Doha: Media scholars and industry experts will convene on February 21 for the Fresh Global Media Players conference, a one-of-a-kind symposium on the reshaping of international media and communication.
Hosted by Northwestern University in Qatar (NU-Q), the forum will bring together media players, researchers and executives who bring new perspectives on the revolutionary change taking over international news and entertainment.
It is sponsored by Qatar National Research Fund as part of its vision to connect Qatar’s researchers to their peers and colleagues at home and abroad.
“The gathering of industry leaders and scholars was the brainchild of NU-Q faculty Joe Khalil and John Downing, who are experts on the Middle East and global media, respectively.
“It will be a forum for a productive exchange of ideas on emerging media trends,” said Everette E Dennis, Dean and CEO, NU-Q.
“The new global media players are looking beyond national borders and redefining the interplay of content, distribution and audience. It’s a dynamic industry that is changing before our eyes.”
Khalil, Associate Professor and conference co-organiser, described industry forces transforming the media landscape and said, “Today people around the world watch content produced in or influenced by the Middle East. The Arab world has joined the global conversation with a clear and distinct voice, but research on global media has not kept up with the times.
Conference co-organiser and Professor Downing said, “The conference will explore the redistribution of world communication power from fresh vantage points, examining new voices and innovative players.”
Speakers includes John Sinclair, global advertising expert from University of Melbourne; Tristan Mattelart, Professor of Intellectual Property and Piracy Trends, Université de Paris 8; and Annabelle Sreberny, Co-author of Blogistan, the Internet and Politics in Iran and Professor of Global Media and Communication, SOAS Centre for Media Studies, University of London.
Yaser Bishr, Executive Director of Strategy and Development, Aljazeera Media Network, will deliver the capstone media industries address at a public lunch on February 21. He is leading the network’s transformation from a regional broadcaster to a global digital media player. His speech, ‘The Economics of the News Business and the Challenge of Innovation in the Age of the Digital Dimes, offers a snapshot of the news business today and a look ahead to where the industry is heading.
This spring, NU-Q will release Media Use in the Middle East: A Six-Nation Survey that tracks habits and behaviour of news and media consumption in the region. It follows last year’s Entertainment Media Use in the Middle East: A Six Nation Survey that focused on the region’s entertainment media consumption, and Parsing “Arab Spring”: Media Coverage of the Arab Revolutions, an occasional paper by Ibrahim Abusharif, Associate Professor of Journalism.
The Peninsula
