be replaced with phone calls and emails.

“I’m still a great believer in actually seeing things on the ground and talking to people in person,” he says. “As people have to write more stories a day it gets more difficult to do that. I would still say it’s very important. I think it’d be a great pity if we get to the stage when we cover all these things without going out into the real world. That’s certainly a risk.”

He admits that he is not what most interviewees expect to meet when he arranges face-to-face-meetings.

“I try to warn them in advance that I haven’t got working arms or legs. People don’t seem to be that taken aback. I haven’t, so far, arranged to meet someone and forgotten to mention that in advance, but I’m sure one day it’ll happen,” he says.

“It does mean if you’re arranging lunch with a contact, if it’s someone you’re pretty comfortable with, you have to ask them to feed you, but that’s not the end of the world. I don’t think things have changed that much – maybe to less of an extent than most people expect.”

It was his determination to get back to work and to avoid going into a nursing home that drove him on after the accident.

“I made it very clear I didn’t see any reason why I couldn’t get back to work. If anything, I was deliberately over confident to try and make it as hard as possible to wriggle out of it. Now I’m here it’s not a problem.”

As for the future, he enjoys the world of finance and emerging markets, but he likes the idea of being overseas again.

“I’d like to get back to an emerging bureau. I don’t see any reason why that’s physically undoable. Johannesburg, Jerusalem or somewhere like that. I do quite enjoy being able to bury myself in one story , which I don’t have the option of doing here because it’s much more a global role. However, given what’s going on in the global economy at the moment emerging markets is an interesting place to be.” link

From the digital frontline

I've started writing a monthly column for the Frontline Club magazine. I'll be covering digital media in its broadest sense with specific relation to how changes in media and technology impact upon foreign correspondents and war reporters - not that I've been near a war in my life, of course - I may occasionally commission other journalists to write pieces, should they show an interest and have something to say. The first column can be found here. I hope to integrate this into the frontline blogs in the not too distant future to allow for comments and more of that webtwopoint0 stuff. I find the substance of the first column quite inspiring. In fact, I might just have described my dream job. Once there's some kind of feed up of the column I'll link to it in the right hand side.

"But, you're talking about people who are still grappling with email..."

...was one line that stuck in my head after a BBC blogging "think tank" session at Broadcasting House on the 30th October. I was invited along by my friend Robin Hamman to talk about how a blog is (kinda) like a living breathing thing and how social media - in it's broadest facebook, twitter, flickr, youtube, dopplr, linkedin sense - functions in a dramatically differently way from traditional top down media.

I used a very short presentation, and some nifty graphical webbiness, to illustrate this difference. Once that was done, my one sole argument was that there was all this "stuff" going on independently of professional, established media outlets and the challenge isn't really to become "a part" of what's going on, to become a part of that conversation - as a journalist wouldn't become "a part" of a story he or she is reporting - but more a question of how and when to filter and process social media to enhance a particular story.

Access to people using and creating social media is not the problem, receiving and responding to it is. I argued, I think, that the key challenge is for journalists to learn the skills needed to access this information, to receive it automatically via RSS, to filter it, to process and verify the nuggets that deserve a wider audience in a way that enhances and informs a particular news story.

At present the basic skills to do this are not that difficult to learn technically, although they are a little clunky and they get increasingly clunky the deeper you go. However, the real problem is journalistic culture - how long does it take to immerse yourself in blog culture - for want of a better word - to come out with a real understanding of how the sphere works and how to interact with it? And how many journalists are that keen, or have enough time, to really get to grips with it?

There are a tonne of pseudowank arguments about how journalists should be doing a million different things in the name of "the story" these days. The journalist has enough to do - and for what the British press pay, that's arguably already too much to do. Anyway... the social media space, the internet, is so vast, so multi-faceted, are we not already at a point where it is impossible for a single journalist to be expected to do a regular reporting job, to access and filter all the hip social media stuff and get a coherent job done? Maybe the geeky journos could handle it, but certainly not Joe Journalist at the Hicksville Gazette who's still struggling with email.

The internet is not getting smaller which means that it's only gonna get harder and harder for journalists to filter and process this stuff. Until such time as journalists and editors have the tools to efficiently and nonclunkily filter the social web, I think we might have arrived at a point where a new editorial level needs to be created - effectively a social media editorial filter - and yes, I do realise that sounds like total pants, but what the...

Talking to a group of journalists in London, I heard a couple of interesting stories about how some bloggers had been hired on a freelance basis to do this very job - filter social media stuff for journalists. And if you think about it, it makes perfect sense. Many bloggers are experts in navigating social media and are definitely more adept at finding the most important stuff than pretty much any journalist.

Whether there's the will and/or the cash to go this route, or whether there's already some startup designing idiotproof social media filtering tools for journalists which will make any new editorial layer obsolete before it is created I have no idea. But, it's a thought, innit.

Good innit

The Observer Food Monthly blog is kicking out some good stuff this week, I really need to up my game... Jay Rayner has a splendidly eloquent rant about food criticism - which I basically agree with, but am pondering a response, if any. The Crash Test Kitchen are, I hope, a portent of what is to come from the video end of OFM. My own sandwich blethering seems a bit lame errrr... sandwiched in between. Time to come out all bells and whistles and ring and blow 'em good. I am spending an awful lot of time elsewhere these days and I'm really chuffed to blog that we - the Frontline Club - will be on BBC Newsnight next week. Twas supposed to be ce soir, but shit happens. As journalism outlets go, they don't come much better than Newsnight. More on all that as and when. PS. I've seen a feature that will run in this weekend's OFM and it's bloody wicked. If you like British food, and you live in Britain, go buy it this Sunday :) if not, grab it online....

Technorati Tags: journalism, newsnight, frontline club, Observer Food Monthly

Digital toolbox for journalists

This is an html (raw edit) version of a piece I did for the Press Gazette. I think RSS, del.icio.us, a blog, scribefire and twitter are the key tools here. I'm working on a training course for journalists who want to know how to use these tools effectively. Got anything to add??? drop a comment or email me.

You have a wifi enabled laptop and the latest mobile phone so what else do you need to work as a digital reporter?

Interview recording - The Olympus DS-2 Digital Voice Recorder is highly portable, easy to use and plugs straight into a PC/Mac. It is voice activated and can record up to 22 hours of audio. It costs £97. If you already own an iPod, you could consider buying a Micromemo. It costs around £25 and plugs directly into the base on an iPod or iPod Nano. Audio quality from the built in flexible, detachable microphone is good or you can use another mic. Audacity is free audio editing software that some newspapers, including The Guardian, use to produce podcasts.

Google for grown ups - saving bookmarks with a social bookmarking service like del.icio.us or furl offers two key benefits for journalists. You can use the network functions to link with people who share the same interests and subscribe to particularly good bookmarkers and keyword RSS feeds. Social bookmarking is a fantastic way of sharing research with what is effectively a human search engine.

Browsing - Firefox browser has over 1000 extensions, including note taking tools like Clipmarks and blog writers like ScribeFire. Flock is a flexible alternative that bills itself as the "social web browser" with built in blogging, social bookmarking and photo sharing. Google's not the only search engine. Alltheweb is highly customisable and offers live search.

News - RSS feeds deliver the news to you as it is published. Download an RSS newsreader, like Vienna or Snarfware, and subscribe to newspapers, blogs and more. Bloglines and Google Reader are two excellent online alternatives. But, don't stop there. Subscribe to RSS feeds from keyword searches on blog search engine sites such as Technorati and Google Blog Search. Netvibes is a useful tool that brings all this information, email and more onto one web page, although it can take time to configure.

Multimedia - whether it be for research or the printed page, photo sharing sites like Flickr and BubbleshareYouTube, Blip.tv and Vimeo do the same for video footage. Some travel journalists are now in the habit of uploading short video snippets to aid the memory and writing process. Free software like Shozu lets you upload pictures and video from your mobile phone to photo and video sharing websites or a blog automatically. For the sound and vision mashers of the mulitmedia newsroom the £20 Soundslides download is the weapon of choice. offer an easy way to store images either publicly or privately.

Google it - Google offers a wide range of reliable services to help keep you organised. Gmail has a massive 1GB of email storage and integrates well with offline email readers and address books. With Google documents you can write and store features online and work collaboratively. Google calendar is a shareable calendar. Google Notebook helps you store clippings of text, images and links from web pages. Use Google Alerts to find out when a new news item or web page with a keyword or topic you are interested in is published.

It's your call - Skype, Google Talk and Gizmo are three of the most popular internet telephony tools. Computer to computer calls are free. Calls to fixed lines or mobiles are relatively cheap. However, sound quality and connection reliability are patchy. Gizmo is currently the most flexible. It offers free calls to other Gizmo users, Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, or Windows Live users. Cheap add-ons allow you to make and receive calls from any mobile phone or landline. Gizmo is the only one to offer call recording as an integrated part of the software.

Contacts - It is possible to sync contacts stored in your computer address book with most mobile phones, other computers and web email services like Gmail and Yahoo! This offers added security if your computer and/or your phone are lost or broken. Services such as Linked in offer far more in depth ways of storing and sharing your contacts.

Blogs - Blogger is a popular free service provided by Google. Typepad is a low cost, professional service while Wordpress and Movable Type are for the more technically minded. Windows Live Writer is downloadable blog writing software that links into Windows Live Spaces. Some journalists use a blog to simply store published articles.

Never forget - Remember the milk is a "task manager" It will help you remember anything, so long as you remember to tell it to remember.

Working as a journalist in Vietnam

I often get emails from journalists and the like who either want to work in Vietnam or visit to work on some story or other, anything from sensitive human rights stories, illegal immigration features to food and travel stories. Here are a few common assumptions about working as a journalist in Vietnam I received this week,

Freelancing is basically illegal in Vietnam, the government will not give you any access unless you are fully accredited.

In order to be accredited, a bureau must be set up by a credible news organisation (and "fees" paid to the foreign ministry).

Journalists MUST be based in Hanoi.

Permission is required by the government every time you want to leave to report outside of your home city.

The whole thing is basically unfeasible.

Can anyone out there - Kay? Julien? - confirm or deny these assumptions? This was always the way I kinda saw it - through word of mouth more than anything else - but has the situation changed any?

Technorati Tags: Vietnam, Vietnamese journalism, freelancing, Asia

"the tools are all in place"

I wrote a piece for the Press Gazette while I was in London last week. It's about how the BBC plans to use social media - blogs, flickr, youtube, twitter etc. - in their coverage of the build up to the Turkish election at the end of July.

“This is an experiment to look at how a series of international reports can be spread through social media sites and hopefully reach new audiences,” says Richard Sambrook, director of BBC Global News. “We talk a lot about convergence – but we want to explore what that can really mean in international reporting.”

If anybody can remember in the very dim and distant, this is a theme I've been keenly interested in for a number of years. However, as Ben Hammersley - who'll be doing the reporting for the BBC - says, "the tools are all now in place" That wasn't quite the case a couple of years ago. Also, the ever growing popularity of social media site like facebook, twitter and the photo and video sharing sites illustrates just how easy these tools have grown to use. It's not the preserve of techies anymore.

I think the real biggie is time. To do a good social media job - with all the interaction that demands - on top of the old media job could potentially take an awful lot of time - especially the video and the interaction. Have you ever tried uploading a video to YouTube??? One video I uploaded took more than ten hours to appear. Most of the other stuff is fairly quick to do and even automated as Robin points out.

It'll be interesting to see what lessons old media outlets like the BBC learn from this "pilot project" and how, if it is successful, they will get other reporters to follow suit, in full or in part. FWIW - regardless of all the hype surrounding a lot of social media, I think if journalists have to choose one tool from the cannon, let it be del.icio.us - best collaborative research tool out there, IMO. Lastly, links to all my public social media accounts can be had in the top right column.

Update: some buzzback from readers here and here - which is gratifying.

Technorati Tags: pressgazette, BBC, social media reporting, journalism

Twitter politics

It seems every other journalist is writing about Twitter and I'm no exception. I penned a piece for the current edition of Total Content and Media Magazine (registration required or Download the pdf ) about how some politicians are using social media tools and Twitter in particular.

On March 21, UK Secretary of State for education and skills, Alan Johnson, launched his campaign for the deputy leadership of the Labour party.

“These days dull, standard, automatically generated emails are beginning to look as ancient as the telegram,” Johnson said in a speech in front of children at a school presentation.

Johnson is one of six hopefuls taking their campaigns online, but unlike his rivals he has embraced free-to-use social networking tools.

Stuart Bruce, spokesman for the Johnson campaign, believes the social networking technology he helped set up is allowing people back into the political process by providing direct contact with politicians.

He says technology is bringing the process full circle. “A lot of people say this is revolutionising the way politics works, but it isn’t,” says Bruce. “If you go back to how politics started you had little more than a street corner soap box. That was about having conversations and listening to people. What’s happening is you’re moving old school politics into the new world. For a long time, the old school got replaced by broadcast and print media. Direct contact disappeared to some extent. Now it has come back.”

Bit more background in the Guido Fawkes interview I posted a while back. And here's Stuart Bruce's original blog post that sparked the idea for the feature.