Americas

The World Press Institute (WPI), which trained journalists from around the world about the role and responsibilities of a free press for 46 years, is shutting down, the victim of dwindling financial support from American news organisations. "This is a sad development," the institute's board chairman, Howard Tyner, said in a statement on the institute's website. "But in the short term at least...

The US blogger whose record 226 days in federal prison stirred debate about who qualified as a journalist and what legal protections journalists should receive, was freed Tuesday after releasing video footage sought by prosecutors about an anarchist protest. Freelance videographer Joshua Wolf speaks to the members of the media after being released from the Federal Correctional Institution in...

Chicago real estate magnate Sam Zell won the bidding for newspaper publisher and broadcaster Tribune Co. Tribune, owner of leading US newspapers including the Los Angeles Times, Ch icago Tribune, Newsday and the Baltimore Sun, had been pushing Zell to raise his bid, which had been close to $34 a share, Reuters reported. Zell is supporting the transaction with a $315 million investment. Tribune...

Strategic training for journalists is helping news organisations build readership and drive online innovation, a new book has affirmed. News, Improved: How America’s Newsrooms Are Learning to Change, which reports findings of the first-of-its-kind $10 million training and research project by the John S and James L Knight Foundation, comes at a critical time as the digital revolution transforms the...

The percentage of minority journalists working in US daily newsrooms declined slightly to 13.62 percent this year, according an annual newsroom census. According to the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE), this year the associaiton counted full-time journalists working online for the first time to reflect the industry emphasis on expanding its Web presence. Including online-only...

For newspapers, February was the cruelest month. So far. Revenue from advertising was in striking decline last month, compared with February a year ago, and were generally weaker than analysts had expected. And while there was one piece of good news for the industry — ad spending on newspaper Web sites rose — many industry watchers were wondering whether the February declines were part of a short...

Are you good in English grammar, spelling and editing? Well there may be a job waiting for you from a newspaper thousands of miles away in the U.S. After IT companies, Banking and finance companies, call centres, education, medical transcription and legal sectors, it is now the U.S. that is looking for outsourcing editing jobs to India and some other developing countries. “Sure, there have been...

US news organisations are under tremendous pressure to find radical new ways to make money as their financial outlooks worsen despite embracing new technology. One way to do it may be to charge Web users for news in a way they cannot avoid -- their Internet access bill, the “State of the News Media 2007” has said. A taxi drives by the New York Times building in Times Square, New York. News outlets...

Journalists have reported extensively on information technology and financial services work migrating offshore. Now it’s their own jobs they can see disappearing over the horizon. In Britain and the US, the so-called outsourced newspaper is becoming a reality. Last Thursday, Tony O’Reilly’s Independent News & Media announced plans to hive off the downtable sub-editing of three of its Irish...

The CIA leak trial and I Lewis Libby’s conviction has not been good news for US journalists. There is widespread apprehension that reporters and their editors must now more than ever balance their pursuit of news with an increased risk of landing in court. Journalist Matthew Cooper, right, and his attorney, Richard Sauber leave federal court in Washington, in this Jan. 31, 2007 file photo. Ten out...