The NLA and the Journalism Diversity Fund

Joanne Butcher, chief executive of the  the NCTJ, had some encouraging words to say about the impact of the Journalism Diversity Fund at the 10 year anniversary reception held this week.

'(The JDF) has been a massive success. Nearly 200 young people have had their training paid for by the Journalism Diversity Fund, thanks to our sponsors -and it has helped young people start their careers in Journalism, which they wouldn't have been able to do without funding. It has made a difference to young people’s careers and it has made a difference to our newsrooms, which was obviously the intention in the first place, to change the face of our newsrooms. It is great to see so many recipients of the fund here tonight finding jobs in journalism - the fund is making a big difference. The NLA were instrumental in setting up the fund in the first place, and without the support of the national newspapers that support the NLA we wouldn’t have been able to set up the fund. It is thanks to their support that the fund has achieved what it has'.
 
We also spoke to Amber Haque, trainee journalist at the BBC, about the impact the JDF has had on her career:

Amber's speech, along with advice for aspiring young journalists, can be viewed here.

£1million landmark donation to Journalism Diversity Fund

At an awards ceremony hosted by Associated Newspapers last night (3 November) NLA media access celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Journalism Diversity Fund (JDF) by presenting a cheque for £100,000 to continue promoting diversity in newsrooms across the UK. The donation brings the NLA’s total support for JDF to over £1million.

The JDF was set up by the newspaper industry in 2005 and supports the training of journalists from ethnically and socially diverse backgrounds by meeting the financial cost of completing a National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ)-accredited course.  

Since its creation the JDF has provided bursaries for nearly 200 aspiring journalists who have gone on to work across the industry, from the Daily Mail to Sky News. Two young journalists who have just graduated from the scheme spoke of their experiences and how they have benefited from Diversity Fund support. Amber Haque, now a trainee at BBC news and Rehema Figueiredo, training with Associated Newspapers both described how the Journalism Diversity Fund has enabled them to overcome barriers to a career in journalism.

The launch of the new Thomas Read bursary, awarded to help aspiring journalists with a disability was announced at the event. The bursary has been established in memory of Thomas Read, a journalist who passed away suddenly in early 2015, and is funded by donations from friends and family. In spite of his cerebral palsy, Thomas had worked as a sports journalist at Sky and enjoyed a successful career in journalism. The first recipient is Gemma Louise Hodgson, who is currently studying at St Mary’s University.

Managing Director of NLA media access David Pugh said:
“Supporting journalists from disadvantaged backgrounds is vital if the media is to retain a voice that is as diverse as the issues it reports on. We are committed to the supporting the success of the newspaper industry and young people who want to forge a career in journalism. The JDF is fantastic at providing opportunities to applicants whose careers could otherwise be disadvantaged by their circumstance.”

Joanne Butcher, chief executive of the National Council for the Training of Journalists, said:
“It’s been a pleasure to manage the JDF over the past 10 years. NLA media access has been a source of constant support and, together with other sponsors of the fund, have provided almost 200 exceptional journalists with the financial means to secure the training they need. Both sponsors and supporters of the fund have worked hard to improve the make-up of their newsrooms and ensure they reflect the communities they serve. We hope the next decade sees more socially and ethnically diverse reporters take their place at UK publishers and broadcasters.”

Photocredit: David Parker

Special Contributors Survey - 2014 Results

In order for NLA media access licences to operate smoothly for its licensees, publishers grant a mandate which covers all editorial content in their publications, so that  monitoring agencies and their clients can copy articles knowing that they can rely on the rights granted in NLA licences.

In fact, the copying rights for a percentage of the content may be owned by the contributor (an agency or a freelance commissioned by the publisher). Most publishers operate highly sophisticated rights management processes, which mean that they either own content or a have a licence to publish, copy, or syndicate third party content – which is essential in a fast-moving, multi-platform publishing world.

Although the percentage of content that is not ‘owned’ by the publisher in this way is small and diminishing, it is important that any contributor that has retained rights should receive their share of revenue that has been earned through NLA’s media monitoring licences. NLA therefore conducts a Survey to determine the percentage that a publisher should pay to individual contributors or (if the amount due is less than £100 per individual) to the Journalists Charity .

The latest survey was conducted in 2014 and the headline results were published earlier this year; but now that all publisher payments have been made, we are able to report in much greater depth, giving details of the extent of the survey and the number of recipients paid. Full details on the Special Contributors Scheme can be found here  

Tackling Online Piracy

Yesterday, NLA media access co-hosted a seminar with the PPA on tackling online piracy of publisher content. Copyright Infringement is happening on a global scale across many different types of content and there are a number of industry wide initiatives which have been set up to deal with this problem. A wide range of publishers attended including EMAP and Euromonitor.

We heard from PIPCU, the City of London Police’s dedicated copyright enforcement team. PIPCU work with a number of partners in their ‘Operation Creative’ which aims to stop advertising on illegal sites. They have seen much success recently with a 73% drop in UK advertising on these infringing websites. We also heard from Publisher’s Association, a membership organisation who represent the rights of books, journals and audio publishers. Currently, the Publishers Association are tackling the large scale infringement problem using their Copyright Infringement Portal which aims to streamline the takedown submission process for publishers.

Finally, the NLA spoke about Online Article Tracking System (OATS) which tracks online infringement of publisher content. Currently 6 of the national newspaper publishers take part collectively in the service and it currently runs at 83% take down rate. Much of the success is down to educating infringers on what can or can’t be copied and the correct use of publisher content on websites. In this way, we see there is an opportunity for magazine publishers to benefit from this service. For more information, email publisherservices@nla.co.uk

The Power of Article Impact Measurement - the Top 3 stories of the last 12 months

What do Cecil the lion, the Pope and Adele have in common? No, the answer isn’t a bizarre chance encounter, but they are the Top 3 most viewed national newspaper articles online in the past 12 months.

The data is compiled from NLA’s powerful new tool AIM (Article Impact Measurement). AIM brings together precise internet page view data directly from the newspaper publisher’s site analytics platforms.

In first place was the Telegraph, with plaudits going to journalists Harriet Alexander, Peta Thornycroft and Aislinn Laing. Their exposé on Cecil the lion’s plight moved the world to condemnation and generated almost seven million hits on The Telegraph’s website. In second and third place were Adam Withnall of The Independent and Bryony Gordon of The Telegraph for their stories on Pope Francis’ support of the theory of evolution and Adele’s snub of Bob Geldof’s project Band Aid respectively.

In total these three stories generated over 16 million views between them, highlighting the astonishing reach of high quality journalism online. While the stories may be different in character, colour and content, they all demonstrate the public’s appetite for reading about diverse issues from trusted sources of information.

So while the commonality between a lion, a religious leader and a pop star may remain unclear to most, AIM allows media and communication professionals to read between the lines.