PMC launches new 'social justice' media website

Pacific Scoop: By Courtney Wilson

The new Pacific Media Centre’s Web 2 news site has been launched at the inaugural Media, Investigative Journalism and Technology Conference.

The new site is a collaborative work, which brings together a range of resources from separate sites including Pacific Media Watch, Pacific Scoop and Pacific media research.

The site also links to Dr David Robie’s blog Café Pacific. Dr Robie is director of the Pacific Media Centre, an associate professor at AUT University and editor of Pacific Scoop.

Tony Murrow, the site developer, said the goal of the site was to bring the huge array of content into one umbrella website.

Dr Robie said the independent website was created with the idea of challenging the role of media around the Pacific.

“We seek to report the untold stories and issues that are simply not being canvassed by other media in the region,” he said.

“And if there is any bias at all on the website it is in favour of social justice.”

He said while many newsrooms are being cut “back to the bone” and web stories are super short, AUT University’s journalism programme is asking postgraduate students for more complexity and quality in their reports.

Contributing editor of Pacific Media Watch Alex Perrottet said the site would be an extremely useful resource for anyone looking for information, not only on the Pacific, but specifically on media and journalism in the region.

“The Pacific is an amazing place and there is an eclectic collection of individuals and groups fighting for a range of worthy ideals.

“Media is a major theme but there are many other important issues often overlooked by our Western media, even those outlets that focus on the Pacific.”

The website will soon change the format of Pacific Media Watch from an email service to an RSS feed.

“You will find quite a history there already of anything and everything to do with the media in the Pacific,” Perrottet said.

There will also be a heightened presence of university media and journalism research on the new website.

Co-editor of Pacific Scoop Selwyn Manning said he was pleased to see the year-old Pacific Scoop paired next to good, strong research.

“It gives a place where a new generation of journalists can express their work outside of a university,” he said.

Manning said the new site is an easily navigable framework, which contains a magnitude of content.

“It is displayed in a visual way as an example of convergence working,” he said.

Visit the new website here.

Courtney Wilson is a graduating Bachelor of Communication Studies student journalist on an internship with AUT’s Pacific Media Centre.

• Pacific Media Centre blog updates will now be posted here.

Harnessing the internet for traditional PNG archives

Pacific Media Centre: UPNG

At the National Cultural Commission's Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies, a team of local researchers has the mountainous task of recording the traditional knowledge of PNG societies.

With some 814 distinct cultures, Ralph Wari, the institute's director, freely admits that they have hardly touched the surface of local language, customs, arts, and music. But with limited resources, the team must record and archive as much material as possible as well as disseminate it, in many cases to help ensure its survival.

While most of the collected materials are currently residing at the institute's Port Moresby base, Wari is hoping that the internet will prove a useful tool in making the vast stores of local knowledge more widely available.

The Institute of PNG Studies is one of several potential information providers taking part in a project coordinated by the University of Papua New Guinea's South Pacific Centre for Communication and Information in Development (SPCenCIID) and funded by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) as part of its Pan-Asia Networking (PAN) programme.

The project – named PAN Information Networking and Services Papua New Guinea (PINS-PNG) – will lead to an information server being established and encourage institutions to publish electronically. Similar PAN country-level information servers have been funded in the Philippines, Vietnam and Nepal by IDRC.

PINS-PNG aims to bring together some of the country's best sources of local content to build up a PNG presence on the internet, as well as provide training for relevant organisations, and encourage the distribution of research materials within the country.

With one of the largest pockets of biodiversity in the world, PNG has long been a focal point for researchers from all parts of the globe.

Unfortunately, the same enthusiasm given to collecting data is not extended to its dissemination within the country.

Big potential
John Evans, a lecturer and book publisher within SPCenCIID and project leader for PINS-PNG, says that much of the research is published outside of the country and often does not make it back.

When it does, it is often limited to one location and its availability is not known elsewhere, particularly in outlying areas where much of it originates. To counter this, Evans will coordinate efforts to make more research information available through the internet as a result of the project.

“People used to go off and write their report somewhere else and it never got back again,” he says.

“Now people might be more inclined to put summaries of their research on the net.”

Locally, there is certainly no shortage of information providers with an abundance of potential content.

For the project, seven organisations have been identified initially - the Institute of PNG Studies, the University of Papua New Guinea, the National Parliament Library, the Government Office of Information and Communications, the Small Business Development Corporation, the National Association of NGOs (NANGO), and the Melanesian Institute.

Papua New Guinea has itself only been connected to the internet since 1997. But since then there is a growing awareness of its potential and no shortage of ideas on how best to use it within the context of PNG resources.

Webbing new and traditonal knowledge