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SHANGHAI, China - The savage beating death of a reporter has shone a rare light on the corrupt, money-driven underbelly of Chinese journalism, where many reporters take bribes to write good news and extort companies to suppress their dirty laundry. President Hu Jintao has ordered a probe into the killing of China Trade News reporter Lan Chengzhang, who Chinese media say may have been trying to...

BERKELEY, California, Jan 31 (IPS) - In a new blow to free expression in Iran, security forces arrested three members of a 15-woman delegation of journalists en route to a training workshop in India last week, accusing them of infringing national security interests and threatening them with trial. After being interrogated at the airport Jan. 25, their passports were confiscated and they were sent...

BEIRUT, Lebanon: Too much zeal for reporting may have led three Lebanese journalists to break into the apartment of a key witness in the slaying of former Prime Minster Rafik Hariri — but the rash move cost them 42 days in jail and got them released on bail only Wednesday. Reporter Firas Hatoum from the local New-TV station, a cameraman and an assistant, were let go on 500,000 Lebanese pounds (US...

LAS VEGAS (AP) - The newspaper industry this week announced a $75 million marketing campaign to declare its relevance in the Internet age as advertising revenues were flat, buffeted by major mergers and a wounded domestic auto industry. It's the second year in a row that the Newspaper Association of America has advertised directly to its advertisers, trying to change the perception that the...

The prevailing online business model for newspapers is to provide free access to their Web sites and then generate all of their online revenue through advertising. Now, one of the prominent exceptions – the Financial Times of London – may be considering changes to its online subscription model. The Pearson-owned Times typically provides only a limited selection of free full-length articles at FT...

NEW YORK - Internet users are taking avidly to sites that let them label photos, movies and blogs with their own descriptive tags, providing a major new way of organizing information online, according to a survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The December survey, released Wednesday, found that 28 percent of Internet users have tagged content, and 7 percent have done so on a typical...

CAIRO - Court proceedings started Sunday against Howaida Taha, an Al Jazeera journalist arrested while producing a documentary on police torture in Egypt. She's charged with harming national interests and faces five years in prison. Meanwhile, Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer has been in jail since November awaiting trial, charged with criticizing Islam and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Taken...

Former Los Angeles Times Editor Dean Baquet was named today Washington bureau chief for the New York Times, positioning him as a leader at one of America's top newspapers but dashing the hopes of some of his onetime employees that he might return to the Los Angeles paper if it changed owners. New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller joined Baquet in the Washington newsroom this morning to...

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Star editor Dean Baquet is returning to The New York Times as Washington bureau chief, effective March 5. The move is not quite a surprise but remains a big score for the Times, which was sorry to see Mr. Baquet leave seven years ago when he became managing editor at the Los Angeles Times. But Mr. Baquet, who eventually became the paper's top editor, recently became...

People’s Watch is inviting applications form working journalists in the print media for the Mukundan Menon Media Fellowship under its national Project on Prevention of Torture in India. This National Project is being implemented in Nine States (Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Orissa, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka). Peoples Watch, the implementing organisation of...