Media Capture How Money, Digital Platforms, and Governments Control the News Edited by Anya Schiffrin

 Media Capture

How Money, Digital Platforms, and Governments Control the News Edited by Anya Schiffrin is a new book by Columbia University Press.

This book on journalism offers a very important mirror on the state of this profession seen through the lenses of situations, people, governments, that are keeping information, news, "captured."

The internet that, at first was seen positively because could, theoretically, facilitate the arrival of news has meant, with the time, misinformation, hate, news manipulated or invented for trying to deviate from the reality the minds of people, (see at the voice Covid-19), while the common newmsagazines and magazines started to develop a profound, real crisis because people preferred the net for being informed,using discutible channels sometimes and avoiding the real magazine, newsmagazine, more expensive.

Of course media has been captured before the advent of the net by moguls, people who invested in the news, but that at the same time removed oxygen to the media that they controlled or that they are still controlling.

This book tells the fragility of journalism, analyzing the state of news in several countries, but also reading what it is going on in social medias, taking in consideration giants like Google, Facebook, but also blogs and their death, because of the advent of social medias and still unclear characters; problems of independence and freedom of telling.

This book reveals the fragilities of a profession in high sea, offering a base of discussion for trying to return to see the light after this long tunnel of obscurity.

Highly recommended book.

I thank Columbia for the physical copy of the book.

Anna Maria Polidori 

Passé Composé by Anne Sinclair

 Passé Composé

by Anne Sinclair is a new book released by Chez Grasset.

What, at first I noticed reading this book, is the original writing-style of this beloved french journalist and writer. 

She tells her life-story not just putting all herself in the tale but in certain cases using a compulsive writing-style for not forget anything and for adding, where possible, more informations. 

Anne was born in a wealthy family but she remained a lonely child. For this reason her parents over-protected her and she was set free only when adult. Her dad was an important man of Elizabeth Arden and Revlon: her mother was more hard than her father, and plus she didn't like to read, an activity that captivated little Anne with all herself. The discovery of journalism was a casualty, in particular the branch of reportage; once, his father afforded for business in Algeria when there were important turmoils: he returned home safe, after two days: in the while, her mother and her listened to the radio what was going on. It was in that moments, still little, still maybe confused by life, that Anne developed the idea of becoming a journalist.

Passionate of policy, she studied the field, knocking at many doors: sometimes people asked her of writing down two lines for introducing herself, without receive any answer.

Anne, anyway, with the time became an affirmed journalist and more or less she has met all the most important men of the Planet. Gorbacev, several American Presidents: Clinton was charismatic, Hillary an intelligent woman: our Berlusoni invited her in his beautiful italian mansion close to Milan. Great evening, great dinner till at the moment in which she asked him something that upset the politician. She would have re-met Berlusconi when Obama became President of the USA, and during an important meeting: Berlusconi was speaking too loudly and Queen Elizabeth asked him why he was doing that.

Alain Delon after all is not all that nice, but Jean-Paul Belmondo is enchanting, Jeanne Mureau the actresss of th classic Jules & Jim an interesting soul. 

Being of Jewish origins, Anne wrote several books reconstructing the existences of her ancestors and more, she has precise ideas regarding politicians she doesn't want to have anything to do with. One of them is Le Pen. She wouldn't want to interview her at all and,always in her book she tells that someone asked her if she wanted to interview Saddam Hussein. We were during th First Gulf War: I remember that an italian journalist interviewed the dictator. Sinclair tells that she refused althought it could have been a scoop, but preferred to avoid it.

A chapter reconstruct the affair Strauss-Khan considering that they were married. The scandal: it seemed that the politician wanted to have a sexual intercourse with a worker of an hotel located in New York: was it something orchestrated for avoiding the victory of the politician at the presidentials? No one can knows it, but Anne tells that she lived pretty heavy moments, with reporters and photo-journalists everywhere and of course was certasin of his man's innocence. After this story the marriage ended and now Anne is happy with another man.

Beautiful memoir. Highly recommended.

I thank Editions Grasset for the physical copy of the book.

Anna Maria Polidori 

Regardless of Frontiers Global Freedom of Expression in a Troubled World Edited by Lee C. Bollinger and Agnés Callamard

Regardless of Frontiers

Global Freedom of Expression in a Troubled World Edited by Lee C. Bollinger and Agnés Callamard, the first one 19th President of Columbia University, the second the director of Columbia's Global Freedom of Expression initiative and the one who headed the investigation on the murder of the Washington Post's journalist Jamal Khashoggi open a discussion with this book on the exigency of freedom of expression in a world sometimes also where there are affirmed democracies, as it happened in the USA these past four years, where we can see a delegitimation of the profession of reporters and journalists because of an extremist president.

It is clear, that a coordination between nations would be more than welcomed for the creation of a world more free of expression. Too many journalists are dying because they try to report in freedom what they think of this world; facts, people, situations; it is unacceptable.

It is more than necessary in this moment a "globalization of journalism", with common principles, like the one of free speech that should be common and recognized in the entire world; we are still behind under many ways, as adds Bollinger in the preface of the book, on normative conflicts and contests, pointing the finger on the one against hate speech and incitement: it hasn't yet found any kind of convergence, but this problem remains big because there are several important words that should be set free so that journalists would work better, much better: autonomy and dignity, and trust me when I tell you that they are fundamentally important under many aspects!

The book is divided in four parts; the first one analyzes the priorities that there are in the profession, like the realization of a global norm for protecting the journalist's sources, reputation and freedom of expression, but also the freedom of political expression; the second  takes in consideration intergovenmental institutions and International Actors seeing international norms; the third part will let us enter in a chapter, in the social media platforms and Freddom of Expression Norms, seeing also the situation of medias in China. The final part will treat the interactive global jurisprudence; a curious case the one of the journey of the Right to be Forgotten, born in Europe in the 1970s.

Highly recommended book to all the people in the journalistic field or the curious ones.

I thank Columbia University Press for the physical copy of the book.

Anna Maria Polidori