The link below is to an article that takes a look at painting bookshelves.
For more visit:
https://bookriot.com/how-to-paint-bookshelves/
Author Archives: particularkev
Banned Books Museum
The link below is to an article that takes a look at the ‘Banned Books Museum.’
For more visit:
https://bookriot.com/banned-books-museum/
Not My Review: Island Home by Tim Winton
Not My Review: Discworld (Book 1) – The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett
Not My Review: Ariadne by Jennifer Saint
Facenote N1 Review
Print isn’t dead: major survey reveals local newspapers vastly preferred over Google among country news consumers
Kristy Hess, Deakin University and Lisa Waller, RMIT University
Newspaper readers in rural and regional Australia are five times more likely to go directly to their local newspaper website than Google or Facebook for local information, and almost 10 times as likely to go to their local news website over a council website for news and information.
Nearly two-thirds of local newspaper readers also indicate policies affecting the future of rural and regional media would influence the way they vote at the next federal election.
These are some of the key findings of a national survey of almost 4,200 Australian country newspaper readers we recently conducted as part of a project to drive greater innovation in the rural and regional media landscape.
Many small newspapers in Australia faced closure after their advertising budgets shrunk during the global pandemic, while others moved to digital-only editions to cut costs.
In our survey — the largest conducted of country press audiences in Australia — we found local newspapers still play a vital role in providing information to residents in these communities, even with the proliferation of news available on Facebook and Google.
This is a significant finding, given how much focus has been placed on the role of the tech giants as a central point for digital news and information.
Mark Lennihan/AP
The federal government recently implemented a mandatory news media bargaining code that forces tech companies like Facebook and Google to pay news producers for content that appears on their platforms.
Last week, the ACCC granted interim approval for Country Press Australia to negotiate with the tech giants on behalf of its 160 newspapers.
This funding is desperately needed to help support publishers of credible, reliable local news who are losing the advertising dollar to social media platforms — but for some, it still may not be enough.
Read more:
As Facebook ups the ante on news, regional and elderly Australians will be hardest hit
Resistance to local papers going online only
Our survey also reveals just how passionate people are about local newspapers in rural and regional Australia — that is, the print version. In fact, the majority of country press audiences (71%) prefer to read their local paper in print than online.
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Many respondents expressed resistance to their newspaper being made available in digital format only. They offered comments such as:
There is always room for improvement, but if this newspaper went digital, I would not be interested.
And this from another:
The day it goes digital only will be the day I stop reading it.
Our survey also found that respondents overwhelmingly (86%) view a printed copy of their newspaper as an essential service for their community.
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This accords with our previous research that has advocated for the federal government to recognise the vital importance of the printed paper to regional communities.
While the average age of our survey respondents was 60-61, this demographic will continue to represent a large portion of local news readership for many years.
This means local news organisations need strategies to aid the transition for all audiences into digital formats and/or advocate for the survival of the printed product in the interests of social connection and democracy.
Author provided
Locals want a say in the future of their papers
Our survey also found 94% of respondents want a much bigger say about government policies and decisions affecting the future of local newspapers. This finding sends a message to policymakers to rethink their strategies for engaging the public in ideas to support the future of local media.
When it comes to solutions for struggling rural and regional media outlets, our survey found:
- audiences believe local newspapers should be collaboratively funded by a range of relevant stakeholders (media companies, advertisers, subscribers, social media, government and philanthropic organisations) to ensure their future
- while some media lobbyists and academics — both in Australia and overseas — have called for newspaper subscriptions to be made tax deductible, 71% of respondents are not in favour of such initiatives
- respondents also overwhelmingly said any additional government funding for local news should be used to employ more local journalists (71%) over increasing digital connectivity (13%) and digital innovation products (17%).
The voices of loyal readers must be heard
Our findings also reaffirm that local newspaper audiences are loyal and develop life-long connections with newspapers wherever they live and work. As an 88-year-old man from Victoria said,
I have always looked forward to the local paper, and whilst the format is now different, it is still a ‘must’ to catch up on whatever is happening in my town.
While there have been Senate inquiries into the future of public interest journalism, media diversity and the role of the ABC in regional and rural areas, the public submissions to these important policy discussions are lacking the voices of local newspaper readers like our respondents.
Read more:
Local newspapers are an ‘essential service’. They deserve a government rescue package, too
This is not because people in the bush don’t care, but because such formal mechanisms are arguably not the best way to engage with and listen to media audiences beyond the major cities.
What is clear from our research is local independent newspapers really matter to their audiences, and many loyal readers are ready to defend them at the ballot box.
Kristy Hess, Associate Professor (Communication), Deakin University and Lisa Waller, Professor of Digital Communication, RMIT University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Not My Review: Arc of a Scythe (Book 1) – Scythe by Neal Shusterman
Philip Ochieng: Kenyan editor and author who did it his way and inspired a generation
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Elizabeth Gitonga, Moi University
Philip Ochieng – who has died at the age of 83 – was a celebrated Kenyan editor, author and hard-hitting columnist who made his mark across East Africa. He was an East African par excellence who counted former Tanzanian president Benjamin Mkapa and revered Ugandan academic Mahmood Mamdani among his circle of friends.
Ochieng began his journalism career in 1966 when he joined the Nairobi-based Nation newspaper group, which was then only a few years old, at the invitation of then editor-in-chief George Githii. Within a year he was entrusted with a regular column debating the social, political and economic issues of a country that had gained independence from Britain only a few years earlier in 1963.
Mastering his environment in such a short space of time was typical of Ochieng. In Awendo, Migori County, close to Lake Victoria where he was born in 1938, his classmates remembered him as a genius who topped his class from the time he set foot in primary school. This fast-tracked him to the prestigious Alliance High School, a national school for high achievers near Nairobi.
Soon after he finished school, he joined the pre-independence airlift of young Kenyan students to the US. These students were being prepared to take over positions of leadership in anticipation of the country’s independence. The programme was organised by the former politician and trade unionist Tom Mboya and his colleague Julius Kiano.
In the US, Ochieng joined Roosevelt University but he did not complete his degree. He moved on to France and East Germany as well but he never graduated with a degree. On the eve of independence, Ochieng returned home, where he was employed as an English teacher in Migori. Later, he would be employed as a protocol officer in the ministry of External Affairs. While here, the letters he wrote to the editor of the Daily Nation caught the attention of Githii, who hired him as a cub reporter. This would mark the beginning of his life-long journey in journalism, which took him back and forth between Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
East Africa reach
Ochieng emerged as a towering figure in the three East African countries. His brilliance was matched only by his willingness to mentor young journalists in the profession, many of them untrained as he had been. Wherever he worked, he helped many improve their writing skills through constant drilling – but also straight in your face memos delivered in his stern newsroom manner.
In the course of this, Ochieng wrote two books. The first, The Kenyatta Succession, was co-authored with fellow journalist the late Joseph Karimi. The second was I Accuse the Press: An Insider’s View of the Media and Politics in Africa.
But he was dogged by controversy in his early years. In 1970 he was forced to resign his Nation job after poking a colleague with the burning end of a cigarette.
He was then already being wooed by the Tanganyika Standard after President Julius Nyerere had nationalised it from its private owners, Lonrho. The Standard Tanzania, as it was first renamed, was merged with The Nationalist, a party newspaper belonging to the ruling Tanzania African National Union party. The title was later changed to Daily News in 1972.
Ochieng made his presence felt as soon as he arrived in Dar es Salaam, beginning a column weekly soon after. He resigned and left Tanzania in 1973.
After another stint at the Nation in Nairobi, Ochieng appointed the editor of the Sunday Times of Uganda in 1981. But it was short-lived. After only three weeks he was incarcerated after one of his sharp, take-no-prisoners pieces.
Upon release from the cells, he was hosted by his friend Mamdani, who arranged his flight out to East Germany.
Mentor and confidante
Mamdani, who hosted him in Kampala after his release from prison in Uganda, told me of Ochieng’s contribution to journalism:
People who were literate and of age in the 1980s in Uganda certainly remember his role in Ugandan journalism and his writing. I have no doubt that Ochieng would have played a noteworthy role in advancing the cause of political journalism in Uganda had he been able to stay longer.
John Agunda, a Kenyan journalist who worked with Ochieng in Kenya for decades, remembers him too as the mentor of many.
He came across as a very meticulous and creative man and a workaholic. He was always at his typewriter either writing something to go into the following day’s paper or working on his manuscripts. He was also a very good teacher of up-and-coming journalists.
In the final years of his life – and with his poor health beginning to slow him down – Ochieng persisted in his love for teaching. His long running column, Mark My Word, was aimed at the general public as much as it was at journalists.
Elizabeth Gitonga, PhD Candidate in Communication Studies, Moi University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
At the BookShelf 
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