From Arab to African media, West to East-the power of videojournalism

Travelling and lecturing in videojournalism further strengthens my already robust resolve that the tools and media skills for reportage, important as they, cannot be seperated from the understanding of the dynamics of human behaviour.

Four months ago I was in Beirut, swapping ideas with some of the emerging videojournalists at one of the country's leading independent newspaper's, Annahar. Its videojournalists are breaking into off-agenda stories to furnish their audience with a wider knowledge of its people and news.

I was drawn to the journalists' energy and their desire to push at the form; their want to landscape something bigger and interesting for locals and internationalists.

In the above picture Joanna is interviewing me on a one-on-one. It preceded a training session to shape the format visually and literally to keep it interesting.

There are many iterations in video and videojournalism and more often than not I am made to feel fortunate about a position I have come to occupy. It is one I neither take lightly and continue to feel indebted to the many people who have helped shape my ideas.

That position assumes a wide understanding of forms and associated behaviour.

But believe me, particularly at the time I was freelancing for any number of network broadcasters, travelling to danger zones to produce the news because that's where the story was, learning how to 2-machine edit and work a $60,000 beta camera because I couldn't find a camera operator/editor, I cursed my fortunes.

The business of video story telling and videojournalism is a journey of the visual art of information, a process in which I'm oft heard to say the square root of four is not two.

It's a creative medium bound by guidelines. For me also it's the journey of as many highs and sucessess as it is lows and failures.

There is no one fixed stanza, no absolutes, no definite way of story production, but I do know the value of a ethical qualified journalism and visual essayist lies in understanding as many of the different forms often, very often by working those genres.

Those catergories include: news, news features, factual programming, interviews Q and A, Long format features, obervational narratives, voice of God narratives, reporter-led features, documentaries 30 mins, docs 40 mins, series docs, adverts, and the many many genres of cinema.

Anyone of these has its semiotic. And in the age of web communication their boundaries continue to be tested, which I believe they should. But there is a constant, though attenuated by nuances of culture and that is people.

Journalism - story telling involves people and we, people, are complex sentinents. But we also exhibit common traits. Traits that lawyers, doctors, managers and many other professions rely upon to make sense of things e.g. who's guilty, an illness, workplace hiearchies and the rest.

Journalism's abilty to make sense of these depends strongly on understanding codes, guidlines, genres, cultures abd being empathatic, curious, understanding and above all forthright.

Which is why I'm often baffled when I ask friends who aspire to be journalists or have been, do you watch television they reply, no.

For as bad as sometimes it is, and it's not the only medium to learn our craft, it is a stage where much emotion plays out.

If you want to learn how to fish, why go to a blacksmith. If you want to know how the clock works, you should have a desire to open the casing.

And slowly methodically work you way through. This thing we do isn't rocket science, but it asks for more than the pushing of buttons and elegant framing.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you more about where I am now and the debates we've been having

10 things you must know travelling to South Africa's world cup

Arriving at O. R. Tambo International Airport, Upgrade.

Two thirty pm.

From door to door , 23 hours. In the air it was about 14 hours. You have to love travelling, otherwise like me you simply go numb with the vacuous look of Mr Mcgoo, consigning your brain cells to reruns of old movies and boarding school meals.

The stewardess either resented her job or didn't much like anyone who didn't do things her way and one of those was a red card for lowering your seat rest to sleep when the person behind you wanted to rest their bottle of water.

Rest your head, rest your water, rest your head, rest your water. Clearly water wins.

"Please sir, could you bring your seat up?"

Half a sleep and feeling restlessly drousy I queried her with my eyebrows.

"Sir put your seat back up!"

It was so incredulous that after the third time of her asking and clearly not noticing that when passengers are tired they pull their seats down I relented.

But as I found out later, seat configurations, particularly in the lie down position is to be one of my "10 things you must know travelling to South Africa". First five today.

Swanky
It's been a while since I have been to the rainbow nation, but if my visit were by default a dry run for the World Cup ahead, then there's work to be done.

Swanky, face photography recognitionn at immigration, an meandering string of tourists around their maze like queing system, in many ways it's as if the architects that built Miami Airport provided the foundation here.

South Africa boasts some of the most hospital people, particularly in the townships away from the dreaded "c" word. But Corporate customer service on the scale that will sazzle them next year is new.

And if you thought the hospitality is likely to bring on unsuspected results then here in Grahamstown, you might want to wear a plack saying "please be nice to me".

Next year in Grahamstown, the venue for one of the world's key arts and culture gigs, they'll have the world cup in tow, and a stream of big conferences for journalists and others.

The build up to the World Cup prompted Richard Quest and CNN to examine the system, rolling of a reel of states - from a programme I saw on my flight.

More on those in my next post, but for the meantime an early foray into what you'll need to know at the airports if you're comng for the World Cup, particularly for domestic flight travellers to the Cape and beyond

1. Through to domestic flights, if you haven't changed any money yet, there's no forex etc past on board luggage checking.

2. There's only one small rest room, which is a little daunting when greeted by the attendant: "welcome to my office" and hasn't quite figured that restroom are private. That said please do tip.

3. Don't rely on the Flight departure board for boarding. It got to 10.00 for a 10.20 departure and still there was nothing up so I curiously sauntered over to the gate to find out they had all boarded and the steward telling me how lucky I was to have got on the plane.

4. Don't put you seat back to rest unless you want the steward or passengers to literally scream at you

5. Do remember your please and thank yous.

Future of the web- Matrix Lecture, Chinese students

I'll write more about the process but hopefully the vid gives an idea of how I went about getting students to creatively collaborate using trend extrapolation.

Chinese students predict the future

They're Chinese students on a three week course in London and they're not very  different from most undergraduates I have encountered except for their extreme politeness.

But I'm equally fascinated with what I can learn from them, as much as they're expecting a whirlwind three weeks of lectures from my colleagues, many of whom have international standings.

All of them have not known a world without the net, and when I joined the media as an undergraduate in 1987, many were not born. An amusing fact none the less, but that's all because the web favours the young anyway.

But I love studying group dynamics and how people are motivated. If like me you spent your formative years in a boarding school you'll understand my fascination.

So the idea that was thrown into the group based on simple principles of an idea's life cycle and what I call the QBS mantra: quality (trust), branding (personal) and simplicity (ease of use).

If a concept's going to make it, these are fundamentals. But if we chart social phenomenon around behaviour and politics, you can reasonably make an intelligent assessment about a future scenario.

Trend extrapolaters, the delphi principle have all sort to use techniques which harness knowledge capital and trends. And that's what we did yesterday.

Their different perspective would shed new light on aged problem solving. It would also provide a forum to explore group dynamics and some of their ideas.

I'll post the video of them looking at the future of the web this week. It's inspiring  

Game theory for minority issues in Journalism

Listening to talks has the effect of resurrecting old fermented and often forgotten ideas. Sometimes it orientates us towards new ones.

Jeff Jarvis was addressing the Guardian group asking the essence of the newspaper. I couldn't finish the vid before being called for a meeting (I should do) but it re-awoke old thoughts.

I had a big itch when I was in broadcasting. It got scratched, but I knew the system well enough to know there's not much that could be done about it, save the "this is ethnic reporting week" for the year ahead.

If you're a minority in the UK, and yes I'm talking race and culture, but not excluding social issues, you can expect little coverage from the main stream press. Rightly so, I argue as a matter of demographics and economics.

The net and social capital via Networks could have neutered this.

In many ways you could say they have. You can search anywhere online for issues of say knife attacks, to classicism in the media and you'll find something, that in the good ol days was nothing more than a crusty press release filed away from sight in forward planning.

But the snag is, if you can call it that, these issue online are confined to the backend of google, worthy of more attention within social networks.

It's a conundrum isn't it? The overall rating of an article; it's argument, its validity and reciprocity (it's come back) is generously dependent on strong articulate social networks, or at least is going that way.

The role of newspapers

Jeff raised the point to the Guardian folks about embracing the blogger into their network. You may not be an employer, but an affiliate employer. Forget the hoops you have to jump through with HR for the moment and consider how those at the eye of their own networks can open a channel onto a wider platform such as the Guardian.

It's an idea which is shrieking to happen and it will at some point purely on economics alone-the economics of people. Imagine the conversation once reserved for DJs and national celebrities.

"Er so what's your numbers?"

"half a million".

"And what about Socanet"? ie social network

"some 100,000"

These could be tweets and blogs respectively. If you're pulling in those and write like Cooke, there's an editor and ad person wanting to talk to you. Just not yet perhaps, but soon.

On Tuesday I'm in South Africa presenting/training and some at “The International Multimedia Workshops for Ethical Reporting on the World’s Most Under-Reported Issues” at Rhodes University, Grahamstown.

The key word here is "Under Reported Issues". Just how do we empower those who haven't a chance to get their story told and how can they tap into more affluent ( both perhaps in knowledge, but definitely wealth) to address their pertinent issues?

Zimbabwe is still suffering, conflict rages in central Africa, the streets of london are still lined with those unable to take care of themselves, young people are still harming each other with dangerous weapons.

The power of reportage, lifting that anti is the least one can do. Tapping into more matured social networks is a prerequisite. Newsnight, the BBC's flagship news programme that I worked on in the early 90s, reported this week, that Keynes was back in vogue.

In this scenario perhaps some form of intervention is necessary, too minority issues as well

Videojournalism Presenter fatigued explained

Rachmaninov concerto No 2 - got there.

I'd tried all the other stations, but this time even a tight bit of soul, Bill Withers wasn't doing the trick.

Earlier in my fuzzy state, I turned to Guy Kawasaki's Art of the Start definitely worth its chunk of 40 minutes.

You see I have a presentation in two days time to a class of Chinese Masters students. It's about something to do with "practice and pedagogy, the web and new things that make you go woo" or something like that.

I presented to a similar group 6 weeks ago and went off message, talking about mediating and motivating theories that underpin our behaviour - far more interesting I thought.

For instance, why are YOU reading this. It it because you're

a) looking for something interesting (chancing it)
b) you're looking to fill time ( reading a newspaper on the train is an example)
c) you have a relationship with this blog, albeit a cyber-like conversation ( which would prob mean I'm saying something of relative value)

Making it happen
What motivates how we spend our time doing those things and how can the very things we seek be made stronger by the providers?

That was the thread. A common sense take. But as I sit here pounding away, I have no desire to repeat that. Perhaps I'm tired, perhaps I'd rather be talking about something else, but you know when sometimes you get this "heavy head" syndrome.

Manager: Hey Chris we'd like you to talk about automated drive systems
Chris: Ok

And you think ***** what am I going to say. Happens to me all the time, usually 15 seconds before a presentation, when I go, wouldn't it be fun if I just went on stage and said, "right, what shall we speak about?"

It's got nothing to do with me not knowing. I kinda do this metaphoric what do I know, and what have they paid their money for?

there are broadly two kinds of talks.
1. what motivates the system
2. the system itself

When I talk about videojournalism et al, I'm mindful people want to know about how to accomplish that edit and that shot, but the alternative, a hybrid practice-theory, begs you to look inside the system.

Why did you want to shoot that way?

I love videojournalism for the reason that's it's not just about point and shoot, and even when it gets really complicated, it's about human behaviour.

Shine a camera on some one, nod sagely and stay quiet and anytime soon they'll begin to speak.

What you're doing with the camera is capturing the essence of a lengthy conversation, in which some piece of valuable information is divulged.

Hilariously, when I first became a Videojournalist, the widespread argument was you couldn't use the two main senses, sight and sound proficient enough at the same time. Well.

Back on Message
Anyway back on message. So in the same way I've illustrated with Videojournalism, I'd rather be inclined to do the same with my online presentation.

So what's the fuss?

Well I get the feeling that the group would want to know more about the system.

Here's the site, that went to the blog, that shifted into a tweet and here are the supporting Twit apps, the 1,000,000 or so that fulfil various functions.

From tech crunch you get a list of 20 apps
no, 1 Twit pic
no, 2 Tweetdeck
No, 3 Digsby
No,4 TwitterCounter
No, 5 Twitterfeed

Now if you're a twitter aficionado you've prob sourced 100 of the above. If you're an addict, 1000. At this rate you could spend a life time explaining to friends and family; in my case, Chinese students, the next best app.

There's legitimate reasons for doing that if you're in marketing, defacto personal branding or want to make those millions of friends. But at some point you have to simply ask, "why?"

Why are you doing this? What's the value? The thin line between addiction and practice is ever shortening.

These things that we do and I count videojournalism in this camp flourish from within an inner social need SMOs. Ambient awareness always existed, but twitter provided the microscope. Making our own programmes is something many of us would like to do; videojournalilsm makes that possible with the right tools.

But to quote Kawasaki and what I tell my own students, "ask why you want it?" "Create meaning rather than pursuing money" says Guy.

Some of the most selfless proponents of this are Mindy McAdams who publishes all her modules and academic findings online, Guy himself whose presentations are micro MBA modules, Mike Jones who possesses a rare deep insight into visual imagery intelligence. Off course there are many more.

They are driven by their "kwa". You could presuppose the group I'm presenting wouldn't be interested in knowledge. There is a strong propensity to always want to learn what other people are doing, so cracking open the SMO model of new apps would do the job.

No, that's not my point, but that perhaps, in this case I'd much prefer we had an open forum and attacked issues on their own need to know.

It cuts into this idea of the conversation, the exploration of ideas and moves away from the idea of the grand lecture, which at times and I rather think doesn't always work. I rather think I'll do that.

Now don't you feel better now David?

Videojournalism. It's more than news, plurality, diversity to name a few

I interviewed one of the UK's respected senior broadcast executives today.

Dorothy Bryne is the head of news and current affairs at Channel 4.

It was a wide ranging interview around the future of news. I have been interviewing some of the well known figures in news e.g. Dan Gillmor, Craig Newmark, Jeff jarvis since 2005.

I hadn't formally started my thesis then, but by nature I'm a collector. Later this week I meet the figure behind convincing the late Sir David English - a powerhouse in British journalism for many years until his death in the 90s - for bank rolling videojournalism in the UK.

On my way home from the interview I reflected on a couple of things, which I intend to expand on later.

1. Videojournalism is about the person. You may be visually gifted and that's a plus, but that can't substitute the bloodymindedness of good journalism, which is story construct from nothingness. By nothingness, eking out something of good use from the chaff of every day chat

2. Videojournalism delivers the media multi linguist. One of the assets I discovered working as a videojournalist within a broadcast framework was an ability to speak to different professionals in their own language. You may not need to know what an "L cut" is, "top and tail", "As live" or any number of strange broadcast terms, but it helps, particularly in team settings.

3. Videojournalism was meant to deliver plurality. Diverse groups delivering their stories. In the UK, many senior news exec lament the lack of a diversity in journalism, which would vary the news agenda.

Next week, I join a team from the Knight International team in South Africa lecturing on videojournalism. I'm excited because in 1997 I headed up an international team from Ghana and their South African counterparts getting their first taste of videojournalism and its profoundness in programme making.

The true strength of videojournalism, the efficient use of this tooled up practice lies in some of the aforementioned in the features and the news, in holding people to account and to expanding our horizons because we have both the aptitude and tools.

Social Media Cool Video

Enuff said

The Videojournalism Timeline & What next?

David's timeline of Videojournalism from 1994-2009 features films he has made since that period or features about that time that give some indication of the change in Videojournalism. Here

The Videojournalism Timeline: in 1994 it was a revolution. I can't tell you how excited I was. A Beta camera, Vinten tripod, Senheiser mikes etc.

You'd find us in the middle of Oxford Street, the camera on its tripod reporting live back to the studio, having informed the Satellite truck of our location.

We did something that the industry sneered at. No one would hire you post 1994 if you said you were Channel One TV.

Birth of a station - Video Journalism revolution from david dunkley gyimah on Vimeo.

I left after two years, not because I'd fallen out with it, but wanted a bigger challenge. I went to WorldWide Television News. There I learned a different craft, but after a year knew that agency work wasn't for me.

Videojournalist David reports from Paris. Note the camera used.

But it taught me well. From the BBC in 1987 (TV and Radio), to South Africa ABC News and the BBC World Service, Channel One and now WTN, I may not have known it but I was picking up workflows, practical ways of doing things that you could only know from being in these organisations.

Because along that path you're likely to bump into /get taught by the most amazing producers and execs e.g. Tim Gardam editor of Newsnight), Joy Hatwood (multiple award wining producer, Radio 4) etc.

From 1994 I kept my videojournalism skills going. When I joined Channel 4 News, undoubtedly the best news/ current affairs programme in the UK, there's really nothing like it, I put my Vj skills to use.

Similarly, I travelled in and around Africa helping to set up networks. In 1998 I bought a ticket to fly to New York to buy my first powerbook.

How mad that seems, but it was cheaper there and I could now start to edit my own films. Jon Snow, the presenter of Channel 4 News was amazed, when he asked whether this laptop and software could replicate the quality of Network TV.


A new era
In 2000 I wrote an article that brought me to the attention of the BBC who had just outbidded Channel 4 News to bring in Michael Rosenblum - the father of videojournalism.

Rosenblum must surely have Had the last laugh. I attended their inaugural meeting in Birmingham and kept my contacts going, till in 2004 the idea was floated by the Press Association whether I could introduce a programme for print journalists.

In 2005 that programme was launched and the Hull Daily Mail became the UK's first regional journalists to successfully embrace videojournalism.

There have been many breakthroughs since. Not least the wonderful time I had in Beirut or presenting in Montenegro, talking at SXSW and teh World Newspaper Forum.

There has been in my eyes a massive shift in videojournalism. In part it's the curiosity of trying to better a process that for me is 15 years old.

Cine-Video Journalism Anti Aesthetic II from david dunkley gyimah on Vimeo.

In a lengthy conversation with a publisher I mentioned some of those which I have written, now buried in the indexes of this blog. We're now in the throes of writing that book, in tandem with new research from my own PhD programme.

I think it would be fare to say I love video and journalism and when the two collide, there is a new stellar arrangement which mutate and asks news questions.

The art of videojournalism is now absolutely nothing to do with multiskilling, in the same way Alice Guy-Blache, an ex secretary directed, did visual effects, painted back scenes for her own films. And this was in 1896.

The semiotics of videojurnalism is reflexive auterism for a medium long found to be wanting when it comes to change. Crassly put it is "total media" for it calls upon the the use of a multiplicity of media skills.

Videojournalism -Let go
Some are less obvious. Take radio for instance. As a medium it fires the imagination like no other. In videojournalism, learning how to use the microphone and acquire good sound is one thing, knowing how to write for radio and TV and understating the nuances of the two and voice is another.

It took me many years and many visits to the now defunct BBC Training Unit to understand.

The point we're at now is an interesting one. We've not yet reached critical for a paradigm within this art form to take place, but the debates we're having, the events we're attending where we talk and swap notes is the effect of the Phoenix from the Ashes.

Ashes because others that have come before us have made what's possible now. But are we really pushing as hard as we should?

Next year in conjunction with my work as an artists in residence at the South Bank I am looking to pull together a number of events that contribute to the work others before me have laid. I hope you can be involved.

Videojournalism for videojournalism educators, videojournalist aficionados- from British newspapers

8 Days

If you're a videojournalism educator, video journalist aficionado, then this might interest you.

I have uploaded 8 Days - UK's first videojournalists from regional British newspapers. - the story.

In many ways it's an on-the-day documentation of how after 8 days videojournalism work, 9 newspaper journalists took to videojournalism.

Five hours condensed into 15 minutes from a 40 minute tape shot over the whole period. The story was laid down 2 hours after returning to base. I'm using "collision" techniques to tell the story and "video impressionism"
I have always been interested in stories of ethnographic value e.g. The Successor Generation: South Africa's first generation of voters -made for the BBC and later ITN's Channel 4 News, Nato War Games - training journalists in simulated wars [ please note at the time of making this Flash did not have controls, so you had to use swf files. I'll repost with controls soon]- and more recently Beirut Videojournalists.

I'm pleased to say there's a story that I've been invited to look at which involves young offenders and dance. Many years back I spent a weekend filming in London's notorious Wormwood scrubs prison, reporting on catergory a prisoner - those inside for muder, so this project brings back a social responsibility

So here it is for the first time. Things to remember

• This was the first time the newspaper journalists were doing this, in a programme I wrote and delivered for the Press Association.
• In 8 days, they learmed more than enough of the basics to understand construct and voice driven reports. They would later go on to win several awards themselves and an international one this end.
• Videojournalism since first practicing it in 1994 has moved on, and since 2005 has shifted into free fliming and framing.

VideoJournailsm Today
Today I'm interested in the psychology and kinesethic underpinning what I call Integrated multimedia videojournalilsm - which is the basis of my PhD and a book by a US publisher next year.

And also next year bringing some clever people together we'll be looking to hold an event which looks at what I call Concatenation. A good example would be the Maclaren Buggy wheels and the mechanism of the boeing 747, so if you're a videojournalist or educator please drop me a line. I have been meeting with a fair few tech, think tanks and broadcaster and it's been very positive.

I'll keep you posted on this.

Video Journalism and creativity into the thick of it

I've had two days to regroup - given me time to work on my site, viewmagazine.tv and redux an old film, but with contemporaneous value: an interview cum feature with James Woolsey, former director of the CIA.

This short lull belies a mammoth week and period ahead. Energy bottles at the ready.

Next week is a an intense marking regime for our Masters students in the art of IMVJ Integrated Multimedia videojournalism: 13 essays and online projects. One the face of it good work, but the critique should provide them with valued insights to where they might push.

Later that week attention returns to research. More forms and chapters to write. It is, if anything relentless, and I'm currently reading through Lacan and Deleuze.

As we gear up for the start of the term, time to revisit modules and ensure updates.

With that done, attention must also turn to the residency. One of the many multiple projects I'm interested in is a dance project which works with young offenders and then there's portraits, which has since yield some interest from a museum in Italy.

What's really getting me excited though is the story of futurecasting media in the UK. Effectively my perspective, but acknowledging the tennants of researched journalism. What the industry calls an authored story, and so far I have a number of senior industry figures on tape, and am interviewing more next week.

Not too long in the future I'll be in South Africa with the Knight Foundation and Rick Beckman. So that's it and as a result I'm going to cool my online work of blogs - just till I get a sense of balance again.

Ciao

Afghan Election news Blackout

Reporting and producing about violence in South Africa 1994. Contextual reportage is called upon.

The Afghan incumbent apparatchik would rather foreign networks did not report on violence at the polls. They have a point. Now before I accuse my alter ego of naive stupidity, it goes something like this.

They want people to vote, so want to black out the violence . It could scare voters away.

Agencies and News orgs say the public has the right to know. The accommodation is somewhere in the middle. Reporting what's happening in the polls but in a sensible way.

Take this as an example. If I put together a report on who likes Chilli Peppers in my family chances are I'll find a lot of people. However the default position of my vox pop must give weight to a different opinion, so the minute I find someone who doesn't like Chillis, like me, et voila, I'm on screen. This creates an erroneous impression.

In other words if you're reporting on atrocities, report on all the others, at least with the use of graphics to inform viewers whether the violence is endemic or localised.

David videojournalism reporting from Ghana on Ecomog Forces being trained by US Special Forces prepping the West Africa forces before they see action.

The killing of anyone is to be condemned.

Is there a way though, if, or when these atrocities do occur, media networks find a way to contextualise what's happening geographically et al. That as much is a needed addition to the timeline of reportage.

Schism
There still exist a wide schism in the world to the role of media and even then in UK media sometimes unusual things can happen, such as the news blackout on Prince Harry fighting in Afghanistan.

I always recall stepping into the cauldron of South Africa reportage before the official end of apartheid and to my amazement realising a lot of the violence being reported was localised.

As a news producer I could with a degree of certainty look for it, whilst other citizens blithely went about their day lives unaware of what was going on.

I guess with the Net et all, graphic interface news could do a good job at referencing THE NEWS in a more 21st century way.

And the next twitterish thing is DIY

How long has Twitter's growth to continue before it plateaus?

The good people of Adland had a trick or two when it came to ensuing continued growth of the brand. Keep the info tight and no matter whether you're in the office or shopping for flip flops in Borneo, you're still on company time.

Similarly, as my friendly Ghanaians would say: "Don't mind the body, but mind the engine" reduxed in the West into the swan syndrome: Ignore the the swan's feet, just watch the elegance on top.

In both cases twitter's being wholesome. Gosh, I think, wouldn't it be great to a bit twatish like Robbie Williams declaring to his fans: "I'm rich beyond my wildest dreams".

No chance. Notwithstanding this piece from The Economist (Twittering all the way to the bank) which reports a leaked memo, twitter appears on its way to the bank, as is the engineer behind twitter decks.

However I can't help thinking its CEO Evan Williams (EV) 's first broadcast to BBC Newsnight only a couple of weeks ago had a banana skin. By dint of talking to Newsnight, it made for an interesting interview.

But when EV responded to the interviewer Kirsty Wark's question about Twitter being a fad, EVs reply that: 'Twitter will only be a fad if someone comes along and does it better', had me visualising PRs working the phone to clarify what he meant.

Shape Shifting
Not that he said anything wrong. No it was an honest straight forward answer.

Except when you're on the end of a news interview, stay honest, but don't do straight forward reciprocating the question.

EV could have simply said. I don't believe, so, which is stronger than I think so.

But by engaging the question opens up to an unconscious subtlety on the one hand and a good headline down the road on the other.

Detectives and lawyers call it shaping.

Lawyer: Did you go down that street in order to call that man a name?
Defendant: I would only go down that street to call that man a name if I wasn't doing anything.
Lawyer: So you admit then if you weren't doing anything you would have gone down that street.

Despite the hypothetical nature of the last question, it sows the possibility to the jury/audience that the man could have called him a name.

One thing is certain about the next thing after twitter:
It will have been devised by a person/friends to assist their quality of life.
It will initially be rubbished by everyone else.
It's most likely going to come from the US
It will make its jump into the ecosystem serendipitously
It will be a bridging tool - more networks

And it too will be asked whether it's a fad

Defense Lawyer shouts objection, that's hypothetical, but the subtlety of the point is made.

I'm sure Peter Barron, former editor of Newsnight who's now communications chief for Google in Europe, will have made this point to his staff.

The morale never answer a question with the original question, despite what your interviewer is inclined to tell you.

p.s Here's an interview I conducted with Yahoo's VP for Product Strategy, Bradley Horowitz

Pure Genius - Viral Videos, Masakali, Bollywood

Pure Genius - the art of disruptive, but brilliant renditions.

For a couple of years I worked as a creative director (re-active.net) for an ex-Saatchi and Saatchi head of the big gun days, Jon Staton, now at Jon Staton Productions.

He recounted how "the World's favourite airline - British Airways" tag and track came about.

They used three different tracks before opting for the choral one.

Yesterday a post I responded to on Advertising age about viral videos attracted this brilliant submission from Sunil Shibad from Mumbai, India.

Pure Genius, it utterly disrupts our fixed semiotic and transforms it to this. Wonder what would have happened if British Airways opted for the 'ethnic' theme. It was the 80s after all when ethnic music wasn't exactly in vogue. Enjoi. Thanks Sunil

Generation Videojournalists 现今的录像新闻是一种最先进的电视新闻产品

I was due to travel to Peking so a former student provided a translation. Thanks Yixiang . Yixiang's blog is here.

You'd not believe that as a Chinese national, two years ago she was hard pushed speaking English and now writes crisp copy. Fab!

现今的录像新闻是一种最先进的电视新闻产品，它是可预测的电视新闻作品的另一种形式，(而电视新闻从其开始产生时就在顽强的克服自身弱点）。

It is next generation television: story telling in which you are not be bound by the many constraints of traditional news production

录像新闻是下一个时代的电视新闻：它的新闻制作不受到传统新闻制作模式的限制 － 英国录像新闻记者领头人和录像新闻制作指导，多个国际新闻大奖获得者， viewmagazine网站制作者 David Dunkley Gyimah 说。

David是英国媒体领域的杰出人士，在其22年的职业生涯中，他曾先后在英国电视广播公司， ITN4频道新闻，ABC新闻和一频道工作，其中一频道是英国首个录像新闻电视台。

David 运用自己被广泛公认的教学模式已经训练了全球上千余记者，这些记者大多来自于：英国金融时报，芝加哥太阳报，和英国媒体协会。其中在英国媒体协会，他协助并且创办了录像新闻节目。


David 是英国享有盛誉的皇家电视协会2009年评判委员会成员，他曾先后为世界报纸联盟，苹果股份有限公司，以及其它一些权威机构开设（关于录像新闻的）讲座。


政治新闻编辑Andrew Brown 先生，英国布朗首相的弟弟，和另外一位英国著名电视主播 Jon Snow都曾评论到David的作品极其具有独创性。


目前他正致力于奥巴马总统“100日”的录像制作 -- 为配合英国一位才华横溢的作曲家的原始古典创作的录像作品。

You can find out how to hire David as a consultant or trainer your online, multimedia and Video journalism projects by visiting his site here (ENTER).The site is in English.

如果您希望与David合作，邀请他担任您的顾问以及指导贵媒体的网络，多媒体， 以及录像新闻，您可以通过登陆他的网站：http://www.viewmagazine.tv/ 查询到他的联系方式。网站语言为英文。

The artist in Me

So what do I do on my time off. Doh

thanks to all supporters who have been pushing further to get the site together in a fashion that allows a more integrated experience. It's now about to be curated. I was trying to find my interview with Mandela, after I shook his hand and then I remembered numpty you ran out of tape and film. Drrrddaddadda!!@!£

Inside BBC Multimedia Newsroom Mary Hockaday

The interview I did with Mary Hockaday has been restored. Mary is the head of BBC Multimedia News and in this cut she's showing me around the BBC Newsroom. I'll get the actual actual link, but you can find it off the bat from www.viewmagazine.tv.

A bit of unobtrusive interviewing :)

And the robocop new media debate oldpost

New media demands more than ‘robo-journalists’ is an oldish post from Nicole, revived via tweets. C'mon.... I'm assuming she is a student at City based on her "my lecturer" tag.

It's a fine post, which pulls up that ol chestnut of online vs new media and do it yourself.

There is no holy grail answer for these, but a series of ideas and probables. There are though some constants. In 12 hours it will be nightime, then day. And as one of my mates and a star CNBC market analyser tells me, there's another big wopper in the works.

Frankly I'd settle for the fact that at 100mb streaming as the norm, I'll be watching the news in my glass of milk as I drink it the same time.

I'm a bit bullish, not like me, with my response, but you have to remember I have emerged from 14 days of research. I feel like talking : ) Read Nicole's posts and here's my response below

The trouble with market corrections - an unexpected event wreaking havoc which eventually is steered back - is there are casualties. A lot of equity is lost, some written off altogether.

In effect, albeit not in the classic case, this is another market correction and they'll be another one, and another.

From 1994, satellite, then cable, then the Net, news has had to buffet a series of disruptions. And if you trend extrapolate with more robust tech networks in the offing, we're only at the tip of this flux.

News orgs might just have to transform themselves, not only as daily providers, but with in-house (on campus preferably) teams working in tandem and tighter with academia/techs addressing in many ways what are driven - phenomenologies impacting news.

Ok that's not what News does, yes! But these are changing times, and it:

1. affords a (likely) integral stream of students into this metamorphosing industry.
2. affords (not always) a potential canary effect of the latest disruptive events.
3. allows for a genuine rolling debate between groups about changing semiotics to be addressed.

Slightly to the side of this argument what Miami University and the Knight Foundation are doing is very impressive. It's worth looking into.

Cheers david
Snr Lecturer, University of Westminter
Artist in Residence, South Bank Centre

Why Do U.K. Videos Always Seem to Go Viral? Viewmagazine.tv response

Advertising Age asks the question referencing this brill, quirk viral.


More on the article here. Here's my response below.

@kcorrick thanks for tweet.

Great pts from previous posters, but there's something else in the UK. You've seen it in BYAs (Young Brit Artists e.g. Hirst), Grime/rare grooves(8os), and starting out film/commercial makers such as Cunnigham and Glazer (Guinness Ad voted best ever by Brits); that is an undercurrent, indie-come-good, might even say subversive movement that bangs against tradition.

And viral ad making was everything anti to the methodology of classic ads until relatively recently. The Viral Factory - a major proponent to Brits viral movement was not too long ago wrestling the status quo, now I doubt many Brit viralists will not pay some form of homage.

In 1999 I was working as a creative director for an interactive ad company in Soho (London) re-active.net and most of ad companies thumbed their nose to this new thing called "viral" It was cheap and followed no apt discourse. I recall one of the founders of The Viral Factory explaining their plans to us. Our mouths dropped, but that a wasn't universal reaction.

This creative (DIY) disruption is something the UK is particularly good at. Their indie TV scene is equally something to admire, which has govts attempting to find ways of helping out to relatively little success.

Your title could also have read: Why Does the U.K. Music Scene Always Seem to Go Viral? Semantically incorrect, but no less worthy. I conducted interviews with greats like Clinton, Fela Kut and Roy Ayers who marvelled at what creatives here could do with their sound.

Personally, I'd say there's a bloody mindedness, coupled with that old Brit jape, but yes as many that get made and seen, there are dead virals strewn across the innards of broadband pipes that we'll never get to make you happy, happy, happy, joy, joy, joy.

David Dunkley Gyimah
Artist in Residence, South Bank
Maker, Viewmagazine.tv
Clinton, Fela Kuti and Roy Ayers who marvelled at

Hitting the creative and videojournalism wall and emerging stronger

A different sort of hitting the creative and videojournalism wall, David's private studio deconstructed.

David's private studio and thinking space (1)

I can't deny it.

It cannot be hidden.

I hit the wall. Hard.

It was a combination of things, some not quite resolved, but in many ways it was almost neccessary, albeit I could do without it more than once in a year.

Tapes on right side of shelf ( beta) D2 and
Panasonic pro ( see below for tapes I'm yet to digitise)
See film on The Mayfair, London's beautiful people

Those things were:

Rewriting submission chapters towards my research thesis.

If I can come close to making sense of the research, it might annoy you. I WILL be persona non grata.

Equally though if you're working in this space of video and design, it should open up a glimpse into some of the whys in a phenomenological way.

The sum of all those parts, shaping the argument, has meant 19 hour days for the last 10 days.

But the SMARTlab Dean of Research Programmes invited me out for a supervisory catch up over supper and in many ways acknowledged this manic streak had not bypassed their radar.


Long Sigh
A small weight has lifted, not a lot, but the knot in my shoulder should dissipate and hopefully they'll be no more incidents where blood vessels in my eye pop. Yes it did.

Academia presses quite different buttons compared to what we know as practitioners. And the fact I have been a senior lecturer for almost a decade counts for very little.

Anyway.

• Artist in Residency
• Crisis Management
• New Videojournalism films e.g Beirut Videojournalism see Pt 2. on Youtube.
  

• Student Markings
• South Africa Knight Batten
• Book deal

Images from my broadcast past working for the BBC, ITN and ABC News and a shoot with Moby in Washington, and an invitation to a creative meeting from the Olympic 2012 bid

These are some of the other things that have been happening alongside my Robert Frost moments ie The Road Less Travelled.

The Artist in Residency (AIRS) is quite frankly the most extraordinary thing to happen and I'll soon refocus new posts on this.

The South Bank Centre has been the home of some of the most illustrious and creative AIRS e.g Royal Philharmonic, Award winning dancer Raphael Bonachela, Poet Lemm Sissay, so it's not to be taken lightly (as if I would) , rather to be looked upon in awe before driving into its principles.

For you see the AIRS programme is all about developing the artist, taking you to a place where you wouldn't go and then watching how you return-that-to- senders: the principle of pay it back.

Free from the constraints of what can be done, what should be done disregarding fixed semiotics, and whether it should be done (which has never put me off) the South Bank asks you to imagine. BIG.

Ideas on deep video linking have been featured in The Economist

Videojournalism Show and Tell
So in September I have my "Show and Tell", a sort of in house TED talk to the South Bank, and at the back of my mind I'm aware they are not impressed easily. Time to raise the bar again?

Videejournalism in Beirut is receding fast. That does not diminish its importance.

What's happening in Beirut with videojournalism is where I'd like to take the form universally and I wager, even though it was the briefest of visits, that the videojournalists, real smart beings, will be trailing a blaze on an international scale in some months.

A lecture to a Chinese contingent in visualisation, and a media management crisis lecture and prepping for a trip to South Africa with some of the US' esteem practitioners in the media and academia looms.

But that's enough for now, I must turn my attention to marking our Master students projects. I'll post their links to their work tomorrow.

Passes from covering Lennox Lewis heavyweight fight in Memphis - a truly awesome experience working for the Lennox Team. You needed at least five passes to move from Ringside to the after party

It is, I hope you agree, pretty good work and as their blog and exit interviews demonstrate, it's less what's on the surface but their informed thinking that's truly beautiful and I know they hit the wall a couple of times as well.

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

More images

Beta tapes I'm yet to digitise. Each tape holds up to five stories. There's a stack of dv tapes which I can't even think about


Made on a Mac - talking at Apple Stores. Looking forward to enveiling new research and going back, if they'll have me, next year

Knight Batten Award for Innovation in Journalism, which only recently has come out of its box. I'm so indebted to Knight Batten for this award

And here thanks to Sabine Streich, who organised the international Videojournalism Awards in Berlin. She rang me up and said you've won and I told her to £@%^& off believing a friend was making a prank call. We still laugh
about it.

Tickets for much sought after friendly England vs France Rugby. My cousin, Paul Sackey, whom I have only met once, plays for England and I wanted to see him close up. I'm still thinking I should get in contact with him and say "Hi Paul fancy me making a film on you"