In the UK, newspapers have been competing for readers by offering free CDs or DVDs. For example, The Daily Mail caused a fuss when it offered Prince’s new album for free. Here in Canada, The Vancouver Sun has dipped its toes into the free music market. It offered a digital compilation for download for free, not just to its readers, but to anyone willing to give it an e-mail address.

First up an admission – I haven’t read Andrew Keen‘s The Cult of the Amateur. But I have read the reaction to it and the debate it has generated. This posting by Tom Coates is a powerful indictment of the book: … his opinion cannot do any good, cannot change anything for the better, but in its decrying of the nascent environment of millions of people finding their voices for

Student bloggers, listen up. CollegeScholarships.org is giving US$10,000 to a college student who blogs. The deadline for nominations, in the form a 300 word essay about why the blogger deserves the award, is October 6th. As someone who sees tremendous potential in blogging, I welcome this scholarship. Despite the continuing debate in journalism over the value of blogs, blogging can offer a powerful tool for students as a vehicle for

Today was the first day of our redesigned core course at the UBC School of Journalism in Vancouver. Entitled Multiplatform Journalism, it seeks to instruct the students in the key intellectual and practical skills they will need to operate as a professional journalist in a multimedia industry. The course aims to move away from training the students for jobs as a print journalist or as a radio journalist. Instead we

If you have ever wondered how news consumption compares around the world, this collection of charts by Akamai provides a useful guide. The Net Usage Index for News shows how many news webpages are being viewed around the world, drawing on data from big news providers such as the BBC, Reuters, NBC, El Pais and Le Monde. Akamai has also created widgets for PC and Macs so that you can