CNN

Sina.com's anti-CNN imagery is violent

The logo looks like something CNN would cook up at the dawn of a new military campaign, but this time the computer-generated bullet holes are in the CNN logo itself.

"Will" at Imagethief noticed this banner on a special page devoted to resisting "Western" media coverage about Tibet and China in general.

The text, according to Will's translation, which is about as good as I can do as well, reads: "Rise up! Angrily resist the demonization of the Tibet affair! / Chinese netizens roast CNN and other Western media!"

Here's a good Global Voices post … Read more

Cyberprotest of CNN called off (for now)

Late Friday, leaders of the Revenge of the Flame called off a planned denial-of-service attack on CNN.com, according to The Dark Vistor, a Web site that follows Chinese computer hacker activity.

"Our original plan for 19 April has been canceled because too many people are aware of it, and the situation is chaotic," cyberprotest organizers said in a statement. "At an unspecified date in the near future, we will launch the attack. We ask that everyone remain ready."

However, early Saturday morning, a post on The Dark Vistor contained detailed plans for various Revenge of the Flame participants, … Read more

CNN tracks Ashley Dupre's social networking activity and provides full report

For most people, updating your MySpace or Facebook profile is not news. Sure, it might appear in your news feed on the site, but that's just about as far as the story is likely to travel. For Ashley Alexandra Dupre, the woman who reportedly worked as an escort and whose clients included former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, not only has her social networking become a significant news item, but it's even possible that her life-long dream of becoming a professional singer may turn into a reality as a result of getting caught in the prostitution ring that brought down a New York Governor.

In a CNN article that's been updated on at least one occasion, Mallory Simon details the activity on Dupre's profiles at both MySpace and Facebook since the time her identity was publicized by the New York Times earlier in the week. According to Simon, "It seemed she was trying to stay one step ahead of journalists, attempting to limit what information they could access."

The damage control was not limited to deleting scantily clad photographs and embarrassing comments from the past but also involved deleting contacts in her network as well. Simon points out that both Facebook and My Space are used by journalists to gleam background information on their subjects and suggests that, "She was seemingly aware that the press would have access to her friends and every word, photo and comment on her profiles, so she began by deleting connections between her friends on Facebook."… Read more

CNN's citizen journalism site iReport goes live

As we wrote on Monday, CNN's citizen journalism pet project iReport was due to get a site of its own. Today the service finally went live as iReport.com, and is already filling up with user content both old and new.

iReport's site has a lot in common with YouTube, showing off a grouping editor-selected videos (and photos) on the top of the page alongside a queue of the latest news content that's been uploaded by users. Each iReport user gets their own page with a listing of their uploaded photos and videos. Similar to Current, content is marked to show if it's been featured on CNN's televised or Web news reporting. adding incentive for others to click on it.

In addition to hosting any news story videos uploaded by users, iReport dishes out assignments to fledgling videographers and photo journalists. On top of the list is the 2008 Presidential elections, alongside weather reports, the ever popular "offbeat images", as well as "stories from Second Life," Linden Lab's MMORPG. Users can upload up to 10 videos and videos at a time, with each one taking up to 100MB in size.

Interestingly enough, the videos on iReport.com cannot be embedded on third party sites, although there are links to share it on five major social bookmarking and news services. Users also have the option of making the file downloadable, letting others grab it to play on their PCs or portable media devices. Syndication (albeit direct) is the name of the game.

In the future the service plans to increase the ties between stories, as well as where users are reporting from by integrating world maps. Already there is a "more on this story" feature that groups together content by assignment. The service also employs tags and a "newsiest" feature which "combines freshness, popularity, activity, and ratings" in an algorithm not unlike the ones found on social news sites like Digg and Reddit.

More screenshots after the break. … Read more

Report: CNN citizen journalism site close to launch

CNN is close to expanding its "iReport" user-generated reporting initiative into a separate Web site, MediaWeek wrote Monday.

The new site, to be hosted at iReport.com, will be a repository for user-submitted news content--video, audio, and photos. Visitors can navigate through categories of news (like sports, weather, and politics), rate content, and embed it elsewhere on the Web. Contributors will be able to create profiles, and regulars can build up individual followings. As for filtering, the new site will be moderated once content has already been posted to the site; this is a change from CNN's … Read more

Does 'Second Life' need CNN's resident journalists?

On my way to work this morning, I came across an item in MediaWeek talking about how CNN is planning to inaugurate a substantial citizen journalism project in the virtual world Second Life.

The idea is that CNN will distribute kits to Second Life residents that will make it possible for them to "transmit copy and photos" back to the network, which could, presumably, run the stories or images on its Web site.

Further, CNN journalists will hold weekly "news meetings" geared toward helping these would-be reporters learn what makes a good story: how to write, … Read more

Suit exposes flaws in Creative Commons

When Creative Commons first surfaced, it was heralded as a means to share media without being ensnared by the complications accompanying traditional copyright.

With six different licenses available, media creators were provided the opportunity to dial in the exact rights they wanted. Or at least that was the plan.

In reality, this bevy of choices has led to significant confusion and as CNN reports, 16 year-old Alison Chang recently learned her picture is being used for a Virgin Mobile ad campaign in Australia. She didn't give her permission, and it appears that the ads exploit confusion around Creative Commons.

… Read more

Republican YouTube debate postponed

For a while there, the fate of the Republican counterpart to last month's CNN-YouTube debates among Democratic presidential contenders was looking pretty bleak. But it appears that the event in St. Petersburg, Fla., will, indeed take place--albeit a few months later than planned.

CNN and YouTube on Monday issued a brief press release announcing that the candidates will be invited to take the Mahaffey Theatre's stage on November 28. As of Sunday night, John McCain and Rudy Giuliani had agreed to show up for the post-Thanksgiving event, but there was no immediate word on the others, a CNN … Read more

Women are blogging; why isn't the media listening?

The BlogHer '07 conference met in Chicago last weekend, bringing together 800 women of the 13,000 members of this vibrant online community. If you didn't hear about it, it's because the national media didn't bother to report it.

Jennifer Pozner, founder of Women in Media & News (WIMN), writes a scathing analysis of this oversight on the Women's Media Center blog, reporting that "only three Chicago newspapers covered the conference, as if this national assemblage of women writers and videographers were simply a local story. Not one national network or cable news broadcast deigned to mention it."… Read more