The World News Day and International Day for Universal Access to Information took place on September 28th. While the former is a campaign supporting journalists in providing truthful and accurate news, the latter advocates the right to information for all. As the President of the European Commission highlighted in her 2021 State of the Union speech , “Information is a public good. We must protect those who create transparency – the journalists. That is why today we have put forward a recommendation to give journalists better protection.” With the journalist playing an always more responsible role in an always more challenging conditions, the question poses itself: how can we support constructive journalism?
Augustine Perraud from Reporters d’Espoirs looks at education as a possible solution. European SOlutions JOurnalism MOOC (e-SOJO) is a Stars4Media supported innovation that provides online training for journalists. The goal? Practice “solutions journalism” by facilitating the knowledge exchange among media professionals.
In the same line, Michèle Foin’s initiative Sol(vox) explores the “Tech for Good” concept. The main concern of this Stars4Media project is providing easier access to the latest up-to-date technological solutions by supporting those entrepreneurs members of social economy aiming to have impact on society. Cristina Grao Escorihuela aims “For a constructive television in southern Europe,”as is the title of their StarsMedia project. This initiative delves into the television media panorama and the media in general as ‘promoters of change for the better that the world needs’. For Cristina and her project partners, the idea begins from a standard paradigm between Spain and Italy, compared to other European and international models.
The European dimension of cross-collaboration remains in focus for many of the second edition beneficiaries. For example, EUROMAG, a joint initiative by Cafébabel, France, and BX1, Belgium, creates a monthly show broadcasted on BX1, that will report on a European topic by bringing it to a local level. This would offer a local and a European solution to an European issue. In addition, the e-SOJO initiative hopes the second project phase will see the expansion of the broadcasting offer to additional languages, thus contributing to a ‘European vision of solutions journalism’ by creating links with other organizations working on this editorial innovation.
For Michèle and her team, Solvox is a first step towards building a solution journalism network. Through eight episodes, their podcast will try to verify if technology can really be put at the service of the common good by conducting an in-depth investigation with the beneficiaries of these technologies. With Stars4Media recognizing the novelty of their approach and providing means, they can now make it a reality.
This is first in the series of articles about the Stars4Media and its second edition beneficiaries. Explore with us their stories and learn more about what drives their media innovations further! Make sure to follow along on Twitter, and to join our LinkedIn community!