Hot topics click link for more
Early this year search engine giant Google awarded €27 million through its Digital News Initiative (DNI) to 128 European media projects. It was clearly part of a charm offensive meant to sooth tender egos bruised by the total eclipse of the digital sun. Publishers of all sorts grumbled and took the money.
Six publisher projects in Belgium shared €2.26 million from the DNI fund. Some are big and some are start-ups. All seek to harness technology for improved digital reach and, hopefully, profit. Over three years Google has promised a contribution of €150 million to “help stimulate innovation in digital journalism.”
Ten years ago Google was ordered by a Belgian court to scrub all content from Belgian publishers “under penalty of a daily fine of €2 million.” French-language publishers copyright management agency Copiepresse demanded immediate compliance. The result was predictable: all Belgian publishers were removed from google.be and Google News indexing. Bye, bye, Belgium. Within a year the publishers were ready to negotiate and Google News indexing returned after a five year delay. (See more about Google here)
Three publishers in French-speaking Belgium - Wallonia - received €500,000 from the DNI for their joint digital news portal project Infotelligence, which was announced shortly before the Google award was made. It’s all about algorithms. Technical specialists have been hired and first results are expected to roll-out in the new year. The partners are publishers IPM, Rossell and Editions de l’Avenir.
“The overall philosophy,” said IPM director and Infotelligence project manager Denis Pierrard, “ is to better understand the needs and behaviors of our website users to provide journalistic content more in line with those needs,” quoted by lalibre.be (June 24). So excited the Economy Ministry of Wallonia granted the project €6.8 million in June as part of its Digital Wallonia initiative.
But the Infotelligence project will have competition. Such is the digital reality. French digital kiosk Articly indicated entry into the French-speaking Belgian market sometime in 2017.
An imminent sale and transfer of Hungarian publisher MediaWorks to a local company with close ties to Prime Minister Viktor Orban is expected, reported news portal 444.hu (October 23). MediaWorks suddenly shuttered daily newspaper Népszabadsag two weeks ago offering, again, disturbing evidence of further collapse press freedom in the country. Népszabadsag had a strong circulation base, well-read website (nol.hu) and a reputation for independent reporting. MediaWorks has been owned by private equity firm Vienna Capital Partners.
The suspected buyer is Opimus Press, owned by publicly traded Opimus Group and associated with Orban ally Lorinc Meszaros. Opimus Press was formed last March. MediaWorks assets include sports magazine Nemzeti Sport and the publisher of 13 regional newspapers, recently acquired, associated with Mr. Orban’s Fidesz political party. (See more about media in Hungary here)
At a Brussels press conference last Friday PM Orban was asked specifically about the closing of Népszabadsag and, more generally, press freedom in Hungary, reported index.hu (October 21). He responded with a quip about hoping journalists at “the rest of the left-wing papers find jobs.” His government had not “dealt with the Népszabadsag case” because it had nothing to do with journalism. He also said the Austrian owners of Népszabadsag had to follow Hungarian laws.
Népszabadsag editorial staff, locked out of their usual workplaces, attracted attention by producing material for free-sheet Fedel Nelkul, published for Budapest’s homeless people.
Last week left-leaning newspaper Nepszava and publisher Geomedia were acquired by heretofore unknown Liechtenstein-based XXI Century Invest AG. Nepszava chief editor Peter Nemeth said, quoted by napi.hu (October 20), the staff would “get to know the new owners in the next few weeks.”
The editorial staff at French all-news channel iTélé voted last Friday to continue their strike through Monday, reported France 24 (October 21). Union (SDJ) members walked out last week in protest, ostensibly because the channel added a talkshow hosted by Jean-Marc Morandini. Officials from Canal+, owner of iTélé, maintained support for M.Morandini and the expected re-branding of the channel.
M.Morandini has long been a fixture in French media, most recently at national radio channel Europe 1 where he was something of a shock-jock. His career took a nosedive this past July when showbiz tabloid Les Inrockuptibles alleged certain improprieties of a sexual nature. A separate allegation of sexual coercion of minors followed with French prosecutors opening an investigation. He was suspended from Europe 1 “with respect for the presumption of innocence,” said Lagardère Active chief executive Denis Olivennes, quoted by Le Point (October 19). (See more about media in France here)
During all the notoriety, M.Morandini was hired by Canal+ to host a weekly talkshow on iTélé. He was already hosting a show on NRJ12, from which he has also been suspended. Once upon a time, he hosted a show on D8, then owned by Canal+ principal Vincent Balloré, who bought iTélé a year ago. Observing all this, French Culture Minister Audrey Azoulay referred to creeping (or creepy) “trumpization of news,” quoted by Le Parisian (October 22). (See more about TV news here)
The iTélé editorial staff by then had grown quite restless. TV news competition in France is intense; iTélé up against all-news channels LCI and BFMTV as well as news output from TF1 and France Télévisions. Canal+ had intended to rebrand iTélé as Cnews this week. That seems to have been put on hold.
|
