This document provides guidance on media activism and alternatives to mainstream media. It discusses common critiques of mainstream media, including that they represent powerful interests, lack diversity, prioritize business over truth, and are influenced by advertisers and government.
The document then gives examples of alternative media models, like independent magazines and videos created by unemployed people. It also discusses tactics for media activists, such as identifying framing of issues in different sources, working with groups on shared issues, and using hashtags to shape counter-narratives. The final sections provide tips for campaigns, like having a clear narrative, being media-ready, and evaluating existing activist groups.
2. What We’ll Look At.
• Some common critiques
• Concepts of media
ownership
• Some case studies
• Bias in Media
• Creating alternatives
3. Activities
• Look at what’s wrong with the mainstream media.
• Identify alternative and mainstream media sources.
• Look at how your issues are being framed.
• Check in about how happy you are with how they
frame your issues.
• Work to identify groups that work on your issues?
• How are these groups portrayed in different sources
• Formulating a communication and action.
4. Practical Lowdowns
• The good and bad
of press releases
• Campaign strategy
• Formulating a
communications
strategy
5. What do you guys feel is
wrong with the media?
Activity 1
6. My Gut Feeling
• Represent powerful
interests
• Lack of minority voices
• Business rather than
bastions of truth
• Advertisers dictate
content
• In bed with government
• Infotainment & celebrity
crap
7. In your groups pick one
Irish media outlet each
and find out as much as
you can about its
ownership structure in five
minutes?
Activity 2
8.
9. Media In Ireland
• Denis O’Brien bond villain number
1.
• INM titles account for over 40% of
all national newspaper sales and
just three groups own 23 of our 37
radio stations
• In radio Denis O’Brien’s
Communicorp, Thomas Crosbie
Holdings (TCH)/Landmark and UTV
Media – own seventeen stations
between them.
• Anne Harris, editor of the Sunday
Independent, has claimed that 17
journalists have received legal
letters from Denis O’Brien in the
last ten years.
10.
11. Liberal Media Myth
• The notion of the
Fourth Estate we
grow up with
• Brave investigative
journalists holding
government to
account.
• Standing outside
power and being
principled.
12. Mass Media Critiques
• Noam Chomksy, popular
American academic who put
forward what has been
called the “propaganda
model” in opposition to the
liberal media myth.
• He put forward a break
down of several factors
shaping our media & how it
relays news.
15. Being Concise.
• The fast paced nature of
our media doesn’t allow
for depth.
• This means complicated
and non-mainstream
ideas don’t get a chance
to get a full hearing.
• Establishment wisdom
passed down all our lives
wins out.
16. Working in your groups, try
jot down what an
alternative media might
look like in your eyes?
Activity 3
17. What is alt media?
• Alternative
media are media which
offer a different and
contrary narrative to
the mainstream media.
• Often they have a
wholly divergent
funding and ownership
model in contrast to the
hierarchical and
corporate model of the
mainstream press
18. Example 1: rabble
• 10,000 copies per issue
• Print feeds online
• Funded through Workers Beer
Scheme & reader donations
• Will only survive as long as its
readers support it (Eg the
Fundit.ie campaign).
• Relies on its readers to
distribute it.
• Recognises its bias and does
not claim impartiality.
• Huge interactions and online
backing despite no staff or real
money.
• Here’s Harry Brown explaining
why it’s a project worth
engaging with...
20. Example 2: Dole TV
• Set up by a group of
unemployed people to look
at life on the dole during
recession.
• Broadcast on Dublin
Community TV and making
use of collectively ran
resources and cheap DSLR
kits and youtube.
• Produced a variety of
content varying from media
aware caricatures, piss takes
of corporate advertising to
arty critiques of how
working class people are
portrayed on TV.
21. Example 3: Indymedia
• Founded among the Seattle
protests against the WTO in
1999.
• Took advantage of ability to
host websites cheaply,
emerging digital film making
techniques.
• Activist journalism and a
collective editorial process.
• Anticipated Web 2.0 and social
media in how people were able
to upload and add their own
stories as well as engage in
discussion on the website.
• Broke huge stories in Ireland
including Shannon Warport
with 300,000 people a month
at its height.
22. In your groups try and identify
sources of mainstream and
alternative media in Ireland?
Activity 4
24. Scots #IndyRef
• Scottish independence: Crowd protests against 'BBC
bias’
• A large crowd gathered outside BBC Scotland's Glasgow
HQ to protest about coverage of the referendum.
• Police said up to 1,000 people took part although other
observers suggested a much higher figure for the crowd.
25. Academic Study
• Professor John Robertson, media politics
professor at University of West Scotland
and author of a study that claimed the
BBC was biased towards a no vote.
• He was reported by BBC figures to senior
staff in the university.
• He'd found a greater number of no
statements. Interviewers would be more
aggressive to yes campaigners.
• Newsnet Scotland reported 10,000 hits
on the day - yet absent in mainstream
media.
• Points towards the collusion of
broadsheet, radio and TV journalists
28. Common Sense
• RTE aired two series during
2006 and 2007 called I’m An
Adult Get Me Out of Here
where a slick estate agent
turned presenter shamed
young people onto the
property trap.
• Very little discussion of
alternatives like continental
renting solutions, co-
operative living etc
• Examples like House Hunters
sponsored by banks
29. Feeding Frenzy
• As late as 23rd of May 2007
the Irish Independent in a
large feature article
headlined Earn Baby, Earn
Irish advised if "if you're
looking to accumulate, its
time to speculate."
• Brendan O’Connor’s
famous line about the
“smart ballsy guys...”
30. Alternative Voices
• In Ireland, economist David McWilliams
(centre) warned unambiguously about the
unsustainability of the boom as early
as January 1998, when he wrote that
‘fundamentals count for nothing if your house
is built on a bubble’
31. Why so blind?
• Julien Mercille breaks down four
factors for all this
• News organisations have multiple
links with the political and corporate
establishment thus sharing similar
ideas and ideologies
• Real estate agents are huge
advertisers so they feel pressure
from them.
• They rely on experts from elite
institutions
32. Implied Rules Of The Game
• Julien Mercille appeared before the
banking committee and discussed some
of these points.
• News organisations have multiple links
with the political and corporate
establishment thus sharing similar ideas
and ideologies
• Real estate agents are huge advertisers so
they feel pressure from them.
• This isn’t about direct conspiracy it’s
about competing world visions and
alignments of interest.
33. Away we go again.
• Dublin is experiencing a
property boom while
other parts of the country
remain stagnant.
• News organisations are
again repeating the
mantras of getting on the
ladder with little critique.
36. Looking at your own campaigns
and issues, take some time to
look at how the media reports on
them. Can you identify any
trends or concerns?
Activity 5
37. Are you happy with how the
media here frames your issues?
Activity 6
44. What hashtags should your
campaign groups start
being aware of in order to
start shaping a counter
narrative?
Activity 8
45. Being Media Ready
• Have your campaign narrative
nailed via a press release.
• Journalists are lazy they want
you to write the story for them
including the headline, quotes
and photographs.
• Reinforce all that information
via a good social media
presence & website.
• There is no excuse for bad
design – find someone and
don’t slack.
• Professionalism counts as it
shows you are taking yourself
seriously.
• Are you cross platform
compliant? Phones etc.
50. Can you identify groups that work on
your issues here already that you
can ally with? In terms of their
online presence and media profile,
give constructuve criticism?
Activity 9
54. Give feedback.
• How easy was it to find information?
• Was their website attractive?
• What was their social media presence like?
• Is it easy to get in touch with them?
• Were there readily available photos and pieces of
media to use in your work?
• Do they look like they are an active campaign with
support?
• Do they get much press coverage?
• What would you do differently? What’s working
and what’s not?
