Case Studies/Media Helping Media
Journalists should share their knowledge freely in order to transfer skills and build capacity in places where the media is still developing. — David Brewer
Overview
Media Helping Media was set up in 2005 to help the media in transition, post-conflict countries and areas where the media is still developing. The site was created because some areas of the world were being neglected in terms of media training.
Many of the 100+ training modules have since been translated by various media training and media development organisations and are being used worldwide. Some are used in online learning programmes. A Moodle is being created (summer 2012) in Azeri using more than 90 of the articles on Media Helping Media to form a resource to assist lecturers running the journalism courses at Baku University, Azerbaijan. Another is being created in English - again, available for all to use.
More free training modules are always welcome and anyone is invited to contribute.
License Usage
All the material on Media Helping Media is released under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA with six exceptions (see below).
The majority of articles have been written by me, David Brewer, the founder and editor of the site, but there are also many great guest articles that have been contributed by others involved in media development and media training.
The only articles not covered by Creative Commons are the six articles contributed by The News Manual. There are five in the basic journalism section of Media Helping Media and one in the advance journalism section. The News Manual is usually happy for these articles to be reproduced, but you have to contact The News Manual to seek permission first.
Everything else on the site is yours to use, reproduce, enhance, translate, share - anything, other than make money out of them. And if you do improve them (or if you spot any errors) please let me know via the Media Helping Media Contact Us page.
You can also add comments to all the articles by using the comment box at the bottom of each module. Sometimes the comments - if the author allows - are added to the modules. That way we continue to grow the resource with the contribution of others.
Motivations
Creative Commons is just the right way to go for knowledge sharing. It means that training resources can have the maximum benefit and reach those who can't afford to hire trainers or buy books and who may be overlooked by international media development effort.
Ideally more and more people will contribute free training resources so that a growing amount of material is available for all to use. If you have any training modules you want to share under the spirit of Creative Commons BY-NC-SA, please let me know please let me know.
Technical Details
The free training modules are presented on the free, open-source Joomla platform using a free template and free components, modules and plug ins.
Business Model
The cost of running Media Helping Media is kept low so that the model can be copied by media in developing countries where there isn't a lot of cash to spare. The platform, template and tools are all free. The only cost is hosting and the URL registration. Those costs are covered by the income from the Google Ad running on the site. Any income over and above those costs is put into the micro-financing system, Kiva.
