[ddj] Newsfoo Camp 2012

[Stephen Doig]

Liliana asked me to give the ddj list a quick recap of this year's Newsfoo Camp unconference that was held here at the Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University Nov. 30 to Dec. 2. If you've never been to an unconference, it's an interesting model. There is no pre-set agenda or list of panels; instead, attendees write quick titles and descriptions of discussions they'd like to lead and then place them on a board blocked out by time and meeting place. It's an eight-ring circus, and the problem always is choosing one session knowing that there are a couple of others going on at the same time that you wish you could sit in on, as well.

Newsfoo Camp is an invitation-only event sponsored by O'Reilly Media, the technology publishing empire. The 150 or so invited attendees were a mix of journalists, educators, technologists, futurists and public policy wonks, mostly U.S. but some from Europe, Latin America and as far away as Australia and New Zealand. You can see the list of campers at  http://newsfoo12.wiki.oreilly.com/wiki/index.php/News_Foo_Campers.

The best way to get a sense of what happened in various sessions is to read the #newsfoo Twitter stream. But I'll mention one session that I found particularly useful. It focused on tools and strategies to keep secret the communications between journalist and their confidential sources. It was led by Danny O'Brien of the Committee to Protect Journalists and my Cronkite colleague Dan Gillmor. Danny's job includes training reporters and activists in repressive countries about ways to keep their communications and sources secret from prying eyes. This has been an issue that I have given talks on at IRE and NICAR conferences, and I was grateful to hear from someone who has been on the front lines of this. Danny particularly recommended a CPJ publication called "Journalist Security Guide" that covered much of what he talked about; you can read it at http://cpj.org/reports/2012/04/journalist-security-guide.php. He also recommended using open-source software like TrueCrypt (http://www.truecrypt.org/) to encrypt hard drives and USB flash drives if there is reason to believe that governments or other organizations might have reason to inspect your files, covertly or otherwise.

Steve Doig
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Stephen K. Doig, Knight Chair in Journalism
Cronkite School of Journalism, Arizona State University
555 N. Central Ave., Suite 302, Phoenix, AZ, 85004-1248
Phone: 602-496-5798    Fax: 602-496-7041
Web -- http://cronkite.asu.edu/faculty/doigbio.php
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