Newsletter 8

The European Commission New Media Literacy Expert Group First MeetingThanks to an excellent EC organisation, the meeting was rich in content and exchanges with about sixty participants engaging. Participants were either EU Member States representatives, European associations and foundations or international organisations active in media literacy, such as UNESCO. After a general discussion about the scope and mandate of the Group, many different topics have been covered, focusing on practices and policies (rather than on research and education). Subjects included media ethics, the role of public service media in society, synergies with other EC policies, decoding propaganda, digital skills for informed citizens and many more. EAVI welcomed this fresh practical approach and look forward to some more focus and to clarified objectives. During the meeting, EAVI reiterated the need to advocate for media literacy promotion, widely and effectively. A practical suggestion to this end would be to reinforce the provisions currently present in the AVMS Directive. See here EAVI’s contribution to the respective public consultation. You can watch a storyfy of our meeting on http://sfy.co/q11oo

                                 EAVI Event at the European Parliament cancelled for security reasons

Because of the terrorism threat in Brussels in late November, the event EAVI was organizing on media literacy at the European Parliament had to be postponed. Since the alert was raised to the maximum level, the European Parliament cancelled all the hosted external events during that period. The new date will be announced as soon as possible.

‘The grey areas between media regulation’ workshop and the CDMSI of the Council of EuropeThe European Audiovisual Observatory and EPRA (European Platform of Regulatory Authorities) have organised a closed workshop to take place on 11 December 2015 in Stasbourg. The workshop, “The grey areas between media regulation and data protection” will develop a discussion on (mis)use of personal data and the media regulation framework. Separately, EAVI will also participate to the Steering Committee on Media and Information Society – CDMSI. Members are the representatives of the 47 CoE countries. EAVI is invited as a civil society representative. The agenda of the meeting includes protecting freedom of expression and the right to private life, implementation of relevant standards on safety for journalists, Internet freedom and governance, data protection, co-operation activities and the CoE Internet Governance Strategy until 2019.

Beware online “filter bubbles” TED Talks – Eli Pariser“As web companies strive to tailor their services (including news and search results) to our personal tastes, we get trapped in a “filter bubble” and don’t get exposed to information that could challenge or broaden our worldview. This will ultimately prove to be bad for us and bad for democracy.” An old video but still very relevant.

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