Discovering the unexplored

Discovering the chances offered by the tools of digital age was like opening a window on a new world. Well, I should say on this world, but from another point of view: other people's point of view. And while I'm looking into this world, this world can look at me through the same window. I think this is amazing!
The idea that there's always someone out there listening to, reading or replying to what I have to say is stimulating. What scares me in social networks is the fact that while interacting with so many people from all over the world, you are completely isolated and often detached from anything around you.

Let's talk facebook to facebook!
Before attending ICFJ course, I regularly used Facebook mainly as a tool to chat with friends and to get in touch with old friends and people I met in the past.  I used to consider it as a virtual place where I could meet people and chat with them. A place where people change into someone else, sometimes...



Twittering...so challenging!
Six month ago, on a particularly "digital-enthusiastic-day", I also created a profile on Twitter. I've never used it till it was required by one of the assignments. That was a new challenge: expressing my thoughts in 140 characters!
I'm not sure I'll become addicted...I find the idea of having my life governed by social media quite scaring!



But now, after five inspiring weeks, I feel comfortable in using social media and tools such as linking, RSS, blogs and multimedia.
What I missed before was the ability to use them in the proper way. ICFJ course tutors and participants helped me in this sense, by sharing insights, discussing and debating. Sharing experiences and opinion with colleagues from the Arab countries was extremely interesting and useful.

A new approach to journalism
What was just a tool to communicate, now is a valid journalistic tool.
I don't think digital journalism is a substitute of traditional journalism - not yet and not for me, anyway -  but the available tools are great alternatives and they can support traditional news.
Now I see them as a way to reach a wider audience, also using several media to express ideas in different ways and languages; sources of information

The challenge now is keeping on using these tools and improve them, without underestimate how powerful they are and the possible implications, especially in terms of ethics, credibility and accuracy.

My experience so far is very positive and I will surely use the tools of the digital age in my job. But the most important thing is keeping on sharing experiences and updating each other. I think the value added in this course was the presence of journalists working in different countries and different media.

Dealing with comments.

Comments are probably one of the best example of interconnecting. For news sites both positive and negative comments are a precious tool to monitor the audience's feedback and reactions and to make some self-criticism, thus improving the quality of reporting.

Every medal has its reverse.
The most positive aspect - besides increasing page views - is that comments enable civil discussion and democratic debate. They also represent a challenge for newsrooms.
The other side of the medal is represented by the "dark side" of comments, which are often based on emotional reaction. When commenting on reports, the audience can be offensive and abusive and use foul language, write insults or leave off-topic, unsolicited and unethical comments. Some people write comments just to gain visibility and to satisfy the need of feeling important.

How to limit inappropriate comments?
To avoid discussion degenerated newsroom can use several told and conditions, which are usually included in the news site's "comment policy" - read an example from the Huffington Post.
The devices most frequently used are:

• identifying-registration - an example from the Wall Street Journal;
  
• filtering by specific words;
• flagging or reporting as abuse" by readers;
  
• moderation, through editor's or moderator's screening;
  
• limiting.
  

Some of the advices above can be very controversial. For example, identifying. On the one hand, people speak more honestly and may feel more comfortable when anonymous. In the other hand, this could bring to offensive and not appropriate comments.
Then, the editor should ask himself "do we want a honest comment - whatever it says - or a constructive comment?". 

In my opinion, the request to identify themselves or the use of conditions is not only a way to keep the readers from posting inappropriate comments. It's also a matter of responsibility: readers must be responsible for what they say and be aware of the consequences their opinions can have. They should learn how to interact in a constructive way and be aware that one's freedom ends where someone else's freedom begins.

The total absence of any advice to monitor comments increase the risk to turn into a "chesspol". That's why conditions and policies are important.

THE ART OF MANIPULATING IMAGES

Cutting out and pasting, composing and inserting, eliminating and substituting. That's the "collage art" of transforming images to make them better, to create wonderful landscapes and to make perfect what is not.

There's nothing new in the art of manipulating images, used in basement darkrooms since the beginning of photography. What digital photography and technology changed is the quantity and the circulation of pictures. An increase in the number of available photos often means a loss in quality and requires more selection.

Ethical implications.

If changing a photo to make it more attractive - brightening images, sharpening focus, adding more or less contrast, colour balance, creating dramatic panoramas, emphasizing the subject of a scene, blurring, making faces prettier - can be accepted by the audience, what is unacceptable is to alter an image with the purpose to manipulate the content.

The problem is when the photo is manipulated and its meaning is changed to deceive the reader. Especially when pictures are used to support the story and give it more credibility.
There's always a line journalists and editors should never go beyond. Digital manipulation is only the latest device to trespass this line.
There are other devices, the use of which was already known before digital photography:

• the selection process itself;
  
• the creation of the scene and "fabrication" the photo - that's the case of Robert Capa's famous "The falling soldier";
  
• the choice of a particular angle;
  
• the process of de-contextualising an image;
• introducing elements and symbols in a picture to make it more dramatic - that's the case of "toy photographers" and the doubts on authenticity of some pictures taken during Lebanon war in 2006.
  

An example
Though I'm not good in doctoring images and I don't like editing pictures - in my opinion, even not perfectly fine pictures are important, since they give an idea of the conditions and the situation the photographer is working it - I've tried to manipulate some photos I took in Afghanistan, on the way from Kabul to the Musahy Valley.

The result is a photo showing a gun and dark smoke in the background, aimed at making people believe that a conflict is going on and Western soldiers are involved in it.

 

To obtain this picture, I've combined Photo 1 - used as background image - and Photo 2 - from which I exported the gun.

 
Photo 1


                                         






  Photo 2




Even without doctoring the pictures I could have deceived the audience, by using photo 1. In fact, the smoke - which is real smoke I photographed in that place at that time - is not consequence of explosions. It comes from a kiln used for bricks, as shown in photo 3.                    

This is to show that even the way pictures are combined or put together can be misleading. Words and captions become essential to avoid misleading context a distorting the meaning.