BBC Broadcasting House in London

Speakers and attendee

David Levy, Director of the Reuters Institute led the discussion together with Nick Newman himself, Controller Future Media and Technology in BBC Journalism, Meg Pickard, Head of Social Media Development at Guardian News and Media and Kate Day Community Editor at the Telegraph.

Speakers

The exact list of attendees was not made available, however most journalists involved in the discussion were respectable and valued mainstream journalists. A smaller group of younger people instead represented the current and upcoming online journalism industry.

The discussion

Most mainstream journalists´questions sounded in some way obvious and were slightly suspicious about the effective values of engaging in social media.
Actually, to find the non-sense of a highly populated world, which is increasingly threatening the mainstream media and journalism, makes strong sense and it is completely  understandable given the threat of potential unemployment or retirement and considering  broadcast journalism revenue.

Attendee

The obviousness of most questions is due to the inverted roles which have been developing in the media and technological environment: the progress is developing very fast, therefore people are not learning their profession from their parents. On the contrary, they are learning “on the field” and it is highly likely that they will learn eventually from their children.
In any case what people do not have to explain their children, they  struggle to explain to their parents.

So at some point it would be time to give up the weapons and to consider the generation gap among journalists as something acceptable and something from which it would be wise to start learning in order to stay as active workers in the industry and to make valuable room for new journalists.

Attendee

Learning and listening from everyone is exactly the success key factor of social media and blogs swarmed by online journalists. Definitely, the concept of first hand information has been developing against the concept of journalism as a lobby.

The value of engaging in social media

In view of this, most speakers´ answers were aimed at clarifying the value of engaging mainstream media in social media as an opportunity to listen to the readers´ voice and to learn what the readers, their final target group, really want.

To the questions “How is it possible to gain money from social media, what is the added value in the engagement in social media?” Kate Day gave a sharp though polite answer explaining extensively that the way is to be complementary and not to replace online and offline newspapers with social media.

Questions and answers

As a matter of fact the synergy of media channels is definitely converging on the internet. Starting from that point, that synergy is sharing its potential with the entirety of the same media channels and is redeploying in different media tools enriched through web functionality that are the most demanded products in the market. For instance  web mobile phones, web tv, online newspaper, e-books etc.

Actually the market and expenditure themselves are determining factors in such kinds of lobby issues and sweep away any possibility of ignoring the reality of social media as the main part of the global conversation, newsmaking and newsgathering.

People wondering if social media brings money to newspapers are easily answered that where are people, there is money.

Imagine an empty shop or better a shop where the clerks tell you everything about the shop but do not let you touch, explore, compare, get your own idea and under the best conditions enjoy a customer experience. It is highly likely that most people won´t buy and will left the shop to go to another shop where they would be free to do what they want. This is the current situation of newspapers which are being left to populate social media.

In addition to that, a pragmatic answer to the money matter was given by Meg Pickard, who said that social media users number in the millions, influencing other people and driving traffic to newspapers.

Multiple voices

Eventually the discussion itself demonstrates that becoming experienced journalists does not imply stopping making comparisons and swapping opinions with new journalists, considering them trustworthy and worth listening to.

As a matter of fact, not listening to them implies not listening to the crowd of voices which are enriching either newspapers or people´s lives through social media and blogs.

None can stop these voices from being raised and from pandemic spreading.

Multiple voices

In fact, newspapers are supposed to stop being one voice and start being part of the multiple voices, profiting from them and using them as a megaphone as Meg Pickard brilliantly said.

Pending answers

However, there are questions that mainstream journalists did not pose and that are still pending:

-          To what extent do online journalism, social media and blogs gain from being considered important by mainstream media?

-          Does this engagement imply a free pass to newsgathering through blogs and social media?

Well, you are invited to answer these questions.

New subject, new rules, new hopes

In conclusion, it would be essential to take into consideration that whereas it is true that online journalism is going to find its definition, as a completely innovative subject, it is also meant to stay open in order to meet people´s changing needs and progress as any successful and user-friendly web project does.

That implicates a rather impossible categorisation within the predefined mainstream media rules and schemes.

To sum up, this quote of Mahatma Gandhi describes the condition of things and conveys an expectant message: “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
Hopefully, many more online journalists, who are now playing the role of agents of change and innovators, will find a rewarding and fitting placement in this new industry in the near future.

Something stays, something changes

Other articles, videos and podcast about this topic:
- The rise of social media and its impact on mainstream journalism by Caroline Beavon
- Social media and its impact on mainstream journalism by Dan Davis

In spite of the fact that many countries are having trouble defining the legal use of stem cells and prohibit some crucial applications of them, a new technique was recently experimented with at the Spire Hospital in Southampton, United Kingdom.

Stem cell

New method
One of the first operations was done on a 39 y.o male suffering from a bone disease that caused him pain on movement. Actually the new method of performance would comply with many legal restrictions connected to embryonic cells whose use has been completely avoided by exploiting stem cells from bone marrow extracted by the surgeons from donors´ pelvis. On top of that any possible prothesis rejections or the issue itself of looking for and waiting for a compatible donor would be avoided by taking the bone marrow from the patient’s body.

Actually the donated bones are degraded pieces taken from patients who needed and were already provided of a joint replacement. That means that side effects would stay for those donors.

Following the stem cell extraction the surgeons purified the stem cells and mixed them with cleaned bone from a donor who had already had the bone replaced. Finally the dead tissue, a consequence of the disease, was removed and the cavity was filled with the mixture. Subsequently the stem cells are to generate new tissue by themselves and to drive the formation of new blood vessels in order to bring in nutrients which guarantee the cells’ survival and growth.

The future

As a next step doctors are aiming to improve the technique with the application of an artificial chemical material supporting the stem cells’ growth. The benefit of that would be using this material in place of the donated human bones, and prevent the use of joint replacements even for those patients. Some of the most unpleasant side effects of the current prothesis are in fact the device substitution occurring repeatedly through the patient’s life and a possible rejection or slipping after the operation, which means new distressing operations, a prolonging of the treatment and last but not least a considerable worsening of the patient’s life quality.

As soon as the next goal is pursued all of those temporary measures will be over. Eventually as a very positive consequence of this new procedure and its forecast enhancement, the treatment time would be considerably shortened and on top of that the time wasted in waiting for a donor to be available would be completely eliminated.

Anyway the new procedure has to show long term results before its full operation is confirmed. That day when potential good results are verified, its use could open the way to a complete replacement of prothesis and any artificial devices apt to substitute human joints.

Improving life quality

On the other hand to provide evidence of the first new procedure successes, a patient operated on one year ago can already say that he can walk normally and without pain. Only one failure has resulted from six patients operated on so far, thus the future is going to provide a high percentage of cases having a positive outcome to be really satisfied about, that will improve patient life quality, an aspect of the utmost importance in disease treatments.

Obstacles

Whereas ethical issues would be prevented from being further discussed, new obstacles would be raised by multinationals operating in that trade, that could drive public opinion against the innovation and could consequently influence global expenditure in order to enable their business the survival of, or even boost, their business.

Positive social impact
However, the life quality improvement due to the new technique is going to result in a positive social impact which is at the base of any discovery’s fulfillment and propagation. In other words people´s needs and strengths would be the decisive factors that could quickly drive many of the above mentioned businesses out of the market.

A potential new growing market

It is highly likely that those companies would soon be advised to rethink their products and possibly replace them with an active support to methods involving the utilization of stem cells. For instance, the production of artificial material nurturing the stem cells, whose employment doctors are going to set up in the near future, could early become one of the key products of a potential new growing market.

Chocolate ice-cream

Italy is well known as ice-creams´ motherland and Italians and tourists can guarantee the high quality of it extensively and directly from my tongue. The first ice cream is as ancient as the Roman Empire and even more, in fact some similar concoction, a mix of snow and fruits, would have been popular then among then among Middle East countries.

Ice-cream history

Whereas the first ice-cream-like recipe comes from an ancient Roman Quinto Fabio Massimo, the Arabian who moved to Siciliy in the late 800d.C. used to produce the same iced food with a mix of cane sugar.

Delicious!

That would have been the origin of the famous granita in the way it is nowadays known, as one of the most famous gastronomic Sicilian delicacies and a good alternative to the ice-cream on the warmest days.

The real ice-cream as we eat it today owes its birth to 2 men: Ruggeri, an unknown cook who prepared it for the wedding day of Caterina de´ Medici in Tuscany and Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli, a Sicilian chef who made the ice cream a business and invented the first ice-cream machine. He opened the first ice-cream shop called Café Procope in Paris in 1686. Many Italian ice-cream shops are currently named the same or in a similar way to honor the tradition. However, the name Café given to the first ice-cream shop was assigned to it because of the wide range of intellectuals, philosophers
and literary men crowding the Café at the time.

Enjoy!

The reputation attained as “The most famous European café” helped to spread the notoriety and production of ice-cream itself.

Ice-cream competition

The prize for the most tasty ice-cream in the world is awarded every 2 years at the contest called Ice-Cream World Cup . Teams of 4 ice-cream master coming from different countries challenge each other to create ice-cream sculptures, cakes, impressive ice-cream wafers, ice- cream bowls supported by iced sculptures. This exhibition is evidence of the masters´ creativity and fantasy which much more often set apart the Italian style and promote handmade ice-cream internationally.

Homemade ice-cream, an Italian recipe

As for homemade ice-cream I would suggest a successful chocolate ice-cream recipe whose tastiness is spreading out between my expat Italian friends in Switzerland. I would propose you use organic products as I do and high quality Swiss chocolate world wide known and distributed like Lindt, these will extremely boost the final result. Then I recommend using an Italian chocolate as well, and propose Perugina, but it is not so broadly distributed. In case you find it by chance the best buy is the chocolate bar for confectionary (cioccolata per pasticceria) which is distinguishable beyond the name through its big chocolate chunks. Furthermore you would need an ice-cream machine, if you have the opportunity to buy an Italian one do not pass up the chance to buy a Symac product. My mother has been using the same Symac ice-cream machine for 20 years.

Ingredients:

1 yolk

5 spoons of sugar

200 grams fresh and full white cream

1 glass an half of full milk

200 grams dark chocolate Lindt 70%

Preparation:

Break the chocolate into pieces and melt it in a bain-marie (vessel containing hot water in which another pot is placed to heat its contents) or in the microwave. Pay attention not to burn it. Afterwards put all ingredients in a mixer. When you noticed that the white cream is whipped (the mixture stays liquid but it raises its volume) put everything in your ice-cream machine and wait till it is done. Once it is condensed put it in the refrigerator. Usually homemade ice-cream takes time to freeze and time to melt down. So remove it from the freezer 15 minutes before serving it.

Enjoy!

Ecstatic childbirth

Nowadays the number of babies in the occidental world is increasingly reducing. There are plenty of reasons connected to this phenomenon and are all well known and interrelated. Just to quote some of them: fewer families are being established, career development, homosexuality and sterility. Together with all the possible causes, the pregnancy itself would be an extremely committed time period in a modern woman´s life which is not apt to having a baby but only to produce as much money and work as it is possible over the active years and possibly more. Giving birth is one of the most painful human actions recognised in the world, which is an added key and scary factor for many women considering the possibility to have a baby. A quote from the bible stated it thousands of years ago “The woman will give birth with pain[…]” Are you still trying to find something good in that?

Surprise!

The result of a recent study could really change the view of the way we look at and feel childbirth. The research has demonstrated that 20% of women reach climax during the parturition and more than 30% have sexual feelings. Would you believe that?! Actually probably not and the cause of this disbelief is imaginable. The religious involvement of many people on one hand and the taboo related to sex in most societies on the other hand prevented the spreading of the word and prevented even the wonderful sensations which have already surprised many women in the world. Surely none of them have been prepared to feel that fabulous excitement in giving birth, have they? In conclusion no women would be prepared for that in the near future, unless the women themselves would ask increasingly to be informed about this opportunity.

Technically the body releases the hormone oxytocin which stimulates ecstasy, then there are uterine contractions, nipple erection, and under the best circumstances an orgasm. How to get these best circumstances? Doctors agreed with creating the best circumstances recreating the home atmosphere where usually women make love.

Other trustworthy sources and documents about this topic that can help women be ready to talk about it and overcome incredulity are:

• The website www.orgasmicbirth.com
• The testimonies collected by Laura Shanley at www.unassistedchildbirth.com
• A renowned scientific German magazine Die Zeit Wissen published an interesting article in July 2009 about all of that titled Lust fürs Leben (Lust for life).

I am looking forward to seeing this revolution and hopefully more babies.

Travelling back to a place and time in history could be adventurous and challenging, especially for those lime me who are going to choose: year 0. Nazareth.

WHO

It should not be such a big issue to understand what I´m going to write on: Jesus Christ´s birth. Instead the big issue could be the fact that I´m treating this theme, especially if you consider that I´m Italian and what does means in terms of religion and culture.

WHAT

My aim would be to investigate the birth of God´s son and verify the truth of the story narrated by the bible and by the Christian belief itself. I would go to that place and see whether a baby was really born in such conditions in order to save the world.

WHY

Verifying the existence of that baby could change a lot of the current way of life. For example costumes, which have been evolving for centuries, could have evolved in a quite different way. This would have determined a fundamentally different social behavior. Furthermore, the calendar and the concept of time itself could have been developed following completely different rules.

Last but not least many political issues and wars could have been avoided or solved in a less dramatic or bloody way. So that travelling back to that time and place could be quite important, since religions have had a big role in human life and evolution.

Discovering and verifying the truth about Jesus Christ would lead us to a different future, where many sins could be viewed as they actually are, just pleasure. In addition to that the use of condoms and other contraceptives could be allowed and not so many Christians in Africa would die because of HIV, as it is happening right now.

WHEN will come the time to further discuss about that?

The choice of doing this travel back has so many reasons, but there´s not enough space to list them all here and now. I´m quite convinced that I highlighted enough crucial points to be discussed and verified together. I´m ready for your comments.

Smile!

It is a common perception that human beings can find happiness only in case they follow some standardised and recommended ways of life.

The media and advertisement convey messages of happiness connected to any sort of cultural patterns or merely to commercial products, the constant exposure to repeated advice affects people´s lives deeply and contributes to the formation of the public opinion generally and specially about what the meaning of happiness is.

Rarely would it be said that suggestions from media could be applied to the real everyday life. In fact common people struggle to reach the paradisiac state, which is projected through the widenind media´s lens. Even if they buy all advertised “happiness-producer” products and try to behave the same way as famous cinema or tv stars, their life does not improve so much in terms of happiness.

What does it mean?

This question is fully answered by that: if your thoughts are made of happiness, if your eye sees happiness, you will be happy beyond things that you can buy, beyond media cultural pattern that you can follow and finally beyond goals you can achieve.

I´m willing to suggest a careful consideration of pure and original feeling of happiness, which are highly likely to be misunderstood or replaced by thoughts belonging to the economic system about what it is supposed that people have to consume.

In conclusion, I would strongly suggest developing self-confidence and optimism by simply trying to review and correct pessimistic or false points of view. Personally speaking, spending time positively socialising could produce more happiness than spending the same time actively shopping in a commercial centre advertised by the local media.

Just change your eye and seldom will you have to face unhappiness again!

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How to get rid of them?!?

Having been a real proud coward for ages, fleeing away as soon as a gentle zzzzzzz came into any perception of sound or any unidentified flying object crossed any side sight, I was wondering if I could really overcome a wasp’s invasion in my own beloved apartment.
I was persuaded that this honestly pudding hearth behavior would have saved me from many distresses like stings, bites, pricks and associated side effects. I could have not figured out so far any other possible rational reactions to such attacks and harassments than a plain outrush.

My hero!

My Hero

Despite his will my boyfriend was often requested to be involved in many aerial fights equipped with newspaper, vacuum cleaner and long arms weapons. So well did he succeed that I started to observe his war techniques from a safe corner instead of running out of the room shutting the door and waiting for him to come out victoriously.

More than an interest, it was a need: I could not count on him all day and night long since he works at a company and travels for business very often.

The opportunity to start my new insects’ serial killer life came during summer: a wasps´ cluster invaded my bedroom shutters.
At first it happened from time to time that a wasp came in to the room letting us wonder how it came in since the window was closed.
My first approach was the only one I knew: leaving the room immediately as it was burning out and waiting for my boyfriend to come back home.

Anyway a much more substantial event changed our mind regarding this issue that was considered just temporary. After some holidays we went back home and found 14 dead wasps in our bedroom.
We did not waste time in any burials and mourning and found the courage to go on and to think of global wasps´ extermination. However it was late evening and we wanted to go bed without feeling guilty because of ecological principles to be respected, so we just ignored the invasion and slept on it.

Neither dreams nor our sleeping will put this problem on hold, in fact 3 wasps woke us up early in the morning celebrating our new life together. Newspaper weapons worked well in this respect and we went back to sleep.

Nevertheless many other wasps were outside and looking forward to living with us. They adventurously passed through the shutter despite any possible harm and found a passage to our beloved house.

My boyfriend plugged any entry connected to the shutter and it helped a lot. But how could we overcome the summer warmth with the windows constantly closed?
We must open them and let wasps come in again.

Wasps invasion

Living with wasps became a habit since I liked the room so much that I used to work there during the day and the wasps just sat on the window glass and buzzed bearably.
Until when would this peaceful cohabitation have to go on?
That was the question and it was quickly answered.

The summer was early over and windy rainstorms were becoming the steady everyday weather, though windows were still half opened. Are you wondering where wasps spend their winter? I was wondering the same before going to bed on a rainy night when 3 wasps came in to my kitchen and 2 into my bedroom.

I took a look at the bunch of magazines lying on shelves for months and I quickly chose one of them which I was so not interested in. I grasped it strongly in my hand, I took aim measuring the collocation of the wasp on the closet wall and mashed it!
Yes, I did it and I did it well and again.

Soon I discovered the pleasure of killing them and that I could not stop it. I became addicted to that, I had to find wasps and kill them more and more. I was definitely getting into my new personality: the wasps´ serial killer.

This confession could be criticised by ecological organizations without any understanding of what my life with wasps was like and how I really tried to live with them in peace. Borders could be crossed, that is fine, but they did not meet the requirements to get any residential permit and what can I say? I am grievously pleased with that, a contradictory feeling I must live with.

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