A Breakthrough for International Broadcasting

Coverage like this interview by RFE/RL’s Azadi Radio in Kabul, Afghanistan, could become accessible to U.S. audiences under a new law.

Recently, Congress passed and the President signed legislation that will ease restrictions on access by people in the United States to the world-class news, information and cultural programming created by Broadcasting Board of Governors’ (BBG) entities.

Under a decades-old law known as the Smith-Mundt Act, we had been prohibited from making available to domestic audiences the programs that we had been producing for people overseas. The advent of the Internet and satellite broadcasting, of course, made it difficult for U.S. international broadcasting entities to keep their content away from American audiences, and it was not clear whether the outdated law restricted our use of certain distribution platforms.

Congress and the President agreed that the law needed to be clarified, and they lifted this restriction in legislation that will take effect in July.

The law provides better transparency on agency activities and will offer Americans a better understanding of the journalistic mission of U.S. international broadcasting. At the same time, it may give taxpayers a clearer view of how America’s international broadcasting dollars are being spent.

Our objective news and information programming could benefit a variety of domestic audiences who request that programming, especially diaspora communities that may have scant access to information in their native languages.

The new legislation does not change the BBG’s founding statute, so we’re only allowed to create programs for international audiences, and we cannot disseminate programs within the United States outside a request for that programming. Our funds will continue to be spent serving overseas audiences.

The legislation was just signed into law last week, and it doesn’t take effect for six months, so we have time to consider all of the effects it may have and the opportunities it may present.

In short, this is a very welcome change that has been long sought by the BBG and some of our public diplomacy colleagues outside government as well as at the State Department. But it does nothing to change the agency’s overarching mission, which is to inform, engage and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy.

A Spotlight on Excellence

Right to left, Dick Lobo, VOA Director David Ensor, and representatives of the Indonesia Service.

Right to left, Dick Lobo, VOA Director David Ensor, and representatives of the Indonesian Service.

This week I was pleased to participate in a new initiative designed to shine a light on the some of the best work being done here at the Broadcasting Board of Governors. It’s called, appropriately, the Spotlight on Excellence Awards.

The program was created in our Office of Performance Review (OPR), which took on the difficult task of identifying the very best examples of excellent media content from among an extremely rich pool of quality work by broadcasters in the Voice of America (VOA) and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB).

Spotlight Awards were given out in six categories for content that represent the best of what we do without regard for program popularity or geopolitical clout.

I understand the selection process was extremely difficult and that any one of our services could easily have been honored in each of the categories. But as Bob Long, a program analyst in the OPR said in opening the ceremony, these are spotlight awards, not floodlight awards.

I believe strongly in recognizing extraordinary achievement, not only to reward our most dedicated and talented professionals, but also to encourage others to strive for excellence in their work. We want our employees to know their contributions to our team will be respected and appreciated. These awards are yet another way to recognize success and boost morale.

The surprised winners received a handsome, framed certificate and another appropriate gift: a high definition camcorder.

Excellence in Journalism: VOA’s Khmer Service for its special report “Khmer Rouge War Tribunal,” which attracted the wrath of the Cambodian government.

Excellence in Presentation: VOA’s Indonesian Service, which provides reports and features seamlessly to its many strong affiliates and provides an indispensable window on the world for all of Indonesia.

Technical Excellence: VOA’s Vietnamese Service for its website, “VOATiengViet.com,” with its nimble mastery of the platform and intense attention to detail.

Excellence in Relevance: The OCB for “Estado de SATS,” a TV program which is produced by dissidents inside Cuba and smuggled out to OCB.

Unique VOA/OCB Quality: VOA’s Urdu Service for “Sana, a Pakistani,” a unique 30-minute television program that views life in America through the eyes of a young Pakistani woman who has just arrived in the country.

Excellence in Audience Engagement: VOA’s Russian Service for “Podelis,” a TV/webcast program which on Nov. 1 was the most shared link among Russians discussing the American elections.

Staying On The Air Through a Storm of Historic Proportions

With the Capitol in the background, a jogger passes a fallen large oak tree on the National Mall near BBG headquarters.

Rain was falling in sheets. Wind was whistling down a deserted Independence Avenue at speeds that mocked the 25 mph speed limit. Outside the Cohen building, streets were dark and eerily devoid of the usual hustle and bustle of midday traffic.

But inside at our Broadcasting Board of Governors and Voice of America (VOA) headquarters, hard by the Capitol, scant attention was being paid to the local impacts of this “Frankenstorm” called Sandy that raged outside our walls and windows.

Instead, legions of people were sharply focused on a mission that has, over the years, met every challenge: VOA was on the air.

It was with great pride that I personally witnessed the dedication of VOA journalists, producers and technicians who braved a storm that had shuttered federal agencies, closed mass transit, and turned Washington DC into a ghost town for two days.

BBG and IBB staff, including top managers, were on hand at headquarters, while many others kept operations moving apace by telecommuting from home.

I know, also, that similar challenges were being met across town at the headquarters of Radio Free Asia and across the river in Springfield, VA, where the Middle East Broadcasting Networks are headquartered.

Some members of our staff never left the Cohen building, taking their meals in a family-run, basement cafeteria that sporadically opened through the ordeal. There were folks sleeping on cots, on office couches, at a few nearby hotels.

As my colleague VOA Director David Ensor said afterwards “it was really an extraordinary team effort.” Every program went out as scheduled and some language services provided nearly non-stop storm coverage to affiliate stations and audiences around the world.

To everyone who helped the BBG meet the extraordinary challenges of the last few days, I want to say thank you and congratulations on a job well done.

Thinking Outside the Government Box

Left to right, Rob Bole, Todd Park, Raina Kumra, and Dick Lobo

Last week I had a very engaging conversation with one of America’s foremost technology evangelists, Todd Park, Chief Technology Officer of the United States.

Park spoke to me and other members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) team about innovation, entrepreneurship and how government can function best by applying private sector thinking to public sector missions. He is seeking to get government managers to think more like entrepreneurs and less like bureaucrats.

Park is the kind of next-generation thought leader this government needs as it strives to become leaner, more innovative and more efficient by taking advantage of all technology has to offer. We can’t continue to rely on what used to work.

Not yet 40, Park founded two highly successful health IT companies, including one when he was 24-years-old, before being named Chief Technology Officer for the Department of Health and Human Services in 2009. He was picked by President Obama to be America’s Chief Technology Officer this year.

In both of his government roles, Park has been seen as a change agent who is unafraid to think outside the government box. He is, to quote the White House website, the federal government’s “entrepreneur-in-residence.”

Before he met with me, he visited our Office of Digital & Design Innovation where he found a couple of kindred spirits in BBG’s Co-Directors of Innovation Rob Bole and Raina Kumra. Like Park, Rob and Raina are working every day to bring new technologies and innovation to all corners of the BBG enterprise.

They presented Park with a black ODDI t-shirt. And while it may not have been a formal endorsement of ODDI and its work, Park immediately put the t-shirt on over his dress shirt and tie and wore it through the rest of his meetings here.

The BBG’s Gold Medal Awards

Last week, it was my privilege to join in celebrating the accomplishments of 94 employees who demonstrated extraordinary commitment to the Broadcasting Board of Governors and our mission during the previous year.

Our annual Gold Medal Awards ceremony is one of the highlights of the year for me, for the gold medal recipients and for our team. Being selected for a Gold Medal Award is a special honor, since the winners are nominated not by their bosses, but by their peers.

The recipients are reporters and editors, support staff, IT professionals, multimedia specialists and more. In many cases, they are innovators who helped us explore new ways of reaching our audiences. Each recipient receives a medal, a framed certificate and $2,500.

Christine Brown, Administrative Officer, Resource Management Directorate, TSI, receives her award from VOA Director David Ensor, center, and Dick Lobo, right.

As I said in my remarks at the ceremony, these extraordinary accomplishments come at a time the agency is being asked to do more with less. But while we face many challenges as an agency, we also see opportunity to bring new ideas and technologies to our mission to engage with people around the world in support of freedom and democracy.

The ceremony, held in the Cohen Auditorium at our headquarters in Washington DC, drew a standing-room-only crowd that included the winners, their co-workers, friends and family members. It was a celebration of all that is good about the work that we do here.

The video above tells the story of the Gold Medal Awards and how much they mean to the recipients and to the agency. Watch it, and I you’ll see why this recognition means so much.

A Tragic Loss for the U.S., Libya

Christopher Stevens

Last week, the United States lost an able, experienced and dedicated diplomat, and the people of Libya lost a friend.

The shocking, outrageous deaths of U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans during an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi robbed the fledgling democracy movement in Libya of one of its staunchest allies.

Just before he left to serve as ambassador, Stevens stopped by my office here in D.C. to discuss the assignment and to learn about the BBG’s growing broadcast capabilities in Libya. It was our first meeting, but it was clear right away that this was a man dedicated to Libya and its people. Along with his deep knowledge of the country and the many challenges it faced, Stevens also demonstrated a keen interest in U.S. international broadcasting.

This was to be Stevens’ third assignment to Libya, and he was looking forward to helping to shape the post-Qaddafi future there, never mind the enormity of the challenge or the immense personal peril he would be facing.

Stevens was very enthusiastic about the BBG’s plans to expand our broadcast capabilities to reach an ever widening Libyan audience via the Middle East Broadcast Networks’ Radio Sawa. He understood the importance of providing the people, especially its young future leaders, with uncensored, accurate news and information.

At the time, our Radio Sawa was already broadcasting around the clock in the rebel stronghold of Benghazi, and we were just bringing online a new FM radio transmitter in the Libyan capital of Tripoli. We are currently working to construct a third new BBG FM facility in Misratah.

In a statement last week, Secretary of State Clinton said the U.S. mission in Libya is “both noble and necessary” and that carrying it forward in the wake of the violence in Benghazi honors the memories of Stevens and the other victims.

We totally agree. And that’s why the BBG has vowed not to let this tragedy weaken our commitment to a robust U.S. international broadcasting presence in Libya.

BBG Sharing American Democracy With the World

Every four years the eyes of the world focus on political life in America and the battle for the White House.

And while you and I are used to seeing the quadrennial presidential election drama unfold, for many around the globe it is an opportunity to witness American democracy at work. Giving the world an up-close view of our electoral system in action is at the very heart of our mission “to inform, engage, and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy.”

That’s why we sent a team of writers, producers, correspondents, VJs, editors, and technicians to the Republican convention last week in Tampa and to the Democratic convention that is going on now in Charlotte.

Coverage from VOA will be broadcast around the world in dozens of languages and remote feeds of key speeches and other events will be provided to affiliate stations. Alhurra TV’s “Road to the White House” is on every night, Radio Sawa is carrying the top speeches and TV Martí’s “Antena Live” is broadcasting live nightly from the convention sites.

Of course we provide ongoing coverage of the presidential race throughout the election season, but the conventions offer an opportunity to show a uniquely American exercise in democracy. Each convention is a microcosm of the political process, with delegates from all the states and territories coming together to make official the primary voting that has already taken place nationwide.

Bringing this to the world is one of our core obligations. And providing coverage in many languages is critical to our goal of delivering context and background on American politics to the foreign audiences we reach.

In fact, the Voice of America’s charter – now enshrined in the U.S. International Broadcasting Act which governs the family of BBG broadcasters – requires us to “present a balanced and comprehensive projection of significant American thought and institutions” and to broadcast responsible discussion and opinion on U.S. policy.

So as the politicians deliver speeches, as the nominees accept their respective party’s mantles, as the balloons drop from the rafters, BBG journalists are there, as always. And millions around the world are better informed for it.

In Nigeria, Remarkable Growth in Mobile

Traders display their goods and wait for people to buy telephones at the computer village market in Lagos, Nigeria. (AP Photo/George Osodi)

Tomorrow, the BBG releases the latest in a series of reports on how audiences in key countries around the globe are using modern media. This is the third report we have released in partnership with Gallup and it looks at media use in Nigeria.

We previously surveyed Iran and Tibet — and we’ve picked up some valuable insights into how our target audiences use the media that are available to them.

One trend that I find particularly interesting and encouraging across the three studies is the remarkable growth in mobile penetration, even in developing and repressed countries. These are people who until recently had little access to the Internet and very limited options to communicate with the outside world in real time.

Let’s take a look at Nigeria, not a wealthy nation by standard measures. Still, nearly three out of four Nigerians use mobile devices. And among those who use the Internet regularly, the vast majority did so via a mobile device.

The number one use of mobile devices in Nigeria – aside from voice calls — is for text messaging. Interestingly the second most popular use of mobile is to listen to radio broadcasts. By western standards, regular Internet use is low in Nigeria, with only 20 percent saying they accessed the Internet within the past week. However, two years ago that figure was only three percent in a country of 170 million people. The study attributes that growth to a shift from café-centered Internet to mobile.

The data on Nigeria, like that on Iran and Tibet, is illuminating as it shows how communications technologies are spreading even in poor and repressed countries. This is the kind of information we need as we seek the most efficient and least expensive ways to reach and grow our global audience.

Lessons From Vint Cerf

Dick Lobo and Vint Cerf

I recently had the privilege of meeting with Vint Cerf, the computer scientist and visionary whiz who is recognized as one of the “fathers of the Internet.”

Cerf is recognized worldwide for his many contributions to how the Web works today: In the 1970s he developed the data transmission protocol that to this day powers the Internet; in the 1980s he helped develop the first commercial email system; and in the 1990s he was instrumental in founding the organization that controls the Internet’s domain name system.

Today, Cerf continues his pioneering work, tackling the challenges of making an Interplanetary Internet, or the InterPlaNet, to transmit data over huge distances in space. He currently holds many titles, including Chief Internet Evangelist at Google and distinguished visiting scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Cerf met with me, BBG Board Member Michael Meehan and Radio Free Asia President Libby Liu at Google’s offices in Washington. We discussed recent BBG-Google collaborations and ways we can continue to use emerging technologies to enhance the way we transmit news and information around the globe, especially on the Internet.

In the world of international media, we face a technological landscape that is evolving every day, and we have no choice but to keep pace. To achieve our goals we must be willing to look beyond current strategies and technologies.

What is perhaps most inspiring about Vint Cerf is how he has consistently looked forward over the course of his career, moving nimbly from one new challenge to the next, never satisfied with yesterday’s achievements or today’s technologies. We in U.S. International Broadcasting should do the same.

The Human Costs of a Free Press

Wearing black T-shirts that read: “Stop killing press,” journalists walk to collect signatures from members of the media in Yangon, Myanmar, Saturday, Aug. 4, 2012. (AP Photo/Khin Maung Win)

Malick Maiga is a local reporter in Northern Mali and, in my mind, one of the most courageous journalists anywhere.

Maiga is a regular contributor to our Voice of America, one of many who regularly face violence and intimidation as they gather news and information in some of the world’s most dangerous places. He is one of a special breed of correspondent, those who refuse to be silenced no matter the peril.

Last week, Maiga watched as hundreds of demonstrators prevented a group of Islamists from cutting off the hand of a man accused of theft in the city of Gao. As Maiga was about to broadcast news of the demonstration, he was attacked and beaten unconscious, apparently by the same Islamists who had been thwarted in their attempt to carry out Sharia law.

This was not the first time Maiga’s reporting was met with violence. Twice before, he was beaten by Islamists in Gao only to resume his reporting. After this third attack, he again refused to be silenced. Speaking from his hospital bed, he told VOA’s French to Africa service how the men beat him with rifle butts and eventually left him for dead in a cemetery.

I join my colleague VOA Director David Ensor and everyone at the BBG in condemning this cowardly attack in the strongest possible terms. At the same time, though, I cannot help but be saddened by the fact that attacks on journalists are being carried out far too often.

In January, the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for gunning down VOA reporter Mukarram Khan Aatif as he prayed in a mosque near Peshawar. Since then, fearless BBG reporters have been assaulted, interrogated or detained in Belarus, Sudan, Ethiopia and elsewhere. Many of these journalists are especially vulnerable because they live openly in the communities they cover.

These brave journalists are on the front lines fighting to preserve the kind of press freedom westerners sometimes take for granted. The best protection for reporters working in the shadow of repression is light. The Committee to Protect Journalists is among the leaders in shining light on Maiga’s case and other abuses.

I call on all international broadcasters, independent media, advocacy groups and governments to focus attention on these and all incidents that threaten the open exchange of information and, ultimately, the spread of freedom.

Viewpoint

Discussions About the Future of International Broadcasting and Media