Feb. 5, 2018 By AMANDA POPE Staff reporter A website to help children understand the news, a mobile platform that provides newsrooms with better access to eyewitness videos, and an online platform for distributing newscasts on voice-activated devices were among the ideas-in-progress at the recent launch of the Digital News Innovation Challenge. Nearly 100 journalists, aspiring entrepreneurs and students attended the Jan. 25 launch of the Canada-wide incubation program in Ryerson University’s DMZ. The event was an opportunity to learn more about how to become one of five journalism startups accepted into the Facebook-sponsored program. The teams selected through the…
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By MADDIE BINNING Special to the RJRC Journalists reporting on extremist groups need to arm themselves with knowledge as neo-Nazi and terrorist organizations become more sophisticated in their messaging and media manipulation, a leading expert on radicalization told Ryerson journalism students. Amarnath Amarasingam, a research fellow at the London-based Institute for Strategic Dialogue and at George Washington University, made the case for beat reporting, arguing that reporters need to be equipped with the knowledge and background to challenge the claims of extremists and to put their claims in context. “Part of the problem with the alt-right is that they removed…
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This is one of a series of articles and videos on the June 2017 conference “Is no local news bad news? Local journalism and its future” hosted by the Ryerson Journalism Research Centre. Watch the full conference panel below. To read more about the conference and local news, visit: localnews.journalism.ryerson.ca. By MIRIAM VALDES-CARLETTI Staff reporter Newsroom collaborations can give students valuable training and provide a service by filling gaps in local news coverage, says a media labour expert. Errol Salamon, the work and labour editor at J-Source, says that established media publishers and editors have also helped students by giving…
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By JASMINE BALA Staff Reporter While most Canadian millennials get their first taste of news via Facebook posts, Twitter shares and other social media, that is typically just the starting point when it comes to their news consumption habits, a new study suggests. The study contradicts the commonly held belief that young people don’t go much beyond social media in their quest for news, says Jessica Thom, a Ryerson University School of Image Arts assistant professor and the author of the research. In fact, she said, many youth use social media as a gateway to mainstream news sites. “They’re really…
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BY JASMINE BALA Staff Reporter News stories that deal with mental health-related recovery and treatment are shared much more frequently than stories about mental health and violence, according to new research by a Ryerson University journalism professor. The study by Gavin Adamson examined the content of articles dealing with mental health and how they were shared across digital platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. “There’s sort of this assumption that what bleeds leads in journalism,” said Adamson, who co-authored the report with McGill University’s Robert Whitley and Liam Donaldson, a research assistant at Ryerson. “It’s like this catchphrase. I don’t…