Preparing to embarrass myself

(Click to enlarge poster).

I somehow agreed to be on a panel tomorrow called News Uncovered, discussing how the Hong Kong media covers (or doesn't cover) international news. All the other panelists will be speaking Cantonese, except yours truly, who will be speaking in Mandarin. If you live in Hong Kong and know one of those languages and feel like coming to make fun of my street Mandarin and rusty vocab, feel free. It would also be great to have some folks asking provocative questions.

You may be wondering: I just showed up in Hong Kong. How am I qualified to speak about the quality of the Hong Kong media's international news coverage? When I asked that very question to the organizers, they replied that they wanted me to be the person who brings a more international perspective to the debate and ties the discussion to the issue of global news coverage in other countries.

The one observation I will make about HK news coverage of international stories is that when I have encountered HK journalists in mainland China or in other countries, 99% of the time they are in a big pack. Outside of Hong Kong it seems very rare to run across a solo HK journalist striking out on his or her own on a story that none of his or her competitors aren't also covering. Talking to Hong Kong journalist friends about the reasons why, people say it has a lot to do with the editorial pressures that news editors put on the journalists not to "miss" anything that the competition may have. Journalists are not rewarded for doing original work, especially if it happens at the expense of not being present at the same press conference that everybody else plus their dog and uncle attended. Go figure. (To be fair, Western news organizations aren't immune to such tendencies either, but with the HK media it seems much more extreme.)

Other than that I'll stick to my usual themes: issues of global news and attention imbalances, the rise of international blogging as an alternative source of international story-telling, and the debate amongst U.S. newsies and media pundits over the future (or end?) of "foreign correspondence. " More of my recent rantings by me here and here, plus a couple new articles on the demise of the "foreign correspondent" - both very worth reading - in the Washington Post and on the website of the Committee of Concerned Journalists.

I expect to learn quite a lot from the other panelists and hopefully from the audience about what journalism schools like the JMSC might be able to do to encourage better international reporting by Hong Kong's media.

Comments

[doug]

I guess that answers the question asked by everyone: Is Hong Kong an International city?

No.

[Stephanie Chin]

I think your observation is objective. I don't think this is an editorial pressure. This is a lack of self confidence to take risk, to be independent, to have a brain of your own. And after all, if the news is not original, it is called "olds" :) -- this is a worse kind of pressure you give yourself as a journalist.

Don't worry about your Mandarin, most of the people understand. If you need a Cantonese/English/Mandarin simultaneous interpeter to run around next time let me know.
(Sorry about this time, I am engaged tomorrow)
:)

[China Law Blog]

So do the HK journalists alert their friends at other publications as to where they are going? If not, how is it that they manage to run in packs?

[Rebecca MacKinnon]

You'll have to ask a Hong Kong journalists how it happens, all I know is what I have observed with my own eyes. I also frequently observed members of the pack standing round comparing notes about what got said after a press conference or group interview. I guess we can ask people why and how this happens during the panel tomorrow - or if people think I was hallucinating.