US Election 2010's covering

The US mid-term elections are coming up on November 2nd and they have such a big importance not just for this country, also for everybody, because is going to make a diference in the Obama's government: Obama's party control 59 seats in the Senate, and has a majority as well of 40 seats in the House of Representatives.

BBC has a special about it, called US Elections: The Basics
They started a while ago to cover the information , and it basically has a lot of graphics helping to understand how the process is and how it has been changing. Is more than just reporting, it's educative.

Inside this special there is a section called Q&A, where are the questions and answers about the process, for example, it helps to find out things like: What happens if Democrats lose control of Congress? , What happens if Democrats lose control of Congress?

But the editor selection is showed too, with the section Races to watch. It has the most important races, according to BBC editorial.

Finally, the section which impress more is the one called Predicted result. There they take a risk saying what could happen, and which candidate probably is going to win, backed by expert from few other media:

Charlie Cook - The Cook Political Report
Stuart Rothenberg - The Rothenberg Political Report
Larry Sabato - Sabato's Crystal Ball
Nate Silver - FiveThirtyEight Blog, New York Times

New York Times has also a section about the elections called 2010 Midterm Elections, but it less graphic and has more relevance on the news.

BBC wants your drama!

BBC currently has a lot of plataforms, TV, Radio, Web, etc and it has became the most important media in the UK. BBC wants to get more points in another countries trying to make their audience from all over the world to participate. Now, they have a new contest, who has an important relation with our course or the things we've been doing like a radio program.

The International Radio Playwriting Competition is run by the BBC World Service has an espectacular contest in its 12th version.

It is a competition for anyone resident outside the UK, to write a 60-minute radio drama for up to six characters.There are two categories: one for writers with English as their first language and one for writers with English as their second language.

The two winners can go to London to see their program made in a BBC radio production and receive £2,500 for the runners-up. They want to hear from us, even if we are not experienced!

Last year winners were from Ghana and their play was about four men trying to make their way in the world after their release from prison in Ghana.

The play must be in English, never published before and never been produced in any media.

The deadline is on March 2011!

Is not all about writing: Week in Pictures

Nothing gets more attention than a picture. Some people say "one picture has more value than a thousand words" and BBC knows this well.

Using their corresponsals all over the world, BBC selects the best pictures of the week in the section Week in Pictures, and they talk by themselves! There are the most important news by BBC. Also it has a resume of the news or caption. To make it easier the pictures are showed through a slideshow.

If we try to find the same in Chile, we see that here there is not a "picture culture". Emol has "mundo gráfico" with pictures of the day, and classified by news, for example. "Elena Dementieva announces her retirement from tennis". But there is not yet an editorial compromise to say, these are the most important things of the week in pictures.

La tercera has its section as well, but some of the pictures are not really informative: "A little insect is placing on a glass covering with water drops after a rain day in Viña del Mar"
Pictures are not just artistics, should be informative too!

Some examples of pictures from BBC (October 16- 22th):

A "super typhoon" struck the northern Philippines with heavy rain and winds up to 260km/h (162mph), leaving at least three people dead. Typhoon Megi made landfall in Isabela province at 1125 local time (0325 GMT) on Monday destroying buildings and crops.

Lanterns are hung up in preparation for the annual autumn festival celebrating the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Meiji Shrine in Tokyo, Japan.

Covering Nelson Kirchner's death

Since the ex-argentinian president Nelson Kirchner passed out the media have been covering all the information about it. BBC World didn't want to be apart of it and they've been updating every few hours the latest news. There are corresponsals in Argentina right now helping to build the news in the website.

There is an analysis and opinion column headlined "Legacy of leader who brought Argentina out of crisis" . Basically explains everything that Kirchner has done for the country, good things and not that good as well, highlighting his relationship with South American's Presidents, specially with Hugo Chávez, current President of Venezuela and the cold one with George Bush, ex USA's President.

The covering also includes pictures, showing the reaction of the argentinians and other people. Probably the pictures are the weakest part of the covering, because there are just 19, even if they talk by themselves, it could be better.

Besides that there is also an analysis about how the media are covering the news about Kirchner:
Some examples:

- The death of Nestor Kirchner could be a chance for his wife Cristina to really assume power, writes Rosendo Fraga on the website of Argentine newspaper La Nacion

- La Prensa de Santa Cruz says Mr Kirchner's political roots helped him to succeed

- Newspaper La Capital, in Rosario, Argentina, says it is "willing to follow his words to continue transforming our country".

In general is a really good analysis to understand what's going on from another point of view, and see how affects to the argentinians depending of their politician visions.

Have your say: You got the power

"Have your say" is a section on BBC website where the audience have their own tribune to say and debate about important topics. This section let people be journalists for a while and tell everybody their stories and experiences. The mediators are real journalists who select and edit the information and then upload the most relevant ones.

For example, today there was a debate on the section about the air tax rises. As we can see there are a lot of opinions about this topic which is complicating flights from the UK to another countries. In the section BBC is trying to figure out how is going to affect to the people and who is better than the same the audience talking about their own experiences. In the last update the editor selected the most representatives opinions and those are which everybody can see. This means there are people working in BBC specially for that and the section is really successfull (at least seems like).

Also we can find related news at the end of the section.

BBC covering the Chilean miners trapped news

Since the trapped miners news started, is has been a lot of attention from different countries. BBC is not the exception and they have a group of journalists instaled in the mine, watching all the activities in the place and reporting. There is also a bounce of information about it on their website, graphics and videos. The news are not just about the facts, as well there are human profiles. The information is complete and we can notice they got a lot of sources to complement it.
Some of the most interesting information are detailed below:

1. Chile miners trapped underground:

This is a special microwebsite dedicated to all the miners situation and the context.
There is a profile of each of the trapped miners with pictures. If you click the pictures you can see the bios.
Supply lifetime is a graphic image with all the items that have been sent down through the "palomas" with a picture of each of the elements.
Underground refuge has all the operation information and maps of how the refuge is.
On rescue operation are some details about A, B, and C plans and other updates with pictures.

2. Family's diary

Relatives of the miners trapped in the mine and camping near the shaft are wtiting a diary for BBC, talking about themselves and how they have kept the hopes up

3. Videos

BBC is also uploading exclusive videos with their own reporters.
Attached are some examples:

Trapped miners speak with rescuers for the first time
Chile mine rescue "set to begin on mid-october"

BBC's History

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is the largest broadcasting organization in the world. Its global headquarters are located in London and its main responsibility is to provide public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom. The BBC is an autonomous public service broadcaster. Within the United Kingdom its work is funded principally by an annual television licence fee, which is charged to all U.K households, companies and organizations using any type of equipment to record and/or receive live television broadcasts.

Outside the UK, the BBC World Service has provided services by direct broadcasting and re-transmission contracts by sound radio since the inauguration of the BBC Empire Service in December 1932, and more recently by television and online. Though sharing some of the facilities of the domestic services, particularly for news and current affairs output, the World Service has a separate Managing Director, and its operating costs are funded mainly by direct grants from the UK government. These grants are determined independently of the domestic licence fee.

The Corporation's 'guaranteed' income from the licence fee and the World Service grants are supplemented by profits from commercial operations through a wholly owned subsidiary, BBC WorldWide Ltd. The company's activities include programme- and format-sales, magazines including Radio Times and book publishing. The BBC also earns additional income from selling certain programme-making services through BBC Studios and Post Production Ltd., formerly BBC Resources Ltd, another wholly owned trading subsidiary of the corporation.