The team at the Press and Society Institute (IPYS for its acronym in Spanish) Venezuela has found a more accessible way to present information it was collecting about the country's media.
Latin American journalists now have a tool that allows them to discover the best published journalistic research and articles in the region. The tool is known in Spanish as the Banco de Investigaciones Periodísticas (BIPYS), a database of journalistic investigations created by the Press and Society Institute (IPYS for its acronym in Spanish), which has been open for public access since July 6 through a paid subscription.
A government agency in Ecuador that regulates media content, dictates headlines and corrections that news organizations are forced to publish and doles out fines to those who dare to disobey has just celebrated its second anniversary and announced changes in the country’s controversial communications law.
April 1 was a day like any other for Nicaraguan journalists. A day of silence, of censorship. And it’s because at the beginning of the month, the president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, celebrated 3,000 days without an open press conference, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
The 70th General Assembly of the Inter American Press Association (IAPA), an organization that brings together media owners and editors of the Americas, condemned the “direct and indirect censorship and physical attacks on journalists” that have occurred in the last six months.
Uruguayan journalist and lawyer Edison Lanza was confirmed before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) as the new Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression, replacing Colombian Catalina Botero. Lanza began on October 6 a three-year term, taking over the Special Rapporteur's Office at the Organization of American States (OAS).
The ability to cope with a disruptive environment and an awareness of new technological resources are key skills for the 21st century journalist. This was the lesson highlighted by a group of eight students who participated in a recent Massive Open Online Course, or MOOC, through the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas. The students won scholarships to attend the 10th Brazilian Congress of Newspapers (CBJ by its initials in Portuguese) and visit the facilities of Google Brasil.
As part of its series of occasional e-books, the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas just launched “Transparency and Accountability: Journalism and access to public information in Latin America and the Caribbean.”
To create more awareness and knowledge in Brazil about the country's young Public Information Law -- which was approved two years ago on May 16, 2012 -- the Brazilian Investigative Journalism Association (Abraji) published this week on its site the guide in Portuguese “Public Information Law -- What you need to know,” with the financial support of UNESCO's International Program for the Development of Communication.
Forty-six percent of Guatemala's government institutions bound under the country's Access to Public Information Law (LAIP in Spanish) did not present their annual reports on how they responded to public information requests received during 2013, news website Plaza Pública reported.
Award-winning Colombian journalist María Teresa Ronderos will be the new director of Open Society Foundations' Program on Independent Journalism. Each year, the program channels millions of dollars to support independent journalism projects around the world.
On World Press Freedom Day, celebrated on May 3, Venezuela’s Press and Society Institute (IPYS) launched a new chapter of the digital platform Poderopedia, which helps visualize the connections that exist between powerful people in the country, the organization reported. The platform collects and charts information about political and business leaders in the nation, revealing conflicts of interest, spheres of influence and other connections.