'Jeopardy! Power Player Week 2012' Spotlights IWMF: Katty Kay Battles to Win

 
IWMF Board Co-Chair Katty Kay, Washington correspondent for BBC World News America, will appear during “Jeopardy! Power Player Week 2012” tonight with her winnings earmarked for the International Women’s Media Foundation.

“We are all better off when there are more women in journalism to help our news reflect our society. The IWMF supports incredibly brave women journalists working in dangerous and repressive environments. These women risk their lives just to keep reporting the news. I’m honored to be associated with an organization that helps them do that,” Kay said. (Jeopardy Productions Inc. photo)

Appearing with Kay on the pretaped program will be Dr. Mehmet Oz of “The Dr. Oz Show” with his winnings going to HealthCorps, and Chris Wallace of “Fox News Sunday” with his winnings going to Hope For The Warriors charity.

 This year's Power Players feature some of the country's most influential media personalities, including political figures, authors, journalists and newsmakers. Collectively, they have earned 21 Emmys, eight Peabodys, four Pulitzer Prizes and a Grammy Award; served under three White House administrations; and include the NBA's all-time leading scorer. The winner of each game will earn a minimum of $50,000 for the charity of their choice, while each of the other contestants will receive a guaranteed $10,000 for their special cause.  

'Forbidden Voices' Shows Internet Power of Women Bloggers in Cuba, Iran, China

 

Despite threats and censorship, three women bloggers from China, Iran and Cuba dared to cover controversy. Now their powerful stories are out in a long-waited documentary “Forbidden Voices.”

After two years of production, the film tribute highlights the global impact of the Internet and online social networks to circulate information and organize protests.  Director Barbara Miller captured their stories.

 

Chinese activist Zeng Jinyan has blogged and tweeted since 2006 about her life – including the imprisonment of her activist husband Hu Jia, who defended AIDS sufferers. Iranian blogger Farnaz Seifi was threatened and fled the country, after she wrote about a campaign to change laws discriminating against women. Havana-based Yoani Sánchez says she was subjected to government censorship and physically attacked, after using USB flash drives and CDs to circulate her critical writing about Cuba. Read more about film here.

IWMF Selects 2012 Courage in Journalism, Lifetime Achievement Awards Winners From Ethiopia, Palestine, Azerbaijan, Pakistan

An imprisoned Ethiopian newspaper columnist wrongly convicted of terrorism after criticizing the government, a Palestinian writer threatened and beaten for covering politics in Gaza and a Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Azerbaijani investigative reporter targeted in a smear campaign after reporting on corruption are the IWMF’s 2012 Courage in Journalism Award winners.

Reeyot Alemu, 31, a columnist for the Ethiopian newspaper Feteh, is in prison for 14 years after being convicted of conspiracy to commit terrorist acts and participation in a terrorist organization.  Asmaa al-Ghoul, 30, a Palestinian blogger and writer, regularly receives death threats and has been beaten by Hamas security forces while covering protests. Khadija Ismayilova, 35, a talk show host on RFE/RL’s Azerbaijani Service who covers corruption and abuse of power by the government elite, was threatened and had surveillance cameras planted in her apartment in an effort to silence her.

Pakistani media pioneer Zubeida Mustafa -- the first woman in her country's mainstream media -- is the IWMF’s 2012 Lifetime Achievement Award winner. Mustafa, 70, worked for three decades at Pakistan’s oldest English-language newspaper and mentored many younger women journalists.  She continues to write columns for the paper.

These inspiring women will be honored by the International Women’s Media Foundation at award ceremonies in New York on Oct. 24 and in Los Angeles on Oct. 29. With this year’s award winners, 75 journalists have received Courage Awards and 21 journalists have received Lifetime Achievement Awards.

Read more here.

IWMF's Christiane Amanpour Follows 'Footsteps of Bin Laden' in CNN Documentary

“In the Footsteps of Bin Laden,” a documentary charting Osama bin Laden’s “gradual but deadly transformation,” took CNN’s Christiane Amanpour from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan to Afghanistan reporting.

Amanpour, an IWMF board member, describes how the world’s most hunted terrorist was finally tracked down. In the two-hour report, Amanpour describes his transformation through interviews with people who knew him best throughout his life.


 “How did Osama bin Laden’s love of god become a mission to kill?” Amanpour wonders.

 

IWMF's 2012 Digital News Frontier Grant Winners: Three Innovative Start-Ups Selected to Receive $20,000 in Seed Funding

The International Women’s Media Foundation has selected the three winners of the 2012 Women Entrepreneurs in the Digital News Frontier grants. 

The winning start-ups, which will receive $20,000 to launch and pro-bono coaching from professionals, are:

Computational Platform for Investigative Journalism, a hub for data-driven reporting, tools and training, started by Agencia EFE senior correspondent Teresa Bouza.

Bouza, a Knight Fellow at Stanford University, has worked since 2005 as a foreign correspondent in Washington D.C., for Spanish-language news agency Efe.

Real World STEM, a video-based webzine engaging teens in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) reporting, conceived by freelance journalist Rebekah L Fraser.

Frazer, a widely published writer who created STEM matters educational webzine in 2010, received an Online Learning Award from the International Society for Technology in Education.

Symbolia: The Tablet Magazine of Illustrated Journalism, a tablet-focused visual journalism enterprise combining investigative reporting with comics and illustration, created by media strategist Erin Polgreen.

Polgreen, who has advocated for the intersection of comics and journalism to engage consumers in complicated stories, previously worked at The Media Consortium working with 50 leading independent media outlets.

“We were impressed by the caliber and diversity of this year’s proposals,” IWMF Acting Executive Director Elisa Lees Munoz said.  “We continue to see a dearth of seed funding and training for aspiring women entrepreneurs, and we are pleased to provide these much-needed resources to three exceptional winners.”  Read more.