SoloJourno

Via Canadian Journalists for Free Expression:

(Toronto, October 28, 2009) The man who shot the video that changed how tasers are used by police departments in Canada was presented the first CJFE Citizen Journalism Award by Canadian Journalists for Free Expression at an event last night.

Paul Pritchard is the 27-year old British Columbia native who shot the footage showing the October 14, 2007, airport encounter between the RCMP and Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski. Pritchard’s footage from his digital camera shows four police officers using a taser on Dziekanski repeatedly, ending in Dziekanski’s death.

“Without the tape we wouldn’t have had the journalistic investigation, the year-long inquiry into the incident, and we wouldn’t have seen the safer use of the taser by police departments across the country,” said CJFE President Arnold Amber. “The remarkable partnership between investigative journalists and the citizen who recorded the last minutes of Dziekanski’s life has led to all these revelations and impact.” Amber added “What he did probably will save many other lives down the road.”

CJFE’s October 27 event titled “The Citizen As Journalist: Tasers, The RCMP and Public Perception” was part of CJFE’s Free to Speak series. The panel discussion featured Terry Milewski who covered the Robert Dziekanski story for the CBC, Sandra Bartlett, a CBC reporter who has investigated the story behind tasers for several years and Paul Pritchard. The conversation was moderated by Anna Maria Tremonti, host of “The Current”.

The CJFE Citizen Journalism Award was given to recognize the vital role that Pritchard played in getting the facts about the incident out to the public. CJFE noted that Pritchard not only continued to tape despite pressure from security personnel to stop, but crucially, after surrendering his footage to police on the night of the incident, hired a lawyer and battled successfully to get the tape returned three weeks later. The RCMP reneged on their initial promise to return the tape within 48 hours and had informed Pritchard that they wouldn’t return it for two years.

CJFE salutes Paul Pritchard who has demonstrated values that we need in citizens and journalists - the courage to bear witness and do the right thing. In presenting the Citizen Journalism award, CJFE President Arnold Amber remarked “Canada needs more Paul Pritchards.”

Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) is an association of more than 300 journalists, editors, publishers, producers, students and others who work to promote and defend free expression and press freedom in Canada and abroad.

For more information, contact CJFE Manager, Julie Payne at (416) 515-9622 x. 226 or email - jpayne@cjfe.org.

Read Man who shot Dziekanski video gets journalism award (CBC.ca).

Via Poynter Online:

Journalists, take note: Twitter is about to introduce a highly anticipated feature that will add a whole new experience to the social networking service. As early as this week, Twitter Lists will be introduced to the general public. They’re now available only to a select group of beta users. [UPDATE: TechCrunch reports that a full rollout is underway and all users could have access by Friday.]

Read the full article.

Via Democracy Now!:

We speak with Kevin Bales, a leader in the abolition movement to end modern-day slavery and co-author of The Slave Next Door: Human Trafficking and Slavery in America Today. Bales estimates some 27 million people labor as slaves today—more than at anytime in history. Bales has also helped expose modern-day slavery in the United States, where he estimates between 14,000 and 17,500 people are trafficked into the country each year. He writes, “There has never been a single day in our America, from its discovery and birth right up to the moment you are reading this sentence, without slavery.”

Read the full transcript and download audio/video.

Author and New Yorker essayist Malcolm Gladwell was interviewed by Alex Altman for Time Magazine just prior to the publication of his new book, “What the Dog Saw“. Among the subjects discussed was experimenting with public education, the flaws in corporate hiring processes and the future of journalism.

Here’s Gladwell’s answer to Altman’s question: If you had a single piece of advice to offer young journalists, what would it be?

The issue is not writing. It’s what you write about. One of my favorite columnists is Jonathan Weil, who writes for Bloomberg. He broke the Enron story, and he broke it because he’s one of the very few mainstream journalists in America who really knows how to read a balance sheet. That means Jonathan Weil will always have a job, and will always be read, and will always have something interesting to say. He’s unique. Most accountants don’t write articles, and most journalists don’t know anything about accounting. Aspiring journalists should stop going to journalism programs and go to some other kind of grad school. If I was studying today, I would go get a master’s in statistics, and maybe do a bunch of accounting courses and then write from that perspective. I think that’s the way to survive. The role of the generalist is diminishing. Journalism has to get smarter.

Read the full Q&A. See also TIME’s 2008 profile: “Outliers: Malcolm Gladwell’s Success Story” (November 13, 2008).

Via Time Magazine:: More than 100,000 registered sex offenders live in California. A TIME.com video looks at how police keep track of them