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MARS - Media Against Racism in Sport | 2nd National Encounter starts this week in Cyprus |
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Written by Stefan Tenner
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Monday, 23 January 2012 10:31 |
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 Paralympian Gold Medallist Karolina Pelendritou and footballer Coskun Ulusoy will kick-off a four-day seminar at the Cyprus Community Media Centre (CCMC) in Nicosia’s Buffer Zone. The event, which starts on Wednesday 25 January, is organised in partnership with the Council of Europe (CoE) and the Community Media Forum Europe (CMFE).
The aim of the programme is to promote the inclusion of the principles of non-discrimination and diversity as an ongoing angle of media coverage. Organised within the framework of the joint CoE / European Union MARS - Media Against Racism in Sport - programme, this encounter will focus on sport related issues.
The issue of racism in sport has made headlines across Europe in recent months following incidents involving high-profile football players in England’s Barclays Premier League. “The cases of Luis Suarez and John Terry have highlighted the importance of understanding the nature and prevalence of racism in sport”, said Michalis Simopoulos, local coordinator of the encounter. “By encouraging professional collaboration with media actors and the exchange of media practices, CCMC hopes to enhance a diversity of perspectives and topics dealt with by the media”.
The MARS Programme is a follow-up action to the 2008 – 2010 CoE “Speak out Against Discrimination” campaign, CMFE were already involved in. “We believe that an inclusive information environment is crucial for achieving effective social cohesion and participation in democratic life”, said Reynald Blion, MARS programme manager. “Working with media partners at the European and national levels is a strategy that we believe can influence public opinion vis-à-vis diversity and intercultural issues”.
CMFE is one of the partner organisations for MARS, working close together with the Council of Europe or partner like MediaAnimation, IFJ/EJF, VIDC, FARE and other. The programme brings representatives from Community Media, Minority Media and Mainstream Media together on a very pratical level. CMFE is responsible for the organization of several national and one european gathering and inviting editors and journalists to come together and produce media reports through cross-production with non discrimination and diversity as an angle of media coverage. The first Encounter focussing on Cross Production was held in Vienna in September 2011, organized together with the austrian CMFE member and federation for free radios VFRÖ. The second encounter in Nicosia from 25 to 28th of januar 2012 is now organized with the cypriot CMFE Member Cyprus Community Media Center CCMC. Later this year there will be several other national Encounter on Cross Production in Dublin in April 2012, in Berlin in July 2012 and in autumn in Budapest. The 1st European Media Encounter on Media Cross-Production will be in Portugal in Oktober 2012. All journalists, editors and media activists are invited to join these meetings. Additional everybody can apply for "European Media Work Exchanges", where media professionals from Community, Minority or Mainstream Media have the opportunity to host a media colleague/counterpart and be hosted themselves by a media related organisation in return.
Beside Cross Production, there are several other actvities in the field of Training & Literacy and Ethics. For further information on the whole MARS programme, please visit the Council of Europe page.
For more information on the part of the MARS Programme, CMFE is responsible for, please visit: http://www.cmfe.eu/mars and get in contact with CMFE MARS Coordinator
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Hungarian Media Laws in Europe: An Assessment of the Consistency of Hungary’s Media Laws with European Practices and Norms |
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Written by CMFE
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Thursday, 05 January 2012 23:22 |
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 The Center for Media and Communication Studies (CMCS) of the Central European University in Budapest announces the release of the new study. Led by researcher Amy Brouillette it analyses the consistency of the Hungarian media regulations with European practices and norms. It addresses a key international policy debate regarding the conformity of Hungary’s new media legislation to European and EU media-regulation standards. The study also contributes to the ongoing policy making process regarding Hungary’s media laws—particularly in light of the recent rulings by Hungary’s Constitutional Court which requires several provisions to be amended by 31 May 2012—as well as contributing to the debate around other areas of concern that have been raised by the European Commission, European lawmakers, and domestic and international stakeholders.
In December 2010 and January 2011, the Hungarian Government released two statements summarising the main criticisms of its new laws and providing examples of regulations from 20 European and EU-member states as precedents for Hungary’s media legislation. For this study, the Center for Media and Communication Studies (CMCS) commissioned media policy experts in each of these 20 countries to examine every example cited by Hungary’s Government. The findings of this report are based on the expert assessments of these examples. The purpose of this study is to examine the accuracy of the precedents cited by the Hungarian Government in order to shed light on the more critical question of how consistent Hungary’s media laws are with other media systems in Europe.
The study finds that Hungary’s media laws are largely inconsistent with the cited European practices and norms, based on an examination of the legal precedents provided and on the expert analyses of how these precedents are implemented in these European and EU-member countries. In a majority of examples, experts report that the Hungarian Government’s references omit or inaccurately characterise relevant factors of the other countries’ regulatory systems, and as a result, the examples do not provide sufficient and/or equivalent comparisons to Hungary’s media regulation system. In many examples, the Hungarian Government accurately presents a portion of a legal provision or regulation, however in these cases the reference either excludes elements of how the regulation is implemented or the regulation cited does not correspond with the scope and powers of Hungary’s media laws or Media Authority. Overall, this study finds that the European media regulations cited by the Hungarian Government do not serve as adequate precedents for Hungary’s new media laws.
The study also reveals a wide disparity in media-regulation policies among European and EU-member states and highlights some key deficiencies in a number of other European systems that may inhibit press freedom in ways that do not appear to conform to European free-press norms.
Download:
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Digital Radio: CMFE and AMARC Europe sent letter to European Commission |
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Written by CMFE
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Monday, 19 December 2011 21:37 |
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 On behalf of the thousands of community media around Europe, the Community Media Forum Europe (CMFE) and AMARC-Europe (the European regional section of the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters) wrote, on 19 December 2011, a letter to Neelie Kroes, The European Commissioner for the Digital Agenda.
In this letter we ask Ms Kroes to enter into a dialogue with us:
- To include necessary actions in the Digital Agenda to accommodate community (local) media to enter the digital broadcasting era;
- To enforce the use of open standard, hybrid digital radio receivers;
- To support and promote the adoption of DRM+ and
- To monitor the revision of national FM frequency policies among member states.
The widely supported and promoted digitalization technology, DAB(+), although the preferred technology in large(r) coverage areas, is in many cases unsuitable for community (local) radio stations. We therefore plea for preservation of the FM Band for radio broadcasting and support for the introduction of DRM+ standard on FM and eventually even on Band III alongside DAB(+).
In this way the richness, diversity and pluralism of the media sector is best guaranteed, respecting the contribution of thousands community (local) radio stations, their ten thousands of practitioners (active European citizens) and millions of listeners.
The full letter can be downloaded at: letter_to_EC.pdf |
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Regional and Local Media go Digital |
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Written by CMFE
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Friday, 28 October 2011 00:00 |
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 Pieter de Wit, President of CMFE, contributed to the conference "Digital broadacsting in Europe: technical, legal and regulatory aspects" held in Kiev on 27 October 2011. He stressed the growing acceptance of DRM+ next to DAB+ as a solution for local and regional radio.
Even EBU now accepts Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM)* as member of the ‘DAB family of standards’. Also the Australian government showed, in their report from 12 October 2011, a preference for DRM and DRM+, above HD Radio, to be used to supplement DAB+ services in (some) local and regional areas.
> Download the full contribution from Pieter de Wit, including with links to cited documents
* Since March 2011, CMFE is an Associate Member of the Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) Consortium
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Call for help to broadcast Ourplanet TV's 'Voices of Children from Fukushima' |
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Written by CMFE
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Monday, 02 January 2012 22:03 |
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 Dear CMFE members, friends and colleagues,
Ourplanet-TV, is one of Japan's best known alternative media, an all-citizens based independent public access center, with distribution on the internet, and on Tokyo area cable (in a weekly program window). This non-profit non-governmental media organization in Tokyo, is collecting donations for a 2-hour TV program highlighting the voices of Japanese children, who have been affected by the Fukushima nuclear accident.
These children are exposed to much higher-than-normal radioactivity everyday. Parents are struggling to protect their children from radiation. The case of the right to evacuate has been taken to court, but still more than a half year later nothing has changed. Children living close to the epicenter of the nuclear plant still cannot play in the school yards and outside their houses without being exposed to radiation.
By giving a donation to the program, our colleagues at Ourplanet-TV will be able to broadcast a program that documents the children's daily life and how they have been affected by the nuclear incident. Ourplanet-TV would like to give them a chance to express what they feel and what they think and tell their stories, experiences, and opinions to the society.
Non-profit media in Japan are few, and people are only slowly realizing their importance. There is not enough of a culture of giving financial support to NGOs. Ourplanet-TV is therefore reaching out to people world-wide.
> Collection of short interviews done by Ourplanet with children talking about their experience
> To donate and read further details online
> Our Planet TV
Important: the donation deadline is 29 Februrary 2012.
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CMFE looks back on a successful first Conference and General Assembly |
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Written by Salvatore Scifo
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Thursday, 01 December 2011 15:11 |
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The first Conference and General Assembly of the Community Media Forum Europe (CMFE) was held in Nicosia, Cyprus, from 17 to 19 November 2011, and hosted by the Cyprus Community Media Centre (CCMC). It was the first major event organised directly by CMFE and one of the key community media events of this year in Europe, bringing together over 100 conference participants from 19 European countries as well as members and guests from the Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan and the United States. Five plenary sessions included 24 contributions, where parallel sessions and workshops delivered a further 43 contributions. Representatives from the media regulatory authorities from Albania and the Czech Republic participated to the conference, as well as key representatives from civil society and institutions in Cyprus and Europe.
A special plenary on 'Community Media and Arab Spring', co-organised with the World Association of Community Radio broadcasters (AMARC) and the support of Independent Media Support (IMS), brought together key activists from the Middle East and North Africa region. The speakers shared their direct experiences and insights about the ongoing struggles for democracy, and the crucial role the media plays in networking protesters, in Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, Jordan and Libya. Conference participants remarked how these experiences could provide inspiration and encourage new approaches to community media practice in the European context.
In the closing plenary on the 'Opportunities and Challenges for Community Media in Europe', CMFE's President Pieter de Wit highlighted a number of priorities: "CMFE needs to work with regulators and policy makers to ensure equal access to resources for all media players in the digital environment. We must coordinate efforts to fight back on interferences and limitations of community media's funding and scope, as recently was the case in Hungary and Spain. CMFE will support community media's efforts in Cyprus and the Mediterranean region, in cooperation with AMARC". De Wit also remarked the need for members to call on their own authorities to refer to the 2008 Resolution on Community Media by the European Parliament and the 2009 Declaration of the Committee of Ministers of Council of Europe when drafting or revising their national media policy frameworks.
Emmanuel Boutterin, Vice President of AMARC International, underlined the key political role of the community radio movement in today's global struggle for the access of local communities to the airwaves and the importance of equitable access to the spectrum in the context of digitalisation.
The Conference also endorsed the Cyprus Community Media Declaration prepared by the Cyprus Community Media Centre (CCMC). The declaration calls on different actors across Cyprus to create an enabling environment for Community Media on the island. In particular, it calls on the relevant authorities to ‘recognise Community Media as a distinct sector, operating in a pluralistic media landscape alongside public and commercial media’, and also to ‘make analogue and digital television and radio frequencies available to Community Media with awareness of the social value they provide’.
In this occasion CMFE also convened its 2011 ordinary General Assembly. Held on 17 November 2011, it brought together 51 out of 75 ordinary members, present or represented, the highest number in a General Assembly so far. After the approval of CMFE's 2009-2011 activities and financial reports, 2012 budget and action plan, a new Board of Directors was elected for the term 2011-2014. Composed of 13 members, the new Board includes representatives from Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Pieter de Wit (The Netherlands) was confirmed President, Ciaran Murray (Ireland) is the new Secretary and Jaqui Devereux (United Kingdom) the new Treasurer of the association.
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Multilingual and local: community media and public value in Austria |
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Written by Salvatore Scifo
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Wednesday, 24 August 2011 15:21 |
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 Community Radio stations are relevant media for the generation of Public Value. They are important societal actors in their functions as media and also as organisations and take a prominent place in publicly funded media production. That is due to their duties, both self-defined through their charta as well as prescribed by the legislator, according to the authors Helmut Peissl, Petra Pfisterer, Judith Purkarthofer, and Prof.Brigitta Busch
The research started in winter 2009 and aimed at investigating and documenting the contributions of Community Radio stations to a diverse, multi-perspective, accessible and heteroglossic mediascape and at evaluating the current discussions of Public Value from an Austrian perspective.
A summary of the research, now available in English, presents the results of the quantitative and qualitative research project financed by the Austrian Regulatory Authority for Broadcasting and Telecommunications (RTR).
> English Summary
> Full study (in German)
It was also a follow-up project of two studies published in 2008; one on the effects of Community Radio on plurality and social cohesion, and another one on the legal conditions for the third sector in five European countries.
> Two community media studies published in Austria (18.11.2008)
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CMFE is supported by the EU under the Europe for Citizens Programme 2011. ©CMFE, Community Media Forum Europe, 2004-2011. Registered in Belgium as International NGO n.0822992342
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The we are more campaign seeks European wide support and buy-in of the Cultural Sector (and Civil Society) in order to support the budget proposal for the EU Creative Europe Programme 2014-2020 and to lobby for the right place for culture within the proposal
