Whatever Happened to Journalism?

Today, in the age of (micro-)blogs and big data, the Forth Estate is suspended between extremes. Radical fragmentation and monolithic centralization pose multiple threats to democracy. The project “Whatever happened to journalism?” engages upon a critique of this development and explores alternatives. Starting with a keynote by Konrad Becker the opening event addresses the problem of monolithic centralization in the digital sphere by looking at “Mass Media in the Post-Snowden World”. The workshop “Alternatives to Data-Silos” explores emerging tools for democratic aggregation against the backdrop of the new wealth of networks failing to realize its full potential. In an afternoon workshop the conference investigates models of complicity in new journalism networks. More

Have a look at the guests:

When you roll over the photo with your mouse, the name of the respective guest pops up and the part of the conference she/he is involved in. Click on the photo for further info.

‘You Had Your Debate’: Mass Media in the Post-Snowden World

Konrad Becker’s keynote adopts a speculative bird’s eye view on Mass Media in the Post-Snowden World. Two short lectures dig into cases of liberated as well as repressed news: Sonya Song excavates censorerd news in China and unlocks their hidden power, while Stefan Candea tells the story of prokopovi.ch – an activist-run Belarusian high-visibilty platform for money exchange which became a source for independent news. Krystian Woznicki provides an introduction.

Date: December 6th, 7 p.m. | Format: Panel
Keynote: Konrad Becker (World-Information.net). Speakers: Sonya Yan Song (Mozilla Open News), Krystian Woznicki (berlinergazette.de), Stefan Candea (thesponge.eu).
Moderation: Lili Masuhr (leidmedien.de)
Location: c-base, Rungestraße 20, Berlin-Kreuzberg

Documentation: Photos | Video | Text (Ger/Eng)

Alternatives to Data-Silos: Tools for Democratic Aggregation

This panel presents results from a series of Berliner Gazette-workshops that started at the conference “Digital Backyards” (October 2012) and “Digital Backyards Japan” (January 2013) asking about alternatives to Google and Facebook; then continued at the hackathon “bottom-up & open” (May 2013) and recently culminated at the conference “Complicity” (November 2013) once again bringing together Hackers and Journalists.

Date: December 7th, 6 p.m. | Format: Panel
Guests: Markus “fin” Hametner (Onon.at, Vienna), Magdalena Taube (berlinergazette.de, Berlin), Anwen Roberts (Eclipsing Binaries, Berlin). Moderation: Lili Masuhr (leidmedien.de)
Location: mindpirates, Schlesische Straße 38, Berlin-Kreuzberg

Documentation: Photos | Slides | Video

Networks of Journalism: New Models of Complicity within the Fourth Estate

This workshop looks at concrete case of a journalism network: TheSponge.eu, which origniated in Buchrast around a group of investigative journalists, coders and activists. (Watch an image film). The workshop presents as respondents keyfigures of like minded organisations including the European network of data-journalists jplusplus.org and the global network of crisis mappers The Standby Taskforce. Their networking models can serve as best-practice cases for a discussion on current challenges in journalism and as an example of emergent forms of cooperation, as is reflected by the Berliner Gazette in its annual issue on complicity.

Date: Dec. 8th, 3 p.m. | Format: Workshop
Input: Alex Ulmanu, Victor Nitu, Ioana Cristea, Monica Ulmanu, Stefan Candea (thesponge.eu). Respondents: Nicolas Kayser-Bril (jplusplus.org), Jaroslav Valuch (Standby Task Force).
Moderation: Chris Piallat & Magdalena Taube (berlinergazette.de)
Location: Heinrich Böll Foundation, Schumannstraße 8, Berlin-Mitte

Documentation: Photos | Video | Text

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