Murdoch-Zionist lobby power: @antloewenstein and @margokingston1 on 2003 Ashwari Peace Prize scandal #MikeCarlton

In the wake of Mike Carlton’s removal as a Sydney Morning Herald columnist, it’s worth recalling another instance of Zionist lobby power. Here’s the chapter by Antony Loewenstein in Not Happy, John! featuring an interview with Bob Carr. First, my scene-setting introduction to the story. I'm hearing there's considerable pressure at #Fairfax board level for action […]

Time for @mediaalliance to take charge of secret tapes ethics debate: @margokingston1 #MediaMargo #MediaWatch

I sent this email to the Media Alliance today. Dear Media Alliance, Last night’s Media Watch discussed the ethical dispute among journalists over the ethics of recording interviewees without their permission. The dispute shows serious disagreement on the matter. The Age believes it is always ethical. Some others, including me, believe it it permissible only […]

Selling out ethical journalism: @journlaw on @theage secret recordings #springst

[clear] It is a sad day when senior political figures steal a journalist’s recording device and destroy its contents, as we have been told happened at this year’s Victorian Labor conference. But it is an even sadder day when we hear a major newspaper – The Age – justifying a senior reporter secretly recording their […]

Abbott’s confession: I never left the Oz in spirit

Margo: Thought Abbott couldn’t grovel to Murdoch more than in his ‘Freedom’s discerning friend‘ speech to the IPA last year? Read this. Address to the Australian’s 50th Birthday Gala Dinner Sydney – Check Against Delivery-under Embargo by Political Alert

Citizen journo @Wendy_Bacon on Joe’s ‘Widen the Gap’ budget

[clear]Last night I headed over to FBi, a successful not for profit radio station in inner Sydney to meet up with the Budget_Aus team to listen to Treasurer Joe Hockey deliver his first budget speech. We were hosted by Heidi Pett and the rest of the FBi Backchat team who were working on their show about […]

Stand up, citizen journalists: @burgewords comments on #FairfaxStrike

  A very simple tweet went out on the same afternoon Fairfax journalists agreed to strike in protest at the company’s plan to cut 80 jobs, mainly in production (layout and sub-editing) and photography. Since the current Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) hearing will continue through the strike, a citizen journalist (‘CJ’) asked whether any […]

Delivering transparency on Budget night: @Info_Aus invites you to the table

On April 24 Pia Waugh of the Australian Government Information Management Office (AGIMO) announced the first ever release of Australian Federal Budget Data in Excel and CSV formats. This is the culmination of both internal and external lobbying by open data and budget transparency advocates. There are many people within the Finance Department committed to improving […]

Why Australians should care about World Press Freedom Day: @journlaw

Readers of NoFibs reap the rewards of citizen journalists expressing their news and views with a high level of free expression by world standards. So why should Australians care about media freedom on World Press Freedom Day 2014? Quite simply, because it is a ‘fragile freedom’ – continually under threat and only noticed by most people once […]

Look! You Punters just don’t understand ‘time honoured’ traditions ok? @YaThinkN

I saw some awful reports in regard to poor Joe Hockey, our esteemed Treasurer, ‘being for sale‘ in the paper this morning. Scurrilous journalism at it’s best. Sky News was right onto this outrageous slur against our Treasurer’s integrity, with a bit of hardworking investigative journalism, they got right to the heart of this so-called […]

Reporting grassroots greenshoots when faith in establishment politics dies: @margokingston1

Margo: A version of this column appeared in the Byron Shire Echo – @Echonetdaily – on 29 April as a substitute for Mungo McCallum’s weekly column while he recovered from surgery.    Mungo and I last discussed politics just after the federal election on Late Night Live. We both knew what Abbott would do – seek to close down free […]