Florence Gallez's blog

C4FCM Research Assistant and Open Park developer Florence Gallez leads a roundtable discussion with Russia experts on US-Russian relations at the Media Lab July 14 as part of OP's first case study on collaborative journalism.

"The pictures told the story of all of them, from different planets, representing different ethics, united by a common bond - the galactic Co-operation."

"Once you find your place in the galactic Co-operation - and I assure you that it is an important place - your fighting will stop. Why should you fight, which is an unnatural occupation, when you can push?"

"Specialist," Robert Sheckley

Collaborative online news production: Introducing Open Park

Now that the spring semester is in full swing, I thought I would write a little Intro about my project for the Center for Future Civic Media [C4FCM] where I work as a Research Assistant, and the ideas and ideals behind it.

Let us hope that this will apply to all aspects of media coverage...
Hopefully this review is a good sign.

Gates orders review of policy barring military-coffin photos

By The Associated Press
02.11.09

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Robert Gates ordered a review yesterday of a Pentagon policy banning media from taking pictures of flag-draped coffins of U.S. military dead, signaling he was open to overturning the policy to better honor fallen soldiers.

At least two Democratic senators have called on President Barack Obama to let news photographers attend ceremonies at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware and other military facilities when military remains are returned to the United States. Obama told reporters at his Feb. 9 news conference that he was reviewing the ban.

"If the needs of the families can be met, and the privacy concerns can be addressed, the more honor we can accord these fallen heroes, the better," Gates told reporters at a Pentagon news conference yesterday. "So I'm pretty open to whatever the results of this review may be."

Gates said he initially asked for the ban to be reviewed a year ago, and was advised then that family members might feel uncomfortable with opening the ceremonies to media for privacy reasons or pressure to attend them despite financial costs.

"I think that looking at it again makes all kinds of sense," Gates said. "And we will do so, and I've put a fairly short deadline on that effort."

Shortly after Obama took office, Democratic Sens. John Kerry and Frank Lautenberg also asked the White House to roll back the ban that was put in place in 1991 by President George H.W. Bush.

However, some exceptions to the policy were made, allowing the news media to photograph coffins in some cases, until the administration of President George W. Bush and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In a Feb. 9 letter to Obama, Lautenberg said the Pentagon should develop a new policy to allow "respectful" news coverage while protecting the privacy of the victims and their families. Generally, the remains in the caskets are not publicly identified.

"I respectfully urge you to work to bring an end to the misguided policies of the past that seek to hide the sacrifice of our soldiers and the public recognition and pride that should accompany it," Lautenberg wrote.

He said the Bush administration "effectively censored images of flag-draped caskets from appearing in media coverage."

A leading military families group says the policy, enforced without exception during the Bush administration should let survivors of the dead decide whether photographers can record their return.

John Ellsworth, president of Military Families United who lost a son in Iraq in 2004, said the survivors should be able to decide whether the coffins should be photographed.

I personally have my doubts on the merits and sustainability of obsessive focus on the local, and worse, on the latest born of 'cool' beats, the 'hyperlocal'...

But the World Economic Forum's proposal for "a new global, independent news and information service whose role is to inform, educate and improve the state of the world," to quote its report, leaves me with plenty of questions. To start with, about its independence, as a quick look at who is on its Council on the Future of Media may prompt one to raise such questions...

Here is the link to the WEF's 4-page proposal, entitled "Future of Media," which starts on page 180:
http://www.weforum.org/pdf/globalagenda.pdf

followed here below by a review of the WEF's recommendation based on a report by Cliff Kincaid of of Accuracy in Media, much of which I agree with.
What do you think?

Don't you go and think that Obama is the only political figure who recently engaged his country's youth in the political debate successfully. His now Russian counterpart, President Dmitry Medvedev, just like before him Vladimir Putin, is at the top of his game in this area too - as the MT story here below shows.

Novaya Gazeta, one of Russia's few remaining independent newspapers, is burying this month its fifth murdered journalist in the past eight years. [see AP and Moscow Times stories here below].

As a follow up to my post on MLK papers [Jan 14, 09]: I cannot think of a more timely and civically-minded government-run online media service than this one...

http://usaservice.org/page/content/calltoservice/

The interactive website, complete with a videoed call for action on MLK Day from Michelle Obama, says:

A timely and welcome development - although I had to temper my initial enthusiasm, as both The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and AP reports make clear that this 'online access' comes with the pre-requisite of a trip to the library.
A little puzzling at first sight, but on the whole this initiative a step in the right direction.

http://www.ajc.com/services/content/metro/atlanta/stories/2009/01/13/kin...
ajc.com > Metro > Atlanta
ATLANTA
King papers go public today with online access
By GAYLE WHITE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Scholars and casual researchers can get their hands on important civil rights history — virtually, at least — for the first time today as a major portion of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s papers go public.

Computer access to the documents, which have been digitized and cataloged, will be available beginning today at the Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center.

The papers represent more than 75 percent of a 10,000-item collection bought by a group of civic and business leaders in 2006 from King’s family. Mayor Shirley Franklin and former Mayor Andrew Young spearheaded the effort to raise $32 million for the purchase.

King scholar Clayborne Carson, founding director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University, has been named executive director of the papers and distinguished professor at Morehouse College. Morehouse, King’s undergraduate alma mater, is custodian of the collection.

The documents include many of King’s speeches and personal writings from 1946 to 1968.

About 7,000 pieces are handwritten by King, including an early draft of the famous “I Have a Dream” speech, his 1964 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech and nearly 100 sermons, some of which never have been published.

All will be available for examination.

Carson, interviewed by telephone Monday, said he is especially excited about the outlines, drafts and finished manuscripts of sermons that give insight into King the preacher.

“The religious documents are the ones that have not been available to scholars,” he said.

Carson, 64, said he has spent the last 20 years trying to make King materials available for future generations. “This is a major step forward,” he said. “At the end of this process, it will be a lot easier for researchers to do their work.”

The Woodruff library papers are one of three major King collections. Others are at the King Center in Atlanta, and at Boston University, where King received his doctorate in systematic theology. King donated a collection to the university in 1964.

Morehouse, Boston University and the King Institute at Stanford, which has copies but not originals of King papers, are developing aids that will help researchers determine the location of specific documents, Carson said. He hopes to speed the process. The project, officially the MLK Jr. Archival Collaborative, is funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

“I want to do everything I can to encourage more research and better research, not only on Martin Luther King but on the people who were alongside him in his life,” Carson said.

---------------

Nearly two-year effort brings King Collection index online
By Associated Press | Athens Banner-Herald | Story updated at 11:30 pm on 1/13/2009

ATLANTA - Scholars and armchair academics alike now can browse an online listing of thousands of documents in the Martin Luther King Jr. Collection that further pull back the curtain on King's life as a preacher and a person, officials at Morehouse College announced Tuesday.
Archivists have spent nearly two years cataloguing and digitizing the collection, which is housed at Morehouse, where King graduated in 1948. Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin led an 11th-hour campaign to buy the papers in a $32 million private sale in 2006 that thwarted a public auction to be held at Sotheby's in New York.
Morehouse President Robert Franklin called the collection a "powerful tool" for education and insight into King's life.
"There is a wealth of transformative knowledge that we have yet to glean from Dr. King," he said.
Originally published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Wednesday, January 14, 2009