This year, the official Facebook page for the British Army had more than 900,000 Likes.
The Facebook page passed the 900K mark earlier this month, on December 16, 2012.
While the British Army didn’t reach 1 million likes, the 900K milestone makes it one of the most popular military organizations on Facebook, even more popular than the United States’ own U.S. Navy which has 789,719 likes.
However, the U.S. Army’s Facebook presence has a healthy lead over the British Army with the U.S. Army coming in at 1.6 million likes.
In case you’re wondering about other official pages of the British Armed Forces, here’s a quick look:
The Royal Navy has 177,853 likes at the time of this story, while the Royal Air Force has 287,890 likes.
You can learn more about Facebook Page metrics and trends at the PageData website.
To see the top 30 "Most Liked" government organizations on Facebook, go here.
Image via Facebook
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(NYTimes)
The 8 Craziest Job Openings in the Military-Industrial Complex. Top-secret janitor. Pollster to the spies. Classified comic book artist. Any organization sufficiently large is bound to have the odd job opening within it. But few organizations are as freakin' colossal as the U.S. military intelligence industrial complex, with an estimated 4.9 million Americans holding security clearances today. Which means there are thousands of unconventional positions to fill at any given moment...
(Wired.com)
On Assignment: Syria's Media War. This year, VOA's Rudi Bakhtiar crossed into Syria - at great risk - to report on the uprising there. She spoke with Philip Alexiou about what some rebels are calling a "media war" against the government...
(Voice of America)
In Retaliation for Map of Gun Permit Holders, Blogger Lists Names and Addresses of Newspaper Staff. In response to the controversy surrounding the interactive map of local gun permit holders published by a Lower Hudson Valley newspaper, one blogger decided to punish the paper's staff members by invoking a well-established principle of biblical law: A dox for a dox. Christopher Fountain has spent the last three days posting the names and addresses of nearly every Journal News employee from Publisher on down...
(Gawker)
Gun owner: Newspaper ‘put me on the same level as a sex offender’. Veronica Hash resides on an eight-acre spread in Dutchess County, N.Y. She is a registered to own a handgun — something that visitors to the Web site of the Journal News could ascertain with little trouble. Hash’s address is listed on an interactive map of gun-permit owners, based on public records requested by the Journal News, a Gannett property that serves suburban counties around New York City...
(Washington Post)
Where The Journal News went wrong in publishing names, addresses of gun owners. In the days since The (Westchester, N.Y.) Journal News published and mapped the names and addresses of local citizens who hold gun permits, outraged critics have published the names and addresses of journalists at the paper. New York State Senator Greg Ball has also responded by announcing plans to propose legislation that would make the permits private, no longer subject to open records laws. I suspected that legislative backlash might follow, and it would be a worse mistake than publishing the data...
(Poynter)
Suliman: 'Al Jazeera plays the piper, but Qatar calls the tune'. The long-time Berlin correspondent for Al Jazeera, Aktham Suliman, recently resigned from his post. The journalist tells DW that the Qatari government is exercising undue influence on Al Jazeera's reporting...
(DW.DE)
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Randy Brown, freelance editor and writer, who blogs at Red Bull Rising, will be speaking at NMX 2013 in Las Vegas, NV, that is taking place January 6 - 8, 2013.
Brown joins other speakers at The New Media Expo (aka BlogWorld), including Paul Szoldra, the creator and Managing Editor of The Duffel Blog.
Brown will be participating in The New Military Blogger track.
This session will look at the emerging voices in military blogging and new media. After a decade-plus of war the first person voices and commentary have changed. Who are these new bloggers and what are they saying about our military mission? How are different from the previous generation of milbloggers and who have they been inspired by?
About Brown:
In 2010, Randy Brown was preparing for deployment as a member of the Iowa Army National Guard’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 34th Infantry “Red Bull” Division (2-34th B.C.T.). After he unexpectedly dropped off the deployment list, he retired with 20 years of service. He then went to Eastern Afghanistan anyway, embedding with Iowa’s Red Bull units as a civilian journalist in May-June 2011. Under the pseudonym “Charlie Sherpa,” Brown blogs about ways to “remember, support, and celebrate” military service members, veterans, and families at: www.redbullrising.com. Milbloggies finalist, Veteran (2011); Reporter (2012) categories. 2012 winner, Military Reporters and Editors’ blog category
Connect with Brown:
RedBullRising
Facebook
Information provided by NMX 2013.
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Paul Szoldra, the creator and Managing Editor of The Duffel Blog, will be speaking at NMX 2013 in Las Vegas, NV, that is taking place January 6 - 8, 2013.
The New Media Expo (aka BlogWorld), is the world's largest Conference and Trade Show for bloggers, podcasters, web TV & video creators, and social business pros.
Szoldra will be participating in The New Military Blogger session.
This session will look at the emerging voices in military blogging and new media. After a decade-plus of war the first person voices and commentary have changed. Who are these new bloggers and what are they saying about our military mission? How are different from the previous generation of milbloggers and who have they been inspired by?
About Szoldra:
Paul Szoldra is a former Marine infantryman who left the service after 8 years. While attending college at the University of Tampa, he started The Duffel Blog, a military satire website similar to The Onion. In less than 6 months of existence, the website rocketed to over 30,000 fans, was featured in mainstream media outlets such as NBC & USA Today, and has even gained the attention of the Pentagon. Paul also serves as Media Relations Director for the non-profit Marine Infantry Veterans Foundation, and contributes serious journalism pieces for Business Insider.
Connect With Szoldra:
The Duffel Blog
Paul Szoldra
Facebook
LinkedIn
Google+
Twitter
Information provided by NMX 2013.
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Each month that passes, there seem to be fewer and fewer military blogs written from the frontlines. In fact, going back the past several months, there have only been a few submitted to Milblogging.
The fact is that less troops are blogging from places like Afghanistan, so anytime a military blog from a combat zone is discovered, I like to bring attention to it.
jameslgibson | Afghanistan Deployment 2012 – 2013 is a blog written by 1SG James L. Gibson who serves with Headquarters Troop, 2-1 Cav.
1SG Gibson has been consistently blogging since early December when he arrived in Afghanistan, writing several times per week.
His first post titled And it begins… was published on December 1 and explains why he blogs and describes the beginning of his journey (including saying goodbye to family):
“This blog, diary, storytelling, or whatever you want to call it is intended to keep all friends and family informed of what is going on during my deployment. I will attempt to write every day, but due to operations or the fact that days may become redundant and I have nothing new to write about, it may only be updated every few days. For my military buddies, this will probably be some boring reading as you have all “been there, done that”. I will attempt to keep it profanity free, but I cannot promise that a few will not slip through the cracks. Also, I am in no way a writer, so take it easy on the critiques! So here it goes….”
If you’d like to keep up with 1SG Gibson, you should bookmark his website.
Hat tip to Charlie Sherpa of Red Bull Rising.
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(AlJazeeraEnglish)
How the face of the Syrian regime betrayed Assad over Twitter. Christmas, it seems, came early for Western governments looking to strike a blow about Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime. Following reports that former Syrian spokesman Jihad Makdissi had fled to Washington, a well-known activist released private Twitter messages that show Makdissi had been in contact for months with the opposition...
(FP Passport)
2012 in Syria's civil war: One rebel's story. I first met Bassel Issa in February 2012. At the time, he was leading a group of rebel fighters who called themselves the Syrian Liberation Army. In reality, they were more local militia than army. Most were farmers or workers, ordinary hard-working men who had grown up together and decided to join the fight for a free Syria. Producer Ben Plesser and I had traveled illegally from Turkey to the city of Idlib, in Northern Syria, to live for a week with these men and their families...
(CBS News)
High school student entries sought for Korean War film fest. The GI Film Festival recently announced that high school students from throughout the United States are invited to submit short videos to the U.S. Department of Defense 60th Anniversary of Korean War Commemoration Committee and the GI Film Festival as part of a new educational outreach program, "Heroes Remembered: Voices of the Korean War."
(Broomfield Enterprise)
A story from the Civil War. After Pvt. William Whitlock was killed in a Civil War battle in Dinwiddie, Va., his fellow soldiers had just enough time to dig a grave, wrap him in wool and rubber blankets and bury him inside their picket lines. Details of how the Allegany native lived, fought and died in the Civil War are the foundation of a book titled “Allegany to Appomattox: The Life and Letters of Private William Whitlock of the 188th New York Volunteers."
(Olean Times Herald)
Music project aims to keep Civil War stories fresh. Blood once soaked the soil of battlefields that have since been covered up by skyscrapers and commuter train stations in Atlanta, strip malls in Nashville and farm fields and forests across the South. Now, 150 years after the American Civil War, two musicians are trying to keep that history from being lost in the new landscape...
(Miami Herald)
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It’s that time of year again, when kids from all around the world track Santa Claus as he delivers gifts.
The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) monitors his activities at NORADSanta.org.
According to the website, for more than 50 years, NORAD and its predecessor, the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) have tracked Santa's flight and this year is no different.
“The tradition began in 1955 after a Colorado Springs-based Sears Roebuck & Co. advertisement misprinted the telephone number for children to call Santa. Instead of reaching Santa, the phone number put kids through to the CONAD Commander-in-Chief's operations "hotline." The Director of Operations at the time, Colonel Harry Shoup, had his staff check the radar for indications of Santa making his way south from the North Pole. Children who called were given updates on his location, and a tradition was born.
In 1958, the governments of Canada and the United States created a bi-national air defense command for North America called the North American Aerospace Defense Command, also known as NORAD, which then took on the tradition of tracking Santa.
Since that time, NORAD men, women, family and friends have selflessly volunteered their time to personally respond to phone calls and emails from children all around the world. In addition, we now track Santa using the internet. Millions of people who want to know Santa's whereabouts now visit the NORAD Tracks Santa website.”
However it’s not just a website – combined with social media, NORAD’s Santa Tracker has exploded in popularity.
Earlier this year, NORAD Tracks Santa Facebook page surpassed 1 million “Likes”.
Since December 1, 2012, the page has attracted 200,000 more “Likes”. At the time of this writing, while Santa was making his way through Canada, the Facebook page reached 1,236,150.
On Twitter, NORAD Santa has well over 100,000 followers.
On YouTube, NORAD Tracks Santa has over 18,000 subscribers and reached over 100 million views this year.
In addition to NORAD’s Santa Tracker, the other major organization tracking Santa on its own is Google.
While the NORAD Tracks Santa Facebook page may not be the most “Liked” military Facebook page, it’s certainly up there in the Top 10.
Currently, it’s right on the heels of the National Guard who have 1,288,699 likes, but don’t expect that to last for long.
Merry Christmas!
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While he may not be in the military, he is dealing with posttraumatic stress.
A story in The Atlantic takes a closer look at Gilbertson and war photographers.
“Photojournalists strap bulletproof vests to their chests, steady 60-pound packs on their backs, and hang camera equipment from their shoulders before trekking into the world's most dangerous environments. They follow marine units, rebel militias, and protesters -- stride-for-stride -- into the field, through crumbling neighborhoods and down crowded streets. There, unarmed and exposed, they take pictures of combatants and the afflicted: civilians suffering in battle, hospitals straining to cope with the wounded, and the communities within which conflict lives.
Their industry rewards intimacy, often driving photographers closer to the sharp edge of conflict. But after capturing those last breaths and cities laid waste by violence, these photographers are left to scroll through the day's shots before wiring the most gripping images to newsrooms around the world.”
The Atlantic tells of Gilbertson’s time in Iraq, including the operation in Fallujah, which he often recalls. Gilbertson went on to win number of awards and nominations for his photography, but with the highs there were lows.
Gilbertson’s wife Joanna told The Atlantic, “The worse off journalists are, the more rewarded they tend to be.”
If you scroll down to the comments section of the lengthy story, one of Gilbertson’s coworkers adds,
“As a colleague of Ash, I have seen some of his suffering. I have also seen his efforts to get attention to this subject and can only admire him deeply for his selfless effort to help those similarly situated. It's damn remarkable. And it's just plain ignorant to imply that nobody should care when there is a barrier - such as PTSD - to journalists reporting the horrors of war or the complications of the issues surrounding conflict, as suggested elsewhere in these comments.”
But not all the comments are as supportive.
A reader who goes by the name dogsoldier1960 comments,
“A long article which could use a good editor. It seems to say (mostly) that war sucks so why do young men love it? FYI. B 1/8 is a Rifle Co of a Marine Bn. The minaret was being used as a enemy OP. The Marines were ordered to clear it not to just provide a Kodak minute. No Marine would have allowed a civilian to go first in a room clearing operation. Lots of other BS details and woe is me crap. Moreover who should care if some reporter has PTSD?”
Source: The Atlantic
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(World News)
Acting C.I.A. Chief Critical of Film ‘Zero Dark Thirty’. The acting director of the C.I.A., Michael J. Morell, has criticized a new movie about the hunt for Osama bin Laden, saying it exaggerates the role of coercive interrogations in producing clues to the whereabouts of the leader of Al Qaeda...
(NYTimes)
Stories, artifacts assure that World War II generation not forgotten. The stories of many World War II veterans will continue to be told long after they're gone. Their experiences endure in the artifacts of history they've left behind -- the documents, diaries, photos, medals, mementos or just lingering family memories...
(Plain Dealer)
Lil Wayne touched by soldier's war story. Lil Wayne has publicly thanked an American solider who credited the rapper's music with saving his life during a near-death experience in Afghanistan. Lander Chappell, a Private First Class in the American Army, opened up about a horrifying incident in the war zone when he lost a leg in a roadside bomb attack and revealed singing Lil Wayne's track "Tie My Hands" helped him through the ordeal as he waited for rescue...
(MSN Music News)
Lincolnshire author re-tells brother’s Boer War story. Lincolnshire author Alan Stennett has released the sixth book of his writing career, re-telling the story of the Boer War in South Africa through his grandfather’s eyes. Lincolnshire Lads on the Veldt, Alan’s first self-published book, is taken from extracts of his grandfather Herbert Stennett’s diary which he painstakingly transcribed 12 years ago...
(Louth Leader)
Following the path of Richard Engel's abduction in Syria. As soon as tonight's show ended I rewound my DVR back to Rachel's interview with Richard Engel and tried to follow along with Google Maps to see if I could get a better sense of the area where the events took place. It turns out the satellite imagery of Syria is pretty detailed. So, for example, you can see the tractor trailer trucks lined up at the Bab Al Hawa border crossing where Richard entered Syria from Turkey. Also, most of the photos I've seen of the war in Syria were taken in urban settings, so it's interesting to see how abruptly the towns give way to farmland in that part of the country...
(The Maddow Blog)
Factcheck: NRA blames media for gun violence. At a Friday “press conference” (no questions were allowed), National Rifle Association Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre provided the gun lobby’s explanation for the shooting deaths of 28 people a week ago today in Newtown, Conn. Among LaPierre’s culprits: the media. Here is a breakdown of ways the NRA says media causes gun violence, along with a factcheck...
(Poynter)
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Late last month, I wrote about British Army girlfriend Zoey Peace and her blog Until February…. that has attracted the attention of readers from around the world including celebrities and politicians.
Now, according to ITV News, British Prime Minister David Cameron has become Peace’s latest fan while visiting the troops in Helmand, Afghanistan, where her boyfriend, Cpl Sam Garwood, is deployed.
In the image above, the Prime Minister poses for a picture with Joint Movements Unit Officers Flt Lt Tom Cousins and Lt Pip Hollins, while holding up a sign that says #Smile Camp Bastion. #SmileCampBastion is the brainchild of Peace as a way of spreading smiles for the Armed Forces and their families.
When learning of the news of the PM’s support, Peace had this to say:
“This is fantastic news - when I launched the blog I never thought the Prime Minister himself would get involved.
It might not work for everyone, but for me this blog has been the right way to cope and show Sam I'm OK.
The fact so many other people have taken something from it has been a bonus. I'm still so overwhelmed at how far it's come.”
Here are some interesting facts from last month’s Daily Mail story:
- Zoey Peace's blog, Until February, is getting thousands of hits a day
- Her boyfriend, Cpl Sam Garwood, 24, is on fifth tour, in Camp Bastion
- She charts quest to become 'domestic goddess' before Sam gets home
- Zoey, 26, is from Cambridgeshire, and Sam is from Norfolk
- Has received Twitter support from Lorraine Kelly and Chesney Hawkes
Source: ITV News
Image: @tomcousins1983
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(+972 Magazine)
U.S. on alert for Islamist ire to ‘Zero Dark Thirty’. Could the release of “Zero Dark Thirty” provoke violent protests against the U.S. in response to the film’s searing depictions of “enhanced interrogation” — the coercive, super-secret and bitterly debated methods used by the CIA against al Qaeda terrorism suspects? Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow’s acclaimed docudrama about the pursuit of Osama bin Laden opened Wednesday at five theaters in New York and Los Angeles...
(The Washington Times)
Embed, Embed, Who Wants An Embed. Know I owe some posts, such a follow-up to the tease I posted the other day, but I've been fighting the lung crud and dealing with background issues. Among those background issues is the new revised embed. Last week, I met with a MG at Bragg, and he had a very good idea for an embed and a story that has not been done. I liked him, and liked the story. However, it will take up to another month for his staff to set it up I am told. Yep, yet more delay...
(Blackfive)
NBC’s Richard Engel: ‘We weren’t expecting a rescue’. During the five days Richard Engel and a crew of four others were held in Syria, the kidnappers “didn’t really know who we were,” Engel told Savannah Guthrie during an interview that aired Friday on the “Today” show. The NBC News chief foreign correspondent also described their escape...
(Poynter)
Engel and crew believed they wouldn't make it out of Syria alive. NBC News Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel and his crew believed they would not make it out of Syria alive during their five days of captivity, Engel said Thursday. "There was no doubt that these were violent people and that they could have executed us at any time," Engel told NBC News' Savannah Guthrie in an interview Thursday night on "Rock Center." Engel, 39, and his team disappeared shortly after crossing into northwest Syria from Turkey on Dec. 13. He and his team had already been captured as his last taped report from Aleppo was appearing on "NBC Nightly News" that evening...
(NBC News)
The End of You Served Radio. I just wrapped up the last episode of You Served Radio and it was sad to do but it was necessary. Tonight’s episode (which can be heard anytime along with any of the previous 219 episodes at www.youservedradio.com) was a night to reflect back at the last 4+ years of broadcasts. I used to write on upwards of 5 blogs and host the show all at the same time. But times have changed and I have to re-focus on what I spend my time on (what time I have). Regular readers of this blog know that my writings here have even been sporadic and sparse compared to that they have been like over the years...
(Bouhammer)
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A few hours ago, Bates announced on Facebook, “Flying home today. Back in the states tomorrow!”
Bates also posted a link to a radio interview he did for The Story with Dick Gordon. He’s on at the 24:40 mark.
Bates has been taking photos, drawing sketches and keeping a journal of his embed experience.
He plans to start blogging about the days spent in Afghanistan when he returns.
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The Associated Press reported earlier this week that the U.S. State Department will be monitoring a new Facebook page that may have been created by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
So far, no one has yet to determine whether the Facebook page is authentic or fake. If you ask me, it doesn’t look legit. Full disclosure: It’s just a gut feeling.
Even the AP reporter says the page's contents and style "raise serious questions about its authenticity."
But that hasn’t stopped more than 18,000 people, at the time of this story, from “Liking” the page which was only created on December 13.
As Time.com points out, most of the “Likes” are most definitely not from Iran, since Facebook has been banned there since 2009.
You can judge for yourself if the Facebook page is authentic or not. The page can be found here.
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(TVNewser)
Accounts of a Siege in Syria Differ on Rebel YouTube Channels and British Television. As my colleagues Liam Stack and Hania Mourtada reported, Syrian activists said last week that members of a pro-government militia known as the shabiha had massacred dozens of civilians this month in the village of Aqrab, northwest of the city of Homs, just outside the town of Houla. What made the claim of a massacre in the village unusual were the accounts of witnesses, identified as survivors of the atrocity on rebel YouTube channels, who said that the victims were Alawites — members of the same minority sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, as President Bashar al-Assad and most members of the shabiha militia...
(The Lede)
Your Twitter archive. It’s no secret: You make Twitter what it is. And if you tweet, you may have found yourself wanting to go back in time and explore your past Tweets. Maybe you wanted to recall your reaction to the 2008 election, reminisce on what you said to your partner on your 10th anniversary, or just see your first few Tweets. We know lots of you would like to explore your Twitter past...
(Twitter Blog)
Book offers stories of local World War II heroes. Bob Percy was just a kid at the height of World War II, but the subject and especially those who served in the war was always of great interest to him. There were stories to tell of local people who were involved and the former history and social studies teacher at Southmoreland High School wanted to make sure they were told...
(TribLIVE)
Are Newspaper People Really Still Wondering If Journalism Can Exist Without Newsprint? Decades of often awkward interaction with America's "print media" professionals has proven (to me) that writers who talk about their medium are bores, and also bad writers. This goes for the people who type up rules for "curating" the Internet and the people who propose "best practices" for typing bullshit on Twitter, but it's the newspaper person who is most guilty of being terrible all the time...
(The Awl)
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Image Source: NBC News File
On Tuesday, NBC News was happy to report that Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel and members of his network production team were freed from their captors in Syria after a firefight at a checkpoint.
In a story that appeared on the NBC News site, Mike Brunker wrote:
“The NBC News crew was unharmed in the incident. They remained in Syria until Tuesday morning when they made their way to the border and re-entered Turkey, the network said. They were to be evaluated and debriefed, but had communicated that everyone was in good health.
NBC News said it “expressed its gratitude to those who worked to gather information and secure the release of our colleagues.”
Engel is widely regarded as one of America’s leading foreign correspondents for his coverage of wars, revolutions and political transitions around the world over the last 15 years. Most recently, he was recognized for his outstanding reporting on the 2011 revolution in Egypt, the conflict in Libya and unrest throughout the Arab world.”
I had been following this story closely for the past couple days.
Surprisingly, despite their being a media blackout while Engel was in captivity, a number of news outlets including Gawker publicly reported that Engel had gone missing in Syria.
Even though readership is generally low here compared to mainstream media outlets, I chose not to report the news or link to the news.
Others didn’t respect the media blackout request by NBC News, going as far as tweeting, writing and posting updates about the situation.
BuzzFeed's Andrew Kaczynski has a detailed wrap up on how NBC News tried to keep Engel's disappearance a secret.
There are good reasons for media blackouts.
In 2008, CBC news journalist Melissa Fung was kidnapped while reporting in Afghanistan. CBC requested a media blackout to avoid complicating the negotiation efforts.
The good news is, Engel and his team came out of this unharmed, but it could’ve ended up a lot worse for the NBC news team.
Brunker reports that the Syrian captors executed one of the rebels “on the spot,” who had been escorting Engel and later during their captivity they were subjected to mock executions while blindfolded and bound.
Source: NBC News and BuzzFeed
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(Boston Business Journal)
VA hosting Twitter benefits forum for surviving military spouses and children. If you are the surviving spouse or child of a veteran, here is an opportunity to learn more about your benefits. The Department of Veterans Affairs forum is set for Wednesday at 2:30 p.m. You can follow @VaVetbenefits and can ask questions live by using hashtag #AskVBA. If you're a member of the National Guard or Reserves, see below for how some veterans are putting those benefits to use...
(al.com)
Microsoft Wants to Kinect with Pentagon. Microsoft hopes its popular Kinect gaming accessory will score with veterans who need physical therapy. The software behemoth has paired the Kinect with off-the-shelf software in a package that can be used by injured soldiers and veterans to perform physical therapy at home, without the need to visit a medical facility. Microsoft is working with the Air Force to define requirements for a Kinect therapy system and will discuss the technology with the Army’s Communications-Electronics Research, Development, and Engineering Center...
(DefenseNews)
The Military Is Present. Using outreach, performance, video, photography, and therapy, artists and museums are devising new ways to connect with veterans—and to bring their stories to a wider audience...
(ARTNews)
DARPA and Defense Department look to a more open source future. As the United States military marches further into the age of networked warfare, data networks and the mobile platforms to distribute and access them will become even more important. This fall, the (retired) eighth Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff described a potential future of the military that’s founded not only in open source thinking, but in next-generation user interfaces and biohacking straight out of science fiction. If even some of the strategic thinking he described at this year’s Military Open Source Conference in D.C. is applied to how the technology that supports the next generation of war fighters is built, dramatic evolutionary changes could cascade down the entire supply chain of one of the world’s biggest organizations...
(O'Reilly Radar)
Omar: the mysterious poster boy of the Syrian revolution. Syria's opposition movement is often associated with young burly men in rebel militias, makeshift weapons and fierce fighting. So it comes as quite a surprise that the poster boy for this bloody revolution is a chubby toddler called Omar. Without resorting to violence - bar a tantrum or two - Omar has become one of Syrian president, Bashar Al Assad's, most formidable opponents. Since pictures surfaced of the revolutionary youngster on popular opposition Facebook page, The New Syria, Assad's adversaries in the Middle East and beyond have looked to Omar as the hopeful face of the uprising...
(Al Bawaba)
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The United States Marine Corps is leading the way on Facebook among the different military branches, according to the Facebook Page metrics site PageData.
As of the time of this writing, the United States Marine Corps (https://www.facebook.com/marinecorps) has 2,840,665 likes on Facebook, bringing it very close to the 3 million milestone.
The page grows by nearly 1,000 new likes per day, but it’s not the only Marine Corps Facebook page to watch.
Another Marines Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/marines) just topped 2.5 likes on Facebook recently and as of today has approximately 2,508,915 likes.
Other top military pages by likes include:
The U.S. Army - 1,668,646 likes
National Guard – 1,284,400 likes
United States Air Force - 1,166,336 likes
The U.S. Navy - 783,286 likes
U.S. Coast Guard - 165,766 likes
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By now you've probably already seen the news reports about Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer being involved in a fight that ended up with him being hospitalized.
There has been an arrest and Meyer is out of the hospital already, but details of what went down remain sketchy at this point.
Meyer did issue a statement late last week saying, ""It's unfortunate the circumstances that have happened. This is the first time since being back from Afghanistan that I have been in fear for my life. It's also unfortunate that it happened in my hometown. Hopefully a lesson can be learned, and this can be a stepping stone to making our community safer."
It appears the media was quick to report the news about the incident without all the facts, which upset Meyer.
He took to Twitter to speak out.
On December 14, Meyer tweeted:
“Disappointed in media who let accused criminal spread lies about me without talking to poIice. Bad journalism!”
Several people responded in support of Meyer.
Laurie C @TherapyDogsRock wrote:
Sadly it's no longer journalism. It's all for "shock value" and ratings. Pathetic.
hubris @backtracesec wrote:
the media are idiots :-) #trustme
To keep up with Meyer on Twitter, you can follow him at @Dakota_Meyer
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(Washington Post)
The Syrian conflict: a war photographer's story. I have been covering the situation in Aleppo since August. When I first arrived here, I was taken to the Hullok and Hananu districts – areas that were subject to heavy bombing. Since then, I have known what to expect. It scared me. My time is spent photographing the situation faced by civilians in Aleppo, how they cope with hardly anything and how they deal with their tragedy. There is no electricity, no petrol, there is a lack of bread. It is also now winter and the city is freezing...
(guardian.co.uk)
News orgs circulate Facebook profile, photos of man who wasn’t the shooter. Reporters and producers around the country, frantically searching for information online about the alleged school shooter, found what seemed like a match. Ryan Lanza, 24, was believed responsible for the deaths of 27 people in Newtown, Conn., at the Sandy Hook Elementary School. The Facebook profile showed a Ryan Lanza from Newtown, Conn., who currently lives in Hoboken, N.J. — a male who looks like he’s in his 20s. The photo fit the description, so countless news orgs ran with it in stories and tweets. Problem is, it was the wrong guy...
(Poynter)
Reuters journalists: Israeli troops assaulted us, forced us to strip in street. HEBRON, West Bank -- Israeli soldiers have been accused of punching two Reuters cameramen and forcing them to strip in the street, before letting off a tear gas canister in front of them, leaving one of them needing hospital treatment. Israel's military said Thursday it took the allegations seriously. "The regional brigade commander was ordered to open an investigation," Israeli Defense Forces spokeswoman Avital Leibovich said in an email...
(NBC News)
Duggan: Veteran's story reaches way beyond war. Jumping into and out of a person’s life comes with the territory in journalism. Reporters tend to meet a lot of people — “real” people, as we say in the trade, as opposed to officialdom — who are not obliged to deal with media on a regular basis. We tell their stories as best we can in the context of some issue or trend and move on. Getting to know strangers is one of the most interesting aspects of the work. But some short-term sources stand out in one’s crowded memory well after the story has been filed...
(The Coloradoan)
Google-backed Data Journalism Awards open for entries. The Global Editors Network has today announced the launch of next year's Data Journalism Awards. It is the second year of the international competition which recognises the "outstanding work in the growing field of data journalism", GEN said in a release. A total of €15,000 (around £12,000) will be awarded to eight winning projects in the Google-supported competition. Launching this year's awards at a press conference at the Guardian, Datablog editor Simon Rogers, who is a judge of the awards, urged news outlets and organisations large and small to enter. Data journalism is "not expensive", he said, "it's not about maths".
(Journalism.co.uk)
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In a recent story, Stuart Hughes a BBC World Affairs producer, says some young journalists are not only skipping training that can help prepare them for hazardous assignments, some are rushing into war zones before they've even been published in hopes of getting a big career break.
"The scarcity of entry-level positions is encouraging some young journalists to skip the unglamorous training grounds of local newsrooms and head straight to some of the most hazardous countries on the planet in search of that elusive career break." writes Hughes.
"No non-motorist of sound mind would consider climbing behind the wheel of a high-performance sports car and putting the pedal down without first having a few driving lessons. Yet ambitious writers and film-makers seem increasingly prepared to put their life at risk in some of the most hostile environments in the world without basic first aid training, insurance or protective kit, or any form of back-up plan in the event of an emergency."
Hughes spoke with journalist Sarah Topol, who received a Kurt Schork Award for her reporting from Libya for GQ magazine.
Topol admits to following the same path of cutting corners, and says she discourages others from doing the same.
Full story here.
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