[cma-l] Knight News Challenge 2008: awards for digital projects for communities

Sat May 24 11:45:04 BST 2008

Dear All,
thought this news item might interest people on the list.

Source:
http://www.newschallenge.org/189/news-challenge-press-release.html

Among the winners:

- Community Radio in India
Award $200,000
Winner Aaditeshwar Seth
Organization University of Waterloo

Summary
This project will connect rural radio stations to the Internet by using
new software and computer-based FM transmitters. The innovations will
significantly reduce the cost of creating the stations in India - from an
estimated $50,000 to $2,500. India is issuing a new round of community
radio station licenses, so the proposal is timely. The effort will start
by helping nonprofits already operating in India launch radio stations.

- Tools for Public Access TV
Award $380,000
Winner Tony Shawcross
Organization Denver Open Media
Project URL:
DenverOpenMedia.org

Summary
This project will enable public access TV stations and community
technology centers to use common tools to create web sites that enable the
transfer of video between the web site and the TV station. Together,
public access TV and community technology centers can engage disadvantaged
communities in new media platforms. While there are thousands of public
access stations and community technology centers country-wide that provide
media education and equipment, they don’t share a tool-set enabling them
to become part of a collective, user-driven, online media network.

- Video Volunteers
Award $275,000
Winner Jessica Mayberry
Organization Community Media Distribution Network
Project URL:
VideoVolunteers.org

Summary
Video Volunteers, a New York-based nonprofit, will train 100 people in
rural India as Community Video Producers. These citizen journalists will
produce magazine- style video news reports, typically on local social
issues, and show them on widescreen projectors in poor communities. The
idea is to distribute public interest information to the poor – without
having to provide the entire population with digital tools. To date, Video
Volunteers’ screenings in India have reached 140,000 people in 150
communities. The video technology is not new. The innovation is to do
citizen journalism on a significant scale in a poor, rural area.

- Community News Network
Award $275,000
Winner Dharmishta Rood Anthony Pesce
Organization UCLA Daily Bruin

Summary
Student editors at the UCLA Bruin will create online publishing software
geared to mobile editing. College journalists then will be able to use the
content management system to remotely assign and edit stories, videos and
photos for online college sites. Also, readers will use it to submit their
own content and communicate with one another.

-

Source:
http://www.newschallenge.org/189/news-challenge-press-release.html

LAS VEGAS — Sixteen ideas to fund innovative digital projects around the
world were awarded $5.5 million dollars today from the John S. and James
L. Knight Foundation. Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the World Wide
Web, accepted one of the awards for a project that will create a
technology to give users more information about the origins and sourcing
of digital content.

Berners-Lee's project is a partnership between the Media Standards Trust
and the UK-based Web Science Research Initiative, of which he is a
director.

This is the second year of the $25 million Knight News Challenge, which
funds digital information innovations that transform community life.

Announced at the Interactive Media Conference in Las Vegas, this year's
projects will touch people in rural India, the townships of South Africa
and on college campuses across the United States, among other places. The
winners' ideas include:

    * Using the Web to solicit funding from the public to pay for
investigative journalism projects
    * Creating software that allows a computer to become a digital radio
transmitter, significantly reducing the cost of setting up community
news stations in India
    * Blogging to discuss the idea of interactive games where students
measure and track their personal demand on natural resources.

The prizes ranged from $15,000 to $876,000, and were given to individuals,
philanthropic organizations and for-profit businesses, including the
Bakersfield Californian newspaper. Ten winners were from the United
States, and six were from Canada, England, Lithuania, South Africa,
Zimbabwe and Russia.

"Just as the Knight brothers used their newspapers to help create the
conversations about improving life in their communities, we look forward
to these projects that use new information tools to inform and inspire
community," said Alberto Ibargüen, president and CEO of Knight Foundation.

In 2007, the Knight News Challenge awarded $12 million to 25 digital
innovators.

This year, several projects focus on bridging the digital divide, such as
one to deliver news by text message to inexpensive cell phones used in
developing countries. Often these mobile phones are the only modern
communications devices in a community.

Other projects sought to develop tools that make it easy for anyone, not
just technology specialists, to join the digital conversation.

"More and more, if you're not in the digital conversation about your
community, you're not in a conversation that matters," Ibargüen said.

The number of applicants for Knight News Challenge increased 82 percent in
its second year, to 3,000. The percentage of foreign applicants increased
to 40 percent from 15 percent in 2007. The contest was advertised in 10
languages. It also featured a special "Young Creators" category to reward
the ideas of those who are 25 and younger.

Six of this year's winners were "Young Creators."

"We're excited that young people want to use their ideas and skills to
help inform people in new ways and help those people create stronger
communities," said Eric Newton, vice
president of Knight Foundation's journalism program.

###

Media Resources:

    * Knight News Challenge Web site: www.newschallenge.org
    * Hi-res photos of the winners: http://www.kflinks.com/knc-photos
    * Winner bios and project descriptions: http://www.kflinks.com/knc-bios
    * Winners contact information: http://www.kflinks.com/winners-contact
    * Knight Foundation fact sheet: http://www.kflinks.com/kf-factsheet
    * Knight News Challenge fact sheet: http://www.kflinks.com/knc-factsheet
    * This document: http://www.kflinks.com/knc-release
    * General media contact: Marc Fest, Knight Foundation vice president
for Communications, 305-908-2677, fest at knightfoundation.org
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-- 
Salvatore Scifo,
Lecturer in Community Media
Media Information & Communication
Department of Applied Social Sciences
London Metropolitan University
Ladbroke House, Room LH 326
62-66 Highbury Grove
London N5 2AD

W: www.communitymedia.eu

Companies Act 2006 : http://www.londonmet.ac.uk/companyinfo