The SA media news of the week you need to know, as reported by and aggregated from the media:
Sapa’s own story about it’s closure, 5 Feb 2015
Grubstreet, 5 Feb:
Sapa, the 70-year-old South African news agency, is to close, it has just been announced.
This follows more than a year of uncertainty at the agency that began with founding members pulling out of the not-for-profit entity.
FULL STORY: Sapa news agency to close after 70 years
The South African Press Association (Sapa) will send out its last story at midnight on March 31
— SA Press Association (@SapaNews) February 5, 2015
TimesLIVE, 5 Feb:
A Beeld newspaper reporter and photographer were hijacked in Majakaneng, outside Brits in North West.
The Afrikaans daily reported that crime reporter Leanne George and photographer Deaan Vivier were driving on the R104 on Wednesday to cover protests in the area when they were accosted, according to the report.
FULL STORY: Crime reporter, photographer hijacked near Brits – thieves tried to burn car
Memeburn, 4 Feb:
So this just happened. The Twitter account of South Africa’s largest online news provider News24 just tweeted “Jesus Christ Holy Fuck,” in reference to a video of a plane crashing in Taiwan.
These social mishaps obviously don’t go unnoticed considering the News24 Twitter account has over 1 million followers.
FULL STORY: News24 gets sweary, apologises for ‘erroneous’ tweet about plane crash
Mail & Guardian, 4 Feb:
Constitutional imperative, the law and the courts be damned. Government departments remain as secretive as ever, a new civil society report shows.
Private companies aren’t great, and organisations ranging from South Africa’s largest city to the operator of nuclear reactors are all culprits. But none are quite as bad as the government department tasked with administering justice – which neither understands the law nor implements it, and routinely flouts the Constitution when it comes to transparency.
FULL STORY: Transparency deferred: 14 years on and secrecy still rules
BDLive, 4 Feb:
THE African National Congress (ANC) has broken the deadlock over set-top boxes for television, confirming at its lekgotla last week that a Cabinet decision in favour of encryption taken a year ago must be implemented.
Set-top boxes will be required for all analogue TV sets once SA’s transmission signal switches to digital. Set-top boxes for poor households will be subsidised by the government.
FULL STORY: ANC clears the way for digital TV rollout
TimesLIVE, 4 Feb:
VIDI, South Africa’s video on demand entertainment service, has signed a deal with BBC Worldwide – the commercial arm of the BBC – that will see the best of the British broadcaster’s programming available on the service in the months ahead.
The deal sees a raft of acclaimed shows, from drama to comedy to natural history and children’s, some of which will be available from the beginning of February.
FULL PRESS RELEASE: Vidi signs exclusive deal with BBC worldwide
TimesLIVE, 3 Feb:
Multichoice might soon face something worse than a fine.
It has already had to pay R100 000 in fines in just over 18 months to the Broadcasting Complaints Commission of SA, convicted of exposing youngsters to violent images.
The pay channel must pay another R15000 before the end of this month – just a few weeks after being fined R25000 for flighting promos and content deemed harmful to children outside the “adult viewing” period between 8pm and 5am, or for incorrect age classification.
FULL STORY: DStv ‘makes kids cry’
The new Indy editors with Dr Iqbal Surve, centre Pic: Twitter, Feb 2015
IOL, 2 Feb (and announcement of Gasant Abarder’s move from Cape Times to Argus plus Aneez Salie’s appointment as Cape Times editor):
Cape Town – Independent Media on Monday announced the changes in its editorial leadership team in Cape Town.
Jermaine Craig, Editor of the Cape Argus, has been promoted to the position of Brand and Editorial Executive of the Independent Media group and will join the corporate team with immediate effect.
Craig, who comes with solid brand and media experience having previously worked as Global Communications Manager for South African Tourism and as the Media Manager for the 2010 FIFA World Cup Organising Committee South Africa, will play an important role in driving the brand strategy objectives of Independent Media’s newspaper titles, its magazine and digital assets, as well as the company’s overarching corporate brand. He will also serve on the company’s executive team.
FULL STATEMENT: Senior appointments at Independent
BBC press release, 2 Feb:
BBC World Service has announced new digital investment aimed at reaching new audiences in Africa – the launch of the Africa edition of the bbc.com website. The new edition ensures that English-speaking internet users on the continent will see far more African news stories, features and video on the bbc.com front page, while the bbc.com/Africa section, dedicated to African news, will also see significant enhancements.
With its newsgathering presence in 48 countries on the continent, the BBC has more reporters in Africa than any other broadcaster. The launch of the Africa edition of bbc.com will bring more of the stories produced by BBC journalists, and their unique understanding of the subjects they are covering, to digital platforms.
Now users coming to bbc.com from any African country will see a home page more relevant to the continent, with more live developments on moving news and sports stories as well as enhanced coverage of health, technology and business, in text, pictures, audio and video. The Africa edition will provide more expert analysis from the BBC’s reporters to explain the issues behind the headlines and in-depth features on a broad range of topics, to give a balanced portrayal of the vibrant African continent.
The BBC will also continue to give a voice to Africa’s massive online audience via dedicated space on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Instagram, SoundCloud and YouTube.
The BBC’s digital audiences are growing rapidly, and this investment is designed to ensure this continues as increasing numbers of people in Africa get their news via mobile phones, comments BBC World Service Group Digital Development Editor, Dmitry Shishkin: “We have had consistent and impressive growth of the traffic to bbc.com from Africa over the past two years. This growth is especially significant among audiences using mobile devices to access our content – 40% year on year. Over half of African browsers coming to bbc.com are using mobile devices. The new Africa edition, available on mobile, tablet and desktop versions, takes advantage of this strong presence and growth, and is editorially tailored for these audiences, making sure we serve them best with our multiplatform content.”
BBC Africa Editor Solomon Mugera adds: “BBC covers Africa like no other international broadcaster. This new digital proposition serves as an excellent framework for our significant presence and deep understanding of the continent, making our offer even more exciting, fresh and dynamic. The timing of this launch couldn’t be better as BBC Africa teams are geared to deliver comprehensive coverage of Africa Cup of Nations to the continent, which always brings new audiences to the BBC. Now they will see this content in an even more relevant way.”
With its content in Arabic, English, French, Hausa, Kinyarwanda/Kirundi, Kiswahili and Somali, BBC World Service connects with its African audiences through a variety of delivery methods including TV, radio on FM, shortwave and satellite, online and mobile devices and social networking channels. The language websites – bbcafrique.com (French for Africa), bbcarabic.com, bbcgahuza.com (Kinyarwanda/Kirundi), bbchausa.com, bbcsomali.com and bbcswahili.com – provide audiences with news, information and analysis in text, audio and video. The flagship TV content for Africa includes BBC World News’ shows, Focus on Africa presented by Sophie Ikenye and Peter Okwoche and Africa Business Report presented by Lerato Mbele, and BBC Swahili’s Dira ya Dunia with Salim Kikeke. Together, the BBC’s global news services reach 93 million people across the continent each week.
BDLive, 2 Feb:
COMMUNICATIONS Minister Faith Muthambi on Sunday defended government’s advertising spending after criticism from opposition party the DA.
“The department of communications’ in-house media buying team directs strategic government media buying using Telmar Media’s suite of world-wide leading media advertising software and services used for reach, frequency and optimisation,” she said in a statement.
“Government uses mass communication to fulfil its mandate to communicate to the largest possible spread of South Africans.”
FULL STORY: Muthambi defends government’s advertising spend
My Broadband, 1 Feb:
Deloitte has released its Technology, Media and Telecommunications predictions report for 2015, detailing what is foresees taking place in the media industry in the year to come.
According to the TMT report, print is not dead, and Deloitte predicts that print books will continue to dominate the publishing industry.
FULL STORY: Print is not dead: media predictions for 2015
Sunday Times, 1 Feb:
A journalist once found by a court to be responsible for ‘cowardly acts of terror’ is trying his best to discredit the Sunday Times investigations team. Normally we ignore such small fry, but we believe our readers deserve to know the full story. Stephan Hofstatter, Mzilikazi wa Afrika and Rob Rose separate fact from fiction
On September 19 2010 at 6.11pm, Paul Kirk, a journalist in KwaZulu-Natal working for The Citizen newspaper at the time, contacted the Sunday Times with a tip-off for a story.
He painted an extraordinary picture of the provincial head of the Hawks, Johan Booysen, as thoroughly evil and corrupt.
FULL STORY: Cato Manor: A trail of bodies and a ton of lies
Interesting reads
At last, competition in SA television, TechCentral, 4 Feb
Journalism and clichés, Columbia Journalism Review, 2 Feb
Awards deadlines coming up
Discovery Health Journalism Awards (deadline for entries is 6 February 2015): Click here for more details
Komla Dumor
The BBC has launched the BBC World News Komla Dumor Award in honour of presenter Komla Dumor, who passed away last year. (Deadline for entries is 9 Feb 2015). It is aimed at African journalists. Click here for more details
Sanlam Awards for Excellence in Financial Journalism (deadline for entries is 20 February 2015.): Click here for more details
Citi Journalistic Excellence Awards 2015, which is open to South African business journalists (deadline for entries is 20 February 2015): Click here for more details or contact: Vanashree Moodley, email: vanashree.moodley@citi.com
The Taco Kuiper Award for investigative journalism (deadline 21 Feb 2015): Click here for guidelines and entry forms.
SEE ALSO: Media in the media, Fri 30 Jan 2015
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