Suchergebnisse

Among the events that attracted the attention of the European professional journals the most important are: The difficulties between the editor and the directors of the Gazette de Lausanne, ending with the editor retaining his independence. A similar case arose in Turin with the Gazette del Popolo. The pros and cons of commercial TV as discussed in Great Britain; the first session of the Press Council also led to many articles in the British journals. Unusual news also was the announcement of a new London daily to start in October—this time originating from a weekly. This quarter was characterized further by the richness of international congresses, both of journalists and scientists.

During the last three months the short life of the London Daily Recorder was discussed and analyzed. At the end of March it changed back to weekly appearance and had to be sold some weeks later. The General Assembly of the International Press Institute met for the third time (in Vienna). Freedom of the press and the internal organization of the institute were main topics. In Bordeaux the International Federation of Journalists met for the second time. Lord Camrose (Berry), one of the British "Press Lords," died in June.

During the last quarter of the year the new London daily, the Recorder, appeared in the streets. In content and form it does not differ much from other London newspapers. According to latest reports the Recorder is still losing money. The British government issued a "White Paper" on commercial TV. It was favorably received by the House of Commons. In Germany, government plans for a ministry of information caused great alarm in the press and among political parties. Memories of Nazi information ministries were still fresh. The plan was abandoned.

The International Press Institute organized a meeting of French and German editors in Strasbourg. The following communique was approved unanimously: The press in both Germany and France is called on to achieve a great task in eliminating misunderstandings and prejudices and furthering mutual understanding between the two peoples. In pursuit of these aims the press must bring to its work objectivity, dignity and an awareness of the responsibilities involved. Journalists taking part in the meeting at Strasbourg pledge themselves in a "gentleman's agreement" to observe these principles in their newspapers.

Controversy with governmental agencies, both at home and abroad, continued to occupy individuals and institutions in the field of journalism throughout the last quarter of 1951. Tentative efforts to bridge the gap between editors and the Truman administration over the classification of governmental news broke down when newspaper groups refused to be drawn into consultation to set up categories of information. To this controversy was added a flare-up over the declaration of a truce line in Korea and a subsequent "cease-fire" order which the Associated Press tentatively attributed directly to the White House. The exchanges between President Truman and the AP for a time dwarfed the Korean war on the news wires and at the end of the period there were no reports of cease-fire orders in either the Korean or the Truman-AP "wars." Press services and correspondents came under attack also from private individuals. These sorties included General Charles Willoughby's assertion that certain reporters and newspapers had been "defeatist" and misleading in their dispatches from Korea during the retreat from the Yalu River in late 1950 while he was intelligence chief for General MacArthur's Far Eastern command. Press services were criticized for alleged inadequate coverage of vast sections of the world by several former foreign correspondents. The accused denied everything. As the new year came in, further developments were awaited in the Oatis case in Czechoslovakia and the trial of five newsmen charged with defamation of county officials and gamblers in Lake Charles, La. In the latter case testimony had been completed and the decision was under deliberation by the single judge.

Political and economic threats to press freedom constituted the most significant development in the third quarter of 1951. The farcical Czech conviction of AP Correspondent William Oatis stirred official Washington action in retaliation but by the end of the quarter had not resulted in Oatis' release. In the United States a Louisiana newspaper's efforts to expose gambling and official laxness in prosecuting it resulted in a brazen indictment of the journalists for "defaming" the officials. Amid these threats to free expression, however, a committee of Washington newsmen set an example of adherence to the principle of freedom by turning down an editors' suggestion that Tass representatives be barred from the press galleries as spies. … On the economic side, the International Typographical Union sought to counter the trend toward newspaper monopolies by starting three competing dailies. However, the threat of still higher newsprint prices was causing many dailies to go up to 10 cents a copy and the hunt for cheap and plentiful substitute raw materials for newsprint production continued.—W. F. S.

The professional aspect of journalism came in for an especial degree of discussion during the spring of 1948 as the ACEJ made its long-awaited announcement of its first list of accredited institutions. Several individual schools reported on their educational programs in the trade and professional journals, and in the newspaper field an increasing interest was shown in problems of improved news writing and readability of news copy. These seemed to be related signs of a general awareness that journalism was in a state of change. Mechanically this was reflected in continued research into "cold type" printing and related processes, the Chicago Tribune's experiment with newsprint made from straw, and the Chicago Herald-American's work in magnetic ad layout sheets. The printers' fight with publishers over the Taft-Hartley law continued indecisively, meantime. With television coverage of the national political conventions in Philadelphia, radio in the field of public events entered a major new phase of development itself, and in radio circles also there was increased interest in the professional responsibility of communications. —W. F. S.

The crisis in newspaper labor relations was still the most important development in the winter of 1947-48 as newspapers in Chicago, Springfield, Mass., and various other cities undertook to circumvent the rash of typographical union strikes which sought to test the Taft-Hartley act. In the radio field, the prospect of a general revision of the Federal Communications Act excited charges of censorship clauses and other threats to freedom of speech on the air. Radio expansion for 1948, however, was anticipated to be of record proportions.—W. F. S.

During this part of the year there have been no great events in the European newspaper world. The well-known German newspaper Hamburger Fremdenblatt has appeared again, and Zeitungs-Verlag has issued a special number on magazines. At the FIEJ Congress the Lopez report was under discussion.

In an unprecedented legal action, the U. S. government filed a suit against the Lorain (Ohio) Journal on charges of conspiracy to effect a monopoly. As this historic case began, the question which might ultimately be answered by the courts was whether the inevitable economic trend toward non-competitive facilities may, if aggravated by the owners' deliberate moves to discourage renewed competition, be actionable in the interest of public welfare. The government's ability to prove any ground for prosecution, however, had not been demonstrated in the Lorain case as the fall quarter of the year ended. In another important economic field, the prolonged strike of Chicago typographical unions suddenly ended in a compromise, and with it came the end of a significant and successful experiment in publication of metropolitan newspapers without benefit of compositors. In the radio and television field, two developments highlighted the late summer and early autumn—the order of the Federal Communications Commission curtailing the give-away programs which had become a virtual craze and an added bit of Americana for observers foreign and domestic to wonder at; and the marked "plateau" which the television industry reached after its meteoric postwar rise—a pause which was blamed on various ineptitudes in both industrial and governmental policy controlling "video." —W. F. S.