Programme | Digital Media Africa 2020
Digital Media Africa 2020
Sessions
September 08
Tuesday
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09:00
Opening Session of the First Digital Media Africa Virtual Conference
Good news to start this conference: The 2020 Africa Laureate for the Women in News Editorial Leadership Award will be announced at the opening of the conference!
Chair
Executive Director World Editors Forum, WAN-IFRA, UK
ICFJ Knight Fellow
How will African Media emerge from the crisis of 2020?
This opening session will take a helicopter view of the media in Africa, and its prospects, at a time when the continent is heavily impacted by the pandemic. Will media companies survive? What about revenues? Jobs? Medium-term visibility? How are newsrooms experiencing the situation?Speakers
Editor-in-chief, News24, Johannesburg, South Africa
Executive Editor, Daily Nation, Zambia
Editor in Chief, Vision Group, Uganda
Co-founder and CEO, Stears, Nigeria
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10:05
Time to meet the other attendees!
Join a breakout group to meet your colleagues and discuss topics raised in the first session.
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10:30
Bucking the trend
In conversation with Styli Charalambous Publisher and CEO, Daily Maverick, South Africa. South Africa's Daily Maverick is something of a digital darling in the news business. This year they surprised by announcing the launch of a new weekly PRINT newspaper: “Daily Maverick 168 (for all of you wondering, 168 is a reference to the number of hours in the week) will have a cover price of R20 and will be available free to Pick n Pay Smart Shopper cardholders from Saturday mornings” says a recent Daily Maverick editorial. Among topics that will be discussed with Styli Charalambous: the editorial concept for this new newspaper; the financial risk for the rest of the company and the partnership with Pick n Pay.
Moderator
- Executive Director World Editors Forum, WAN-IFRA, UK
Speakers
Publisher and CEO, Daily Maverick, South Africa
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11:15
Coffee break - Grab a coffee and come back in 15 min!
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11:30
Digital Subscription strategy: How do you prepare your newsroom for paid content
To survive newsrooms need revenue. If your paid content strategy is to succeed, whether it's Digital Subscription or Membership, it's crucial to involve the newsroom from the start. Editors need to understand how their audiences behave, how to build interest and loyalty through the stories they produce, and how to better engage their readers.
Moderator
Executive Editor, The Daily Nation, Nation Media Group, Kenya
Speakers
Deputy Head of Digital, The Times & Sunday Times, UK
Head of Digital Media, Arena Holdings, South Africa
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12:30
Lunch break / Timeout
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15:00
Digital Media Africa Awards! Including Best COVID 19 special project - VOTE! Attendee’s choice.
The three finalists from the Best COVID-19 special project category of the African Digital Media Awards 2020 will briefly present their projects. Participants will be able to vote online for their preferred project!
Chair
Exec Director, Digital Revenue Network, WAN-IFRA
Program officer for the South Africa Media Innovation Program (SAMIP), South Africa
Speakers
Engagement editor, News24, South Africa
Co-founder, Food For Mzansi, South Africa
Co-Founder, Food For Mzansi, South Africa
Editor - Coronavirus Monitor.co.za, South Africa
Focus on Google News Initiative (GNI) in Africa
Speakers
Director, Google Nigeria
Director, Digital Strategy, Pulse Nigeria
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16:00
Workshop: Transforming data into action to grow reader engagement and revenue
In recent years, news publishers have become more and more aware of the importance of data to support both editorial and business decisions. Expertise in data is still rare, but it’s at the heart of all developments for Google. As part of their collaboration with the news industry, the Google team will do a live demo of News Consumer Insights for the Digital Media Africa attendees. News Consumer Insights is one of the free GNI data tools that allows publishers to get personalized actionable recommendations from their Google Analytics data in order to grow reader engagement and revenue (subscriptions, contributions, membership).
Speakers
Director of Analytics and Revenue Optimization for News and Publishing at Google, U.S
Director of Analytics and Revenue Optimization for News and Publishing at Google, U.S
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17:00
Quiz time! Virtual networking event
Join our Quiz Master David Gray in a fun session where you will get a chance to test yourself on General Knowledge, Global Current Affairs, Media Industry, and more besides. There will also be a team element! Make sure you have a second device and your thinking caps, ready for a Resplendent Trivia Session.
Moderator
Quiz Master, Kenya
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18:15
Close of Day 1
September 09
Wednesday
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09:15
Audio everywhere: are podcasts as popular on the African continent as they are in other places?
Is the audio boom a real thing or another false gold rush? Are podcasts as popular on the continent as they are in other places? In this session, we will examine the revenue, content and distribution aspects of this format that seems so well adapted to the media industry, and particularly well suited to African audiences.
Moderator
Senior Strategy Consultant, Kenya
Speakers
Co-founder of Volume, South Africa
Sr. Research Associate, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, UK
Executive Producer of Podcasts, The Children's Radio Foundation, South Africa
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10:30
Networking breakout!
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10:45
Coffee break - Grab a coffee and come back in 30 min!
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11:00
What has happened since DM Africa 2019?
Progress updates: what happened to some of last year’s DM Africa speakers and some of the topics that raised the audience’s interest last year? We have picked two speakers from 2019, and one topic, building a community/membership instead of paid content.
Moderator
Journalist and media lecturer, South Africa
Speakers
Founder, 263Chat, Zimbabwe
Membership for small and mid-size operations
Malaysiakini is a fiercely independent online operation from Malaysia. After quite a long experience in the field of paid digital subscriptions, it is about a very recent foray into a membership strategy that Lynn D’Cruz will tell us about.Speakers
Chief Membership Officer, Malaysiakini, Malaysia
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12:00
Lunch Break
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13:30
Women in charge
According to Quote this Woman founder, Kathy Magrobi, “Research shows that men will be quoted in the news four times for every single occasion that a woman's voice is heard”. The problem is not the lack of women experts, but that their voices are drowned out and “this has significant implications for how we perceive our world”, says Quote this Woman. In this session, we see how this lack of gender parity, identified everywhere in the world, is tackled in Africa.
Moderator
Publishing Consultant FT Strategies, WAN-IFRA Supervisory Board Member London, UK
Speakers
Founder and Executive Director of Quote This Woman+ (QW+), South Africa
Chief Operating Officer, Visual Point Creative Group, Zimbabwe
Senior Program Manager - Data Academy, Code For Africa, South Africa
Special focus on Explain.co.za with founder Verashni Pillay
Explain.co.za is a news startup that aims to explain the news to local audiences in “fun and engaging ways”. They use entertaining news videos to reach traditionally neglected audiences in South Africa.Speakers
Founder of explain.co.za, South Africa
Session brought to you by:
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15:00
It's a wrap - close of Day 2
