In Beeld this Saturday, I wrote of the implications of the Minister of Communications publishing what was the worst piece of draft legislation I have seen ever. What does it mean if one puts out a scrappy, contradictory, ill-considered Bill that has not even been discussed with your cabinet colleagues?
Continue Reading Add comment January 25th, 2010
On the eTV controversy, I think there are two separate questions to ask and answer: was eTV wise to run this interview; and are the police wise to react so sternly?
Continue Reading 3 comments January 18th, 2010
Probing behind the Nasper’s results shows some interesting things: how bad things are in newspapers, how our TV market is changing quietly, and just how big and powerful Naspers is.
Continue Reading 2 comments November 27th, 2009
The Department of Communications responded firmly to the auditor-general’s report into the SABC.
The report showed that there appears to have been wild and uninhibited pilfering of the SABC coffers under former Group CEO Dali Mpofu and financial director Robin Nicholson (still, incidentally, the man with the keys to the safe). One’s immediate response was that at last someone was showing strong leadership at the department and taking a firm hand. But the measures they proposed were a direct move to usurp the role of the new SABC board and take control into the Ministry.
Continue Reading Add comment October 31st, 2009
In between the old SABC and the new one, I twice had a taste of what a national public broadcaster can do. It is a good time to recall those moments, as they get off to a fresh start.
Continue Reading 1 comment September 24th, 2009
How parliament chose its candidates for the SABC board - and the arm wrestling that went on behind-the-scenes - tells us a lot about power in this society, and how it is exercised.
Continue Reading Add comment September 17th, 2009
Running the SABC is like being Springbok rugby coach. Or manager of Chiefs. Or a local police commander, Everyone knows how to do it, and knows better than the person doing it, and has no problem telling them how they should be doing it. It is the breeding ground of that archetypal South African, the armchair expert.
Continue Reading 1 comment September 3rd, 2009
There was a glaring miscommunication in the announcement that Dali Mpofu had received a reward of R11-m for his role in getting the SABC to the mess it is currently in. We were told that R4-m was a restraint of trade to prevent him working for or setting up a rival company. But surely you would want him to work for one of your competitors?
Continue Reading Add comment August 25th, 2009
The SOS (Save our SABC) Campaign has launched a petition to push for the board selection process to be more transparent and accountable. They have hit the nail on the head, I would say.
Continue Reading Add comment July 20th, 2009
If we have learnt anything in the last two years in relation the SABC, it is that how you appoint the board is as important as who you appoint. The parliamentary committee which recommends candidates, it seems, has not taken on board this very basic lesson.
Continue Reading Add comment July 3rd, 2009
South African media companies are producing better-than-expected results, despite the downturn in advertising.
Continue Reading 3 comments July 2nd, 2009
Organisations are popping up all over the place to engage in the fight over the future of the SABC. There is the SOS (Save our SABC) Coalition, and the Television Industry Emergency Coalition. A march on the institution is planned for next week. Online chat and email is buzzing with ideas, proposal, debates, memoranda and candidates’ lists.
Continue Reading 1 comment June 8th, 2009
Sitting on judging panels for journalism awards gives one valuable insight into the best of South African reporting. The Taco Kuiper Award, which gives out a whopping R200 000 for “a distinguished example of investigative journalism” will be handed out this week, and that has meant I have been poring through piles of material of some of the year’s most important stories.
Continue Reading 1 comment April 18th, 2009
Professor Anton Harber directs the Journalism and Media Studies Programme at Wits University. He is former editor of the Mail & Guardian.
Full bio
Among the main results from the World Association of Newspaper’s Newsroom Barometer (a survey of 700 editors and senior news execs in 120 countries) for this year:
- 86% believe integrated print and online newsrooms will become the norm, and 83% believe journalists will be expected to be able to produce content for all media within five years.
- Two-thirds believe some editorial functions will be outsourced, despite frequent newsroom opposition to the practice.
- A plurality - 44% - believe on-line will be the most common platform for reading news in the future, compared with 41% last year. Thirty-one cited print (down from 35% last year), 12% mobile and 7% e-paper. The rest were unsure.
- A majority of editors - 56%- believe news in the future will be free, up from 48% from last year’s survey. Only one-third believe the news will remain paid for, while 11% were unsure. - From Editors’ Weblog
There is a crisis in trust and communication between the British public and the mainstream media, a new report has concluded. The gulf between public expectations of news provision and the actual nature of articles, which oscillate between esoteric or irresponsible, leaves readers feeling confused and excluded.
The report, entitled ‘Public Trust In The News’ was conducted by researchers from Manchester and Leeds Universities and was published by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. - From Editors Weblog
Reflections on Journalism in the Transition to Democracy - Ethics & International Affairs 18, no. 3 (2004).
Journalism in the Age of the Market
- Harold Wolpe Memorial Lecture, Centre for Civil Society, University of KZN, Aug 2002
The Untimely Death of SA’s Finest Daily - Sunday Times, May 2005
“Two Newspapers, Two Nations? The Media and the Xenophobic Violence” from Go Home or Die Here, edited by Shireen Hassim Tawana Kupe and Eric Worby (WUP, 2008)
Remarks at Goedgedacht Forum, October 2008
The rise of social network journalism - From The 2009 Flux Trend Review (Macmillan, 2008)
A recent piece by me on the Zapiro cartoon row which appeared in Comment is Free, a Guardian blog.
