The changing face of news

The Listening Post likes to look deep into the underlying architecture of the news; the politics that steer it, the economics that drive it and – this week – the technology that brings stories and images to TV screens, print publications and websites.

This special edition of the show examines three new technologies that are changing the way the news is gathered and presented.

First, we look at the future of news as seen from above: Whether it is protests, damage from a natural disaster or celebrity chasing, there has been a noticeable increase in the use of drones – that is, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) – by journalists, cameramen and media-savvy activists who are using drones to get new angles on world events.

It is the technology and the ethics of drone journalism that is the subject of our first report from the Listening Post’s Will Yong.

Next, Marcela Pizarro takes a look at how media organisations are adapting to the exponential rise in the quantity and quality of user-generated content (UGC).

These days, eyewitnesses know how valuable content captured at the scene of breaking events can be, and now there is a new generation of intermediaries curating the best content and feeding it into the mainstream.

Lastly, as the saying goes, ‘the camera never lies’, but can it tell the truth objectively when digital post-processing has become as much part of the photojournalist’s art as framing the shot in the first place?

Image enhancement has already courted controversy around highly contentious news stories and has raised questions in the eyes of some about the winners of the World Press Photo awards. Nic Muirhead reads between the pixels. 

Listening Post can be seen each week at the following times GMT: Saturday: 0830, 1930; Sunday: 1430; Monday: 0430. Click here for more Listening Post