By Teagan Laszlo, Queensland University of Technology
For Samantha Magick, journalism isn’t just a job. It is a lifelong commitment to storytelling, advocacy, and empowering voices often overlooked in the Pacific.

As the managing editor and publisher at Islands Business, the Pacific Islands’ longest surviving news and business monthly magazine, Magick’s commitment to quality reporting and journalistic integrity has established her as a leading figure in the region’s news industry.

Magick’s…

ANALYSIS: By Denis Muller, The University of Melbourne
In February 2017, as Donald Trump took office, The Washington Post adopted the first slogan in its 140-year history: “Democracy Dies in Darkness”.

How ironic, then, that it should now be helping to extinguish the flame of American democracy by refusing to endorse a candidate for the forthcoming presidential election.

This decision, and a similar one by the second of America’s big three…

COMMENTARY:  By David Robie in Taipei
It was a heady week for the Paris-based global media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) — celebration of seven years of its Taipei office, presenting a raft of proposals to the Taiwan government, and hosting its Asia-Pacific network of correspondents.

Director general Thibaut Bruttin and the Taipei bureau chief Cedric Alviani primed the Taipei media scene before last week’s RSF initiatives with an op-ed…

ANALYSIS: By Andrea Jean Baker
Lee, the feature film debut from director Ellen Kuras, explores the rawness of authentic image making and the impact of gender in war reporting.

Kate Winslet stars as the world weary photojournalist Elizabeth “Lee” Miller — better known for featuring in an iconic photograph, rather than taking one.

The same day Adolf Hitler committed suicide at his Berlin bunker in 1945, photojournalist David E. Scherman took…

The Global Media Internet Concentration Project examines the concentration of the communications and media in countries around the world. 

The latest data for Australia have recently been released, and they show just how big Google is in the country. 

Alphabet (Google’s parent company) had 2022 revenue in Australia of A$7.9 billion. 

ANALYSIS: By Matthew Ricketson, Deakin University and Andrew Dodd, The University of Melbourne
Until recently, Elon Musk was just a wildly successful electric car tycoon and space pioneer. Sure, he was erratic and outspoken, but his global influence was contained and seemingly under control.

But add the ownership of just one media platform, in the form of Twitter — now X — and the maverick has become a mogul, and…

EDITORIAL: The Samoa Observer editorial board
The Samoan government’s attempt to control the media for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting is a slap across the face of press freedom, democracy and freedom of speech.

It is a farce and an attempt by a dysfunctional government unit to gag local and overseas media.

No international forum of such importance does this. The United Nations, the Pacific Islands Forum or other CHOGMs never…

COMMENTARY: By Jessica Tyson
In recent years Kiingi Tuheitia became known as the “king of unity” with his determined drive for kotahitanga involving rangatahi.

So last week, through his tangihanga and the accession of his successor, a unique first took shape as the largest group of Māori broadcasters to ever work together collaborated with iwi in honouring his “wairua wind”.

Every day during the week-long tangihanga, news and radio teams from many…

RNZ MEDIAWATCH: By Colin Peacock, RNZ Mediawatch presenter
“Anticipation is growing. The warriors are ready. They’re preparing themselves. The paddlers are already on their waka,” Scotty Morrison, alongside veteran journalist Tini Molyneux, told viewers from the banks of the Waikato River.

It was Thursday, and the body of Kiingi Tuheitia was being escorted to the barge to take him to his resting place on Taupiri maunga.

That prompted Morrison — the…

COMMENTARY: By Gavin Ellis
The New Zealand Herald and its publisher are failing to follow a golden rule: Engage with readers when they question your actions.

The Herald is currently confronted by two controversies. The first is its decision to use artificial intelligence to write editorials. The second is its decision to publish a highly divisive advertising wrap-around paid for by the lobby group Hobson’s Pledge.

In neither case has the newspaper…

ANALYSIS: By Denis Muller, The University of Melbourne
ABC chair Kim Williams has attracted considerable attention with his criticism of the broadcaster’s online news choices. Williams has taken issue with what he sees as the ABC prioritising lifestyle stories over hard news.

In the process, he has raised an important issue of principle.

Is it right for the chair to insert himself into editorial decision-making, even at the level of broad…

COMMENTARY: By Dr Gavin Ellis in Knightly Views
Integrity is the most valued element of a news organisation’s reputation. Without it, it cannot expect its audience to lend credence to what it publishes or broadcasts. So, The New Zealand Herald has dealt itself an awful blow.

Its admission that it used generative AI to scrape content and then create an editorial about the All Blacks came only after it was caught out…

COMMENTARY: By David Robie in Devpolicy Blog
Pacific Journalism Review (PJR) began life three decades ago in Papua New Guinea and recently celebrated a remarkable milestone in Fiji with its 30th anniversary edition and its 47th issue.

Remarkable because it is the longest surviving Antipodean media, journalism and development journal published in the Global South. It is also remarkable because at its birthday event held in early July at the…

By Mark Pearson, Journlaw
As I started to disappear into the vortex of 24/7 media coverage of the US election, I recalled the news anxiety I experienced in 2020 at the start of the covid-19 pandemic which prompted me to write an article for The Conversation titled “Coronavirus: 5 ways to manage your news consumption in times of crisis“.

Following events in the…

Knightly Views, by Gavin Ellis
The computer chaos that enveloped much of the world on Friday told us something about almost all of New Zealand’s daily newspapers: Either their deadlines mean they are no longer newspapers, their priorities lie elsewhere, or their "news" values are shot to hell.

I say “almost all” because one newspaper stood out from its contemporaries. The Otago Daily Times was the only paper that led its…

By Shailendra Bahadur Singh and Amit Sarwal in Suva
Given the intensifying situation, journalists, academics and experts joined to state the need for the Pacific, including its media, to re-assert itself and chart its own path, rooted in its unique cultural, economic and environmental context.

The tone for the discussions was set by Papua New Guinea’s Minister for Information and Communications Technology Timothy Masiu, chief guest at the official dinner of the…

ADDRESS: By Professor Vijay Naidu
Professor Vijay Naidu’s speech celebrating the launch of the 30th anniversary edition of Pacific Journalism Review at the Pacific International Media Conference in Suva, Fiji, on 4 July 2024. Dr Naidu is adjunct professor in the disciplines of development studies and governance in the School of Law and Social Sciences at the University of the South Pacific. 

I have been given the honour of launching the 30th…

COMMENTARY: By Mark Pearson
Journalists, publishers, academics, diplomats and NGO representatives from throughout the Asia-Pacific region will gather for the 2024 Pacific International Media Conference hosted by The University of the South Pacific in Suva, Fiji, next month.

A notable part of the conference on July 4-6 will be the celebration of the 30th anniversary of the journal Pacific Journalism Review — founded by the energetic pioneer of journalism studies in the…

COMMENTARY: By Graham Davis, investigative journalist and publisher of Grubsheet.
The Fiji Times totally crosses the line today by using a convicted felon who took part in the 2000 coup to call for the release of the coup frontman George Speight. 

Journalist Josefa Nata spent 23 years in prison for his part in the rebellion. He has served his time and deserves his freedom.

But he does not deserve…

By Tira Shubart, for News Decoder, a global educational service
With the 156,000 allied troops who came ashore at Normandy on D-Day were 500 news reporters armed only with pens, paper, cameras and recording equipment.

On 6 June 1944, the biggest seabourne invasion in history was launched across the English Channel towards the French coast to establish a base and retake occupied Europe from Nazi Germany.

Known as D-Day — and…