In the spring of 1950, Gordon Parks, the first African-American photographer for Life Magazine, returned to his hometown of Fort Scott, Kansas. On assignment for the magazine, Parks photographed his middle…
Longtime New Yorker magazine staff writer Lillian Ross once admonished aspiring reporters not to write about themselves. “As a reporter, serve your subject,” she wrote, “do not serve yourself. Do not…
Julian Disney, the outgoing chair of the Australian Press Council, made a singularly powerful argument in his valedictory speech to the National Press Club on Wednesday: that freedom of the press is strengthened…
A powerful intelligence lobby made up of former defence ministers, police chiefs and intelligence commissioners has emerged in British politics, determined to push for greater powers and resources for…
Jesse Hlebo is troubled. The New York-based artist’s latest exhibition, In Pieces explores information overload and authenticity in the internet era – and it’s a challenging place to spend some time. Walking…
I have spent the past 20 years researching and writing about women in the media. This was initially sparked off by how I was reported on when I stood as a councillor, with more attention paid to my Doc…
Ethan Zuckerman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Consider two tragic events that took place last week. A small cell of Islamic terrorists attacked cartoonists at the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and shoppers in a Paris supermarket, killing 17 people…
They think and work differently, cartoonists. Anyone who has spent any time in an editorial office will know that cartoonists dream and draw on their own, working to the rhythm of their thoughts – if they…
The camera jerks as the wave crashes through the wall of the restaurant. The tables set out for a wedding breakfast are swept aside. The man behind the camera doesn’t realise the awful reality of what…
The final episode of Serial, the most successful podcast in history, went live at 10.30am GMT on December 18. Twitter reported that offices, train platforms and sidewalks around the world fell silent…
AUST gets wake-call with Sydney terror. Only Daily Telegraph caught the bloody outcome at 2.00 am. Congrats.— Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) December 15, 2014 In one brutally insensitive tweet, Rupert…
Sports journalist Daniel Taylor wrote an article highlighting questions that still needed answering about the Valley Parade stadium fire of 1985 in which 56 people died. But publishing it was just the…
ABC managing director Mark Scott undertook the unenviable task on Monday of wielding the axe to meet the Abbott government’s cut to the broadcaster’s funding. Government cutbacks to Australia’s publicly…
Interviewed recently in The Observer, comedian David Mitchell revealed that he never reads the below the line comments on his online articles any more. He said: The presence of that community of commenters…
The BBC has put the cat among the pigeons with the news that its commercial arm, BBC Worldwide, will beef up its presence in Australia by hiring local journalists and launching a dedicated news service…
As we hurtle towards peak Russell Brand, I have a question. Treat it as rhetorical if you like but if anyone has an actual answer, they would be warmly welcomed. My question is: what has Brand actually…
A year after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the University of California, Berkeley, conducted a postmortem of the media coverage of the so-called “Iraq war”. The conference included academics, journalists…
Foundation essay: This article is part of a series marking the launch of The Conversation in the US. Our foundation essays are longer than our usual comment and analysis articles and take a wider look…
Foundation essay: This article is part of a series marking the launch of The Conversation in the US. Our foundation essays are longer than our usual comment and analysis articles and take a wider look…
In the closing decades of the last century, many political and business elites were swept up in a global wave of policies favouring free markets, deregulation of business and finance and privatisation…