All posts by Midnightschildren

TENANT ACTIVISTS WIN MARKET STREET BUILDING, MEDIA YAWNS. by Randy Shaw.

 

Media coverage of the recent victory of the Grant Building Tenants Association (GBTA) once again shows how the media can diminish the role of grassroots activism in shaping the world.

Located at the corner of Seventh and Market Streets in San Francisco, the Grant Building has long provided affordable office space to writers, artists, and a diversity of small businesses. This mix once typified the mid-Market area, but rising rents in recent years have forced many nonprofit and cultural groups to move to less costly neighborhoods. When the new owner of the Grant Building sought to impose steep rent increases last October, the tenants did more than just complain loudly in the media while quietly moving out: they stayed and resisted. Continue reading TENANT ACTIVISTS WIN MARKET STREET BUILDING, MEDIA YAWNS. by Randy Shaw.

ANTI-REPARATIONS ADS BUILD RIGHT-WING MOVEMEMENT. by Bill Berkowitz.

 

As the smoke cleared from David Horowitz’s recent carpet-bombing of the issue of reparations for African Americans, he sought safe harbor in the First Amendment and then claimed that his attack was prompted by a desire to prevent African Americans from becoming targets of resentment over reparations. Sounds like the old Vietnam War saw about “bombing the village to save it.” What’s up with this Master of Mean, Prince of Conservative Politics? Continue reading ANTI-REPARATIONS ADS BUILD RIGHT-WING MOVEMEMENT. by Bill Berkowitz.

25 YEARS: MA EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS COVER THE DECADES. by Rich Yurman.

 

The accomplishments, crises, and controversies that make up Media Alliance’s 25-year history are reflected in its eight very different executive directors. I thought it would be a fitting part of MA’s silver jubilee celebration to tap into their memories. Continue reading 25 YEARS: MA EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS COVER THE DECADES. by Rich Yurman.

NORTH AMERICAN STREET NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION. by Challa Tabeson.

 

Culminating in a march and protest at the doors of the San Francisco Chronicle on July 28, the international conference of the North American Street Newspaper Association (NASNA) gathered for three days of meetings and workshops to strengthen the street newspaper movement. For three blissful days in July, our NASNA conference brought struggling street poets, writers like myself, and homeless advocacy organizations such as the National Coalition on Homelessness face to face with more than forty street newspaper journalists from across the U.S. and Canada, as well as a handful of journalists from Europe and Great Britain. The diverse group of editors and publishers assembled under one unified roof to discuss and respond to issues as varied as are the newspapers themselves. Continue reading NORTH AMERICAN STREET NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION. by Challa Tabeson.

GLOBAL MEDIA GIANTS LOBBY TO PRIVATIZE ENTIRE BROADCAST SPECTRUM. by Jeremy Rifkin.

 

Question: What is the single most valuable piece of property worth owning at the dawn of the information age? Answer: The radio frequencies–the electromagnetic spectrum–over which an increasing amount of communication and commercial activity will be broadcast in the era of wireless communications. Our PCs, palm pilots, wireless Internet, cellular phones, pagers, radios, and television all rely on the radio frequencies of the spectrum to send and receive messages, pictures, audio, data, etc. Continue reading GLOBAL MEDIA GIANTS LOBBY TO PRIVATIZE ENTIRE BROADCAST SPECTRUM. by Jeremy Rifkin.

WATT’S UP? BEHIND THE MEDIA’S COVERAGE OF THE ENERGY CRISIS. by Andrea Buffa.

 

In analyzing media coverage of the California energy “crisis,” the one crucial tool you must have on hand is a flashlight. Not for use in case of a blackout, but for hitting yourself over the head to stay awake. As David Lazarus, who has been covering the story for the San Francisco Chronicle for the last year, put it, “It’s important, it affects everybody, and it’s deadly dull.” Continue reading WATT’S UP? BEHIND THE MEDIA’S COVERAGE OF THE ENERGY CRISIS. by Andrea Buffa.

UNDERMINING EFFECTIVE REPORTING: NEW FCC PROPOSALS. by Jeffrey Chester.

 

Just two days after the terrorist attacks in the U.S., the Federal Communications Commission moved ahead with plans to end or weaken several long-standing policies designed to promote diversity of media ownership. Under the leadership of the new FCC Chairman Michael Powell (son of Secretary of State Colin), the commission released two proposed “rulemakings” that will have a major impact on the country’s newspaper, broadcasting and cable TV industries. Continue reading UNDERMINING EFFECTIVE REPORTING: NEW FCC PROPOSALS. by Jeffrey Chester.

COLOMBIAN JOURNALISTS UNDER ATTACK BY PARAMILITARIES. by Frank Smyth.

 

On May 3, 2001, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) named Colombian paramilitary leader Carlos Castaño to its annual list of the ten worst enemies of the press. Six weeks later, a reporter from the Paris daily Le Monde caught up with Castaño in northern Colombia and asked how he felt about the distinction.”I would like to assure you that I have always respected the freedom and subjectivity of the press,” said the leader of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), Colombia’s leading right-wing paramilitary organization. “But I have never accepted that journalism can become an arm at the service of one of the actors of the conflict. Over the course of its existence the AUC has executed two local journalists who were in fact guerrillas.” He no longer remembered their names. Continue reading COLOMBIAN JOURNALISTS UNDER ATTACK BY PARAMILITARIES. by Frank Smyth.