Goodbye Robin Gibb

The Voice of the Bee Gees has passed away May 20, in London. Following this announcement, reactions were multiple and quick. Between tributes… and bad jokes.

“The family of Robin Gibb, of the Bee Gees, announce with great sadness that Robin passed away today following his long battle with cancer and intestinal surgery. The family have asked that their privacy is respected at this very difficult time.” The British singer and songwriter succumbed at the age of 62 in London.

In the trio, Robin Gibb had often, especially in the 1960s, the role of lead singer. His caressing voice and his tone rather in the treble contributed to the global success of “New York Mining Disaster 1941″, “Holiday, Massachusetts”, “I Started a Joke”, and many more musical hits. On social media, fans and celebrities quickly reacted to the announce of his death. People from all around the world presented their condolences to the family and shared their memories of the Bee Gee.

Pictures of the Bee Gee were posted, as well as videos in honor of the star.

The disparition of Robin Gibb has affected lots of people and not only the anonymous ones. Artists, journalists and athletes have also deplored this loss, as seen in the tweets of Bryan Adams, Justin Timberlake, Miley Cyrus, Nelly Furtado, Bruno Mars or Lance Amstrong.

Of course some Internet users could not avoid to make the link between Robin Gibb and the famous Bee Gees song ”Stayin’ Alive” released in 1978…

…that leads to comments and bad jokes.

And caricatures.

After the recent deaths of Whitney Houston, Donna Summer, and now Robin Gibb, the world of music mourns its dead.

Flora Berset

An open letter to Adam Yauch

Dear Adam Yauch I hope you’re doing well,

I know a lots happen and you’ve been through hell

So we give thanks for providing us good music

Through your words and with your songs you made magic

Adam Yauch (aka MCA), founder of the legendary hip-hop group Beastie Boys, passed away on the 4th of May after three years of battle with cancer. This native New Yorker was a very influential artist with multiple talents: musician, rapper, director and activist, he could do it all. Lets take a look back to his life’s achievements.

Musician:

He was born in August the 5^th, 1964 in Brooklyn. He taught himself to play bass when he was in high school. Beginning of the 80’s, he created the Beatie Boys, with Mr. Diamond, as a hard-core punk band. They released a few EP but the success was not there yet. In fact, they started rapping as a joke, and then found out that the audience liked it better ! From there, they became the first white rap group to achieve massive mainstream success.

Rapper:

Their first hip-hop album “Licensed to Ill”)was recorded in 1986. This opus included the famous song “(You gotta) fight for your right (to party)”. The success followed with another major album, “Paul’s Boutique”, three years later. Only MCA, Mike-D and Ad-rock had enough genius to mix up all kinds of genres: hip-hop, rap-rock, experimental hip-hop, etc. Their masterpieces just could not stick to one category.

 

Director:

Not only did he do good music, but Yauch also started is own film Production Company called Oscilloscope Laboratories. He even directed some Beastie Boys videos including “So Whatcha Want,” “Intergalactic,” “Body Movin’ ” and “Ch-Check It Out,” .

Activist:

In 1994, Adam Yauch started the non-profit Organization Milarepa Fund, to denounce the situation in Tibet. He launched a series of concert all around the world (San Fransisco, NYC, Tokyo, Sydney, Amsterdam,…) to raise awareness for his cause. After 9/11, he organized the event “New Yorkers against violence” to provide help for victims. A fan wrote on his blog: “The fact remains that Adam Yauch turned the world into a far better place than how he found it » .

The Beastie Boys were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in April, but Adam was unable to attend due to his health. Today the world of music suffers a bereavement. Adam Yauch was only 47 but yet was a member of the most influential hip-hop band of the century. He owned a Music Label and a Magazine brand, he was a producer and still had time for charity.  He was also a beloved husband, a father and a model for an entire generation of hip-hop fans.

Official site of the band:

http://beastieboys.com/

#Radiolondres challenged the French Elections

During the French elections, Twitter was the place to be ! As a French law, the article L. 52-2 from the electoral code, prohibits people to talk about the results before 20 p.m. the evening of elections rounds, tweetos found a trick to divert the law.

Marc Vasseur, a politician, asked his followers:

And answers did not wait too long to emerge:

Alain Bembelly, a man fond of Twitter, gave an idea of hashtag that will be accepted straightaway:  #Radiolondres. This idea comes from the Second Wolrd War when French resistants were emiting radio talks from London. Then, people established a code to understand each other.

Journalists, such as Guillaume Champeau, suggested some ideas with clear references to different politicians. For instance, “the custard is in oven”, refering to his nickname Flanby, means that François Hollande is winning. “The tomato is ripe” means Mélenchon because of the reference to the red color of his party emblem.

Then, the phenomenon was launched and people put #Radiolondres in all their tweets. The hashtag became the most used to refer to the election. Twittos largely prefered it to the hashtag Elysée.

Even pictures appear to describe what was going on. During the first election round, some unknown candidates did not get a lot of voices, such as Jacques Cheminade. People published funny picture to explain his situation.

The hashtag had such a sucess that many media around the world published a best-off of the tweets, even The New-York Times wrote something about it.

Furthemore, people made caricature to show that people were most likely to follow the elections on Twitter than on TY. Even if most of the people were both watching TV and following the tweets.

Most of the tweets annouced the defeat of Sarkozy and were retweeted thousand of times.

Almost every tweet bearing the hashtag Radiolondres were joking about the departure form the Elysée of Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife. Their prediction proved to be true because François Hollande replaced Nicolas Sarkozy at the head of the French government.

But, can Twittos be condemned for diverting the French election law ?

People could be fined up to 75’000 euros for revealing results of the elections. Indeed, ten inspectors were mobilized to check people’s tweets. But up to now none seems to bear the consequences of these tweets.

This shows that social media may challenge current laws. As asked a blogger in his post: is #Radiolondres a trick or a true democratic challenge ? and would government be able to adapt their laws to the new technologies ? Thus, if they want to have a control on what happen on the Web 2.0, they need to anticipate the changes… and quickly!

Stéphanie Giroud

Sex on Facebook

Escorting agencies, escort girls, call girls; Facebook and Twitter have become the ideal place for the sex industry to make business. Just type “escort girls” in the search engine of Facebook and you are going to find countless categories, groups, applications, people, and pages related to escort services. Try the same operation on Twitter and a same constant stream of tweets proposer’s appointments, places and dates will pop up on your browser.

Is it that important for escorting agencies to be present on the internet? “Yes, it is necessary, although we have a strong presence on the web“, Adalaïs replies, ex-escort and director of “Platinum Escorting” in Geneva. The agency was founded in 1999 and has been working in Switzerland and internationally since.

Official Facebook page of “Platinum Escorts”

The Facebook page of this agency is new and is still under construction. What sort of benefits can Escorting find on Facebook? “The social network can be developed easily while keeping the user masked, thus confidentiality”. Adalaïs says.

There are many groups and profiles pages like Platinum Escorts. All are seeking to use the exceptional range of users offered by Facebook. How standing out? One way would be to offer a “serious” service. A variable that make sense: “it is very important because the page is the image of the agency.”   Adalaïs informs. As an example, take the notion of “group“ on Facebook.

This is a group that display some girls who offer their services and locations.

When we click on “about“, the page is very poor. We find only the picture of some girls and others who are quite anonymous. We cannot find out real information.

Facebook, group “Escorts Girls”, about. Because I get no answers about the usage of these images. I personaly masqued the faces.

It seems clear that on this group, girls are directly visible and show their profiles.

In “files” we find a short description:

Facebook, group “Escorts Girls”, file page.

“Elegance, charm, beauty, sensuality, culture, etiquette and discretion, our escorts accompanies you for various occasions, whether for a relaxing time, a dinner, or any other applications as desired.” 
This group is actually a link to a French website. We do not know if this is an official page. Are all women escort girls in this group? Is it a problem if we would come to see the girls’ faces like here in “Escorts Girls” group?

On “Escorts Girls” everyone see the faces girls. Because I get no answers about the usage of these images. I personaly masqued the faces.

Adalaïs is attentive to this delicate situation: “Internet (especially Facebook and Twitter) does not stop in Switzerland or at a specific location, but it can be accessed from anywhere. Their friends, family, the employer, or some people could use their profiles to do bad things”. In his agency we will never see faces on a webpage.

“Platinum Escorts” website, girls are anonymous.

“Platinum Escorts” on Facebook, girls are anonymous.

Is it to say that girls of Platinum Escorting do not have Facebook profiles? “Our employees have private pages on Facebook. To my knowledge, few young women have their professional pages on Facebook and Twitter, but this is just a plus, because they are primary working with the agency and with special escorting platforms“.

A lot has been said about Facebook, but Twitter is also a popular platform. Again, if you type “Escort Girls” in the search engine you come across countless tweets.  There is a continuous flow of information, very often more than four tweets per hour.

“World escort 411″ a very active escort network.

Escorting Platinum is planning to move there too. Why? To Adalaïs : “The benefits are the same as for Facebook, but with a twist: the live.” In other words, Twitter provides a platform that links to the website of the company that offers the opportunity to give information fresh and direct to potential customers.

The future for escorting on social networks has many facets. This article deals only with the aspect of “agency”, but many other forms exist. For example self-promotion (dangerous in terms of images), especially for women doing it for a short period of time. But other phenomenon, more curious, have been recently coming up, such as  paying five dollars to be friends with someone on Facebook. A kind of  2.0 escorting. Young women proposing to be friends for money.

A (virtual) girlfriend ? It’s possible for 5$.

Sometimes the contract stipulates that she will post messages on the wall of his client. The ultimate goal is to show an exciting social life as traditional escorting.

Jason Huther

 

Why this theme?

 Before the success of Facebook and Twitter, prostitution on the Internet was not under the spotlight. We always forgot this part of the economy and it is still true for social networks. In the case of social Networking it’s the same.

We talk a lot about the influence of social media in everyday life and in the economy, about enterprises that are created on social media, about the opportunities that are generated by the companies which see it as a form of future. Escorting agencies are part of these companies. Escort girls are among those who benefit from these opportunities.

It seemed to me interesting to talk about this particular business. Nowadays it has become a common thing for students to practice this activity. This is also why I wanted to talk about this subject. How those women take ownership of these networks? Are they sensitive to their dangers? Has it become necessary to be present on these networks to practice this profession?

 I tried to get answers from girls working in “Escorts Girls”, but I have not been able to obtain them. As my article is built up only on information I can get through social media, I did not search further. It was frustrating, but it shows one of the limits of the use of Facebook when trying to do real investigative journalism.

 Thanks for reading.

 

Mai 2012, la grève étudiante s’embrase au Québec

Des dizaines de milliers d’étudiants québécois sont en grève illimitée depuis février. Ils dénoncent la hausse des frais de scolarité annoncée en mars 2011 par le Premier Ministre du Québec Jean Charest et crient leur colère dans les rues. La classe politique a répondu le 18 mai avec la loi 78, qui encadre drastiquement le droit de manifester. Une loi dénoncée par la section québécoise d’Amnesty International, tandis que le Barreau du Québec « formule de sérieuses inquiétudes » à son égard. Cherchant à étouffer le mouvement estudiantin, la nouvelle loi l’a attisé. La crise s’est intensifiée et le sujet prend de l’importance dans les medias étrangers.

Une amie vivant à Montréal a posté son mécontentement sur Facebook. J’ai ouvert les yeux sur l’ampleur de ce mouvement au Québec. Cliqué et recliqué sur les pages de ses amis, révoltés eux aussi.

De nombreuses photos et vidéos des manifestations sont partagées sur les réseaux sociaux, comme cette vidéo de la chaîne de télévision anglophone russe RT:

Et cette vidéo amateur:

Le 14 mai sur Twitter, le journaliste de Radio-Canada Pierre Duchesne décrit la crise étudiante comme une crise politique majeure, suite à la démission de la Ministre de l’Education Line Beauchamp.

Des milliers de tweets son consacrés au mouvement. Parmi les hashtags les plus importants: #grève2012, #loi78, #ggi, #manifencours. Autre point de vue avec le service de police de la Ville de Montréal, qui a son compte Twitter: @SPVM. Et cette « grève étudiante québécoise de 2012 » a déjà son article Wikipédia, précisant qu’il s’agit d’un « événement en cours ».

Le mouvement étudiant est pour sa part bien organisé sur le net. Les associations d’étudiants ont leur site dédié à la révolte, à l’image de la CLASSE, organisation étudiante de type syndical, alors qu’un(e) étudiant(e) anonyme a créé un site de référence, www.greve2012.org.

La révolte est relayée depuis des semaines par les médias québécois. Le mouvement grandit sur le terrain, de même que le nombre d’arrestations, faisant grimper le sujet dans la hiérarchie des médias professionnels étrangers. Le 21 mai par exemple, le « mouvement étudiant » fait la une du journal en ligne Mediapart.

Mais comment définir cette crise, qui a pris de l’ampleur? « Entre la mobilisation et l’émeute, la frontière est de plus en plus floue » analyse une journaliste de TV5monde, commentant une vidéo de la manifestation du samedi 19 mai.

Dimanche soir 20 mai, ce sont 300 étudiants qui ont été arrêtées à Montréal (voir le site de Radio-Canada ou du Huffington Post Québec), le mouvement appelle néanmoins à une grande manifestation le 22 mai dans la ville, notamment via Facebook.

Et pour finir ce tour d’horizon, “Un grand tonnerre”, une lettre adressée aux étudiants grévistes de Christian Nadeau, professeur en philosophie à l’université de Montréal:

 

Julie Liardet

Ireland prepares for crucial EU vote

Just a few days to go before Ireland votes on the European fiscal compact treaty also called the “stability treaty”! On May 31st, the Irish people, unlike their European counterparts, will tell their government to ratify or reject this treaty that England and the Czech Republic refused to sign. Ahead of crucial days for Ireland and Europe, we take a look at the yes and no campaigns and debates, and focus on some of the parties’ respective arguments on Twitter.

Objective: understand what’s at stake in this referendum considering what the latest polls are showing:

“Vote yes!”

Back in February 2012, the government announced that because ”this treaty is a unique instrument, outside the European Union treaty architecture, on balance, a referendum is required to ratify it”. Since then, the Prime minister Enda Kenny and his cabinet, plus his political party (Fine Gael) and many other interested parties have been intensively advocating for a yes vote. So why should the people of Ireland green light the ratification of this treaty?

Many others forecast what would happen if Ireland dared to vote no: larger Irish firms think their ability to raise debt would be impacted, because a no vote would trigger sovereign rating downgrades by Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s. Dan O’Brien, Economic Editor at the Irish Times, fears: “a break-up of the single currency; the ejection of Ireland from that currency union; a collapse of the Irish banking system; a Greek-style sovereign default (while remaining in the euro); and a much bigger fiscal adjustment owing to a lack of additional bailout funds. A rejection of the treaty will increase the probability of all of these things happening to varying degrees”. The Prime Minister and others have used different or similar claims to push forward a yes vote:

Neutralpaddy writes in a comment:”we know we need a stricter set of rules that take account of lessons learned, we know who is buttering our bread for the moment (the Germans) and we know what we don’t know – how long it would take to recover nationally if we were outside the Euro tent pissing alone in a Force Ten financial gale”.

“Say no!”

However, a number of skeptical Irish people wont bend to such threats. They’ve had enough!

And their tweeting it loud and clear!

In this recent video, economic commentator David McWilliams illustrates what he believes is at stake for this referendum:

Michael Burke, economic consultant, blogged that a no would do “a great service to the population of Europe, pulling the brake on the austerity express before it hits the buffers. For this former economist with Citibank in London, a no vote would be a blow in favour of all the victims of austerity and for all democrats across Europe”.

Hard facts

Listening to what the yes and no campaigners say can’t hide some hard facts Ireland has to deal with. These figures put the above mentioned arguments into context. Ireland is running an important budget deficit: 24.9bn euros in 2011. And according to IMF data, the country fell back into recession in the last three months. However, just a few days ago, the European Commission issued a report stating the Irish budget deficit should fall to 8.3% of GDP in 2012, below the Government’s original forecast of 8.6%. 

Eurostat figures released in March 2012 show that Ireland has an unemployment rate of 14.5%. And youth unemployment stood at an alarming 29.4% in 2011 and was possibly rising. The ones that bear the heaviest burden seem to be the households: in the last threee years, their net wealth has declined by 23%. According to a non-governmental organization’s 2012 report, some 706,000 people, including 200,00 children, are living in poverty in Ireland which is an increase of 92,000 in two years.

No doubt Irish citizens will bear this in mind when they cast their vote on May 31st.

Vancouver Riots 2011 : when social media work for justice

Granville Island, Vancouver (BC) © WnnR

Dear reader, do you have any idea how it feels to live in Vancouver ? Well… I do ! I’ve spent four months of my life up there in 2011, and trust me, what you read, hear and see in the media is true : Vancouver is one of the best places in the world, and according to a ranking established by The Economist, it is the third most livable city on the planet nowadays. The reason I am now narrating you this part of my life is not a crucial need to talk about myself. I simply want you to keep in mind that Vancouver is a good girl, before talking to you about a dark time of its life.

In June 2011, the Vancouver Canucks, were competing in the finals of the Stanley Cup, the highest level competition of ice hockey in North America. After six games against the Boston Bruins, they were tied : each team had won three games. The seventh was then the most important, the decisive game. The worst scenario for the Canucks happened : they lost the game 0 to 4 and missed the cup just as they did in 1994 and 1982 (dear hockey fans, you’re invited to follow this link for more statistics).

Hockey can be considered as a religion in Vancouver, and every game night, thousands of people wearing white and blue shirts with the orca in the front, invade either the stadium or the downtown bars to cheer for their team. But the Canucks’ supporters are not much appreciated among the big community of hockey fans, because a little number of them have the reputation of losing their temper when their team loses. That is exactly what happened after the Vancouver Canucks lost the final on June 15^th, 2011. But in a dimension that nobody had imagined. > Click HERE to watch the video <

Angry fans started rioting all over the city center, cars were set on fire, shop windows were destroyed, people were hurt. In a few minutes, the city became what could be called a war zone. The police officers tried to do what they could to stop the violence, but the influence of anger and alcohol had for consequence that the rioters were completely out of control.

Vancouver on fire during the riots © Andrea Forrer

The day after, Vancouver looked like a battlefield that had seen many horrors. In order to be able to move forward after these dark hours, the residents of Vancouver decided to gather their forces and a big movement of solidarity was set up : some people were picking up the trash on the streets while the shop windows that had been destroyed were temporarily replaced by wooden boards.

The Vancouver Police Department, that had no intention to let the rioters continue their lives without punishment, imagined a new solution to find them. They created a website where they put the photos of the troublemakers, and included the citizens of Vancouver in the investigation, by asking them to help them identify the suspects. According to the statistics of the website, 1958 tips were given to the police through the Internet.

But the police was not the only one using social media to try to convict the rioters. Indeed, a Facebook group* was set up and even private people seeking for justice were working on it at home, with videos in which they encouraged people to “name the morons” they saw on their screen :

After acting in order to erase the bad memories from the streets of Vancouver by cleaning them up, the citizens started to write some words on the wooden boards that were momentarily replacing the shop windows : apologies, messages of love addressed to the Canucks, to the city of Vancouver, or simply to other people. Because this is how you act when you feel like you are part of this community. This is the true soul of Vancouver. This is the beauty of Canada.

Student healing Vancouver’s injuries © Keerati Ruenpanich

A famous drugstore says THANKS to the population © Andrea Forrer

Last week, the news came to our ears – through the Canadian media’s websites and Twitter accounts – that six more people had been charged in the case of the Stanley Cup’s riots. This is what happens when you hurt Vancouver. And that’s why I call it good news.

Fresh news : 6 more people charged

*check June 2011

Cloé Bernier

H&M’s polemical campaign: reactions

Here is another scandal around the well-known Swedish company H&M ! This time, it is about its new summer campaign, representing by the sublime Isabeli Fontana, the brezilian model for Victoria’s Secret. Indeed, the pictures above, placarded all over the world at the begining of May, have checked the public opinion because of the model’s tan !  Please have a look to the promotional video below to see the cause of this controversy:

Opposite reactions have arisen on social media: Few fans on H&M Facebook Page have declared that these swimmwear pictures were gorgeous. They are literally captivated by the beauty and do not have second-thought about consequences on a fragile audience:

But the majority is scandalized by H&M’s approach, seen as clearly dangerous for human health. Many doctors and cancer groups have claimed that the campaign’s message is alarming: “”Many people, especially young, will try to emulate this and will try to be justas brown, even though their skin type is not possible.” After all, H&M is one of the motor  for new fashion trends! Even indivuals  have protest against this advertising, accusing them of vulgarity, photoshop players or even of soft porn:

About the photoshop’s accusation, a specialized magazine has published a Fontana’s picture for another AD. As you can see, she is still astonishing but not as dark and caramel as in the H&M’s beach sensation!

But we all know that pictures are always retouched. So, why is there such strong negative reactions on social media? What we can say is that H&M ‘s campaign has a really bad timing: Thus, everyone links this AD with the sensitive recent item that  made noise in USA few weeks ago: Tan Mom, an over-tanned mother, accused of bringing her 5-years old daughter to the solarium. Have a quick look to this video to catch up the story:

By consequence, even if initially H&M had defended its promotional work, the entreprise, facing powerful opponents, has has to present official apologies to its customers to save its reputation:

H’&M’s excuses were spread all over the Web and many Tweets were talking about it:

But what happen next? I naively thought that all posters would have been removed from streets. I was sure that all traces of this polemical campaign will be erase on the official webiste for example. But I was so wrong! Look at the new cover picture on the company Facebook page, updated yesterday :

What does H&M want to prove? That Isabeli Fontana is really dark without any manipulations? Or is this picture retouched as well? Does they want to show that they do not care about public opinion? It seems that the company’s reputation won’t suffer from this scandal. After all, the Swedish firm is used to it and it is a good way to promote the brand: The most important is to talk about it.

Jade Albasini

New Journalism: Online Journalism

How we can defined the online journalisme?

When we speak of Online-journalism we find ourselves faced with a complex problem of definition: are we talking about of a new journalism, with features, players, rules, processes and new ethical charts? Or it is just a new tool for traditional media, which use these tools as distribution channel? Even more, it is a professional journalism, citizen journalism, or a mixture of both? 

We conducted a survey of Online- French media.

Initially the traditional media only translated their information online. Then they realized that their audience was not happy to be just a consumer of information and wanted to be positioned as citizen entitled to participate actively in the creation of public opinion, in order to assert the fundamental right to the freedom of speech. 

The major advantages of the Internet: responsiveness and citizen participation

Internet is thus converted to a carrier that provides information, follows the news, and most importantly it provides responsiveness and citizen participation.  That is why traditional media on the internet such as Le Monde, TSR, RSR include on their website a space for comments, blogs, and are linked to social network such as Facebook, Twitter, RSS.  In that way, they can respond quickly by providing scalable information, which are constantly enriched. 

Can we talk of citizen participation in the new online media? Listen to the conference of the founder of exciting online journal Medipart, Edwy Plenel.  Another good reference can be  the following interview of the journalists Gille Klein and Alain Joannès

 

Some journalists from traditional media have realized that this new technology has its place in the economic market of the media, labour, and creativity. Thus was born the Online Journalism. A citizen journalism and/or professional using this technology as main support for the dissemination of information and opinions. Since the beginning, professional journalism online has had hard time to be recognized as qualified journalism. But there are some examples

The Online-TV: Quality, thematic information and participation

There are different formulas in the creation of online TV: On the one hand, those made by professionals and found in traditional television channels, and the Internet. On the other hand, those broadcasted only on the WEB. Most of online TV are thematic and have a public target: @rrêt sur images: critical issues on the media, Terretv, reportages on environment, carrefourstv, reportages and news on multiculturalism, universciencetv, scientific, WEB TV Geneva, the news from Geneva, Télé Libre.fr, a citizen media: independent and participatory created by professionals and amateurs. Here WEB TV program: you will find the program of WEBTV by theme. www.programme-webtv.com

The Free TV is funded primarily by contributions from citizens. This is not the only media on the Internet that is financed primarily on citizen input. In fact this formula is largely found in any media disseminated primarily or solely on the Internet. This contribution is also seen as a commitment of citizens to freedom of speech, independence and support to quality journalism. In other words, you people, you defend the freedom of speech on the Internet, so you have to contribute financially too…

Online – Press: More and more

The website J’aime l’info is just a platform for donations for the online press, to appeal to citizens to participate with their economic contribution to the development of quality digital press. It is a database to find the major online newspapers. The platform is managed by the Union of the independent press information online (le Syndicat de la presse indépendante d’information en ligne)(Spiil).

The French press is the media which has more developed their concept of Online Media. Numerous newspapers, magazines, weekly have been created; information channels by young journalists such as zoomdici.fr, magazines for specific thematic such as equality between men and women www.egalite-infos.fr, independent newspapers such as Rue89 or Médiapart, a news digital, independent and participatory.

The Online – Radio:

Find professional digital radio is a challenge. Most traditional radio stations are broadcasted on the air and on website. The radio broadcasted only on the Web are created and developed by amateurs who find in this medium a mixture of information and entertainment accessible and manageable. Radionomy is a platform collecting francophone web radios, and allows you to create your own for free, but only as an amateur radio.
Radio Euro District: The exception makes the rule. Web radio, which transcends borders and provides news content and quality entertainment in two languages: French and German. This radio is managed by a journalist with over 20 years experiences.

The difficult use of the freedom of choice:

We see an evolution of the media; they allow citizens and professional journalists to create their own media on the Internet. But it is difficult to choose among the different media, to know whether or not their content is reliable, if their realization is professional, or if they are credible sources. Finally, consumers have several choices, but what to choose? What can be trusted? This is the new challenge.

Do you know any web-quality media? Do you participate in an Online-media? Young journalists, do you be a journalist-Online. Tell us your experience!!

                                                                                                                                     Violeta Ferrer

How the pictures you publish on Facebook can be used by advertising companies and journalists

• HOW THE PICTURES YOU PUBLISH ON FACEBOOK CAN BE USED BY ADVERTISING COMPANIES •

At the moment I’m writing, more than 800 million people are registrated on Facebook around the world, uploading 250 million of photos per day. By doing so, they are actually feeding one of the biggest databases in the world, and the least we can say is that this database is far from being the one protecting the content of what is posted on it. Indeed, when reading the Facebook’s Terms of Service (what we usually don’t do), we see that Facebook is appropriating itself all the rights on anything that is uploaded on the website.

Following these regulations, some rumors started to spread, mostly by wall posts. Here is what the main message said : “Facebook had agreed to let third party advertisers use your posted pictures without your permission”. Does it mean that a coffee company for example could use a picture of a person drinking coffee to promote its product without their consent ? Barry Schmitt, manager of policy communications at Facebook, explained in a post of July 2009 that it was not the case, and that the companies who did it were violating the website’s policy and were required to remove their ads.

Source : Guhmshoo’s webpage

I have to say that I see a few problems here. First, the fact that this information have been disclaimed in 2009 and the rumor is still flowing in the end of 2011 shows that Facebook’s data protection policy’s credibility has been low for a certain time. Then, not only Facebook dispossesses people from their rights on their materials, but they are also totally unable to prevent external companies to use their image. Even if those are requested to remove the illegal ads, the damage is done, and depending on what their image has been used for, these people’s life can be affected to a high level.

Source : Guhmshoo’s webpage

I have to admit that it is difficult (or impossible) for Facebook to prevent people’s image to be used if they do not manage their privacy settings in order to hide their content to the public. But what about those who limit the access to their profile to their list of contacts only ? Are their pictures 100% safely stocked ? Why is Facebook dispossessing people from the rights they have on their photos if they assure they care about their privacy and don’t pass these rights on to anyone else ? There are too many shadow zones here. In my opinion, if Facebook was a secret agent, not only it would be a double one, but its cover would be shattered pretty fast.

• HOW THE PICTURES YOU PUBLISH ON FACEBOOK CAN BE USED BY JOURNALISTS •

Nowadays, Facebook is the gold mine of pictures databases, because people themselves are providing it with their personal materials. As journalists, we are aware that messages, news, articles are always more powerful with a picture to illustrate it. The era of digital media, has made it much easier to access and transmit all sorts of photos of anyone, from anywhere and in any kind of situation. Therefore, isn’t it tempting, when a person doesn’t want to give you a photo, or let you take a shot, to just screen their Facebook profile, or their friends’, in order to get one ? Would it be legal ?

Source : greatenjoy.com

In Switzerland, the Press Council had to deal with such a case. At the end, they declared that “in a social network such as Facebook, the communication is usually used for exchanging images and information between private people – even if it is partly accessible to everyone – and is mostly none of the public’s concern. Not because they publish something on Facebook means that people agree to make it accessible to the public.”

The problem here is that such a decision is not legally binding. Indeed, the Swiss Press Council is a structure that enables disputes related to journalism to be solved out of a court. Because they tacitly accept to be subject to its rules, journalists usually respect them and comply with the decisions of the Press Council. But what happens when they don’t ?

Source : tsrinfo.ch

At the end of November 2011, almost all the newspapers in the French speaking part of Switzerland published the picture of a teacher making a bad joke in front of the gate located at the entrance of the concentration camp of Auschwitz. In his mind, the aim of the shot was just to make his friends have a good laugh, but the consequence was that this man got fired of his job.

As journalists, we should think twice before using a picture taken from a private online page, because the consequences can be devastating. But as people, we should think even longer before posting it. Let’s protect ourselves from what Facebook is not able to.

Source : Dave Makes