Front Row, Jakarta – As part of The Jakarta Post's 40th anniversary celebrations, the English-language daily is holding a series of Media Literacy bootcamps until Aug. 19.
Kicking off the second week of the event, the bootcamp is composed of eight media literacy workshops aimed at aspiring reporters and high school and university students, which are designed to equip participants with essential media consumption and creation skills for the digital age.
The initial Media Literacy Bootcamp on Monday opened with a session on "Citizen Journalism & Mobile Reporting", which was led by journalist and documentary filmmaker Moses Parlindungan Ompusunggu.
Moses said that in this era, truth is difficult to confirm, adding that it is difficult to determine whether a particular news piece is credible or not, as there is no media monopoly, while more people also have access to news sources.
Quoting from Bowman, S. & Willis, C. (2003), "Citizen journalism is based upon public citizens playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing, and disseminating news and information," Moses added that citizen journalism allowed citizens to actively participate in the media.
Meanwhile, mobile reporting facilitates voice reporting and empowerment. "By reporting, we must be able to take advantage of existing limitations," he said, adding that the limitations can be overcome with simple tools and materials such as cellphone cameras and simple handycams as tools, along with stories around what is happening, such as personal unrest or reflection on an event as material.
As a hands-on activity, the session was followed by a group discussion forum by conducting simple coverage of the topic of The Jakarta Post photo exhibition, in which participants were assigned to report on the exhibition by determining which angle they would choose to tell the story.
The day continued with the second session with the theme of "Fact-Checking: Uncovering the Truth", led by Adi Marsiela, coordinator of CEKFAKTA.
Based on Indonesia's 2022 Digital Literacy Status, which was taken from survey results on digital skills, digital ethics, digital security and digital culture in 34 provinces, Indonesian people rarely access information through traditional media, preferring to access it through social media.
Adi explained that for more accurate information, readers can check for themselves via Google by clicking on the special news item or finding a specific quote you want to search for with "cite". In addition, readers can also use the words "OR" and "AND" in the middle of the words they want to search for, such as "pollution OR Jakarta".
When looking for photos, Adi cited applications such as Brave, Google Lens, Yandex or TinEye. Meanwhile, to find more accurate location information and places, he recommended using Google Maps.
Following the presentation, participants were then directed to find locations and names of places based on clues and videos with verified methods and data.
Adi said that, "if we are looking for facts, we must be detailed in identifying them."
Shafa Rizky and Nataya from the University of Indonesia said the bootcamp added information and much new knowledge that the current generation does not know. According to the duo, knowledge of journalism is important, including for creating content.
In addition, they praised the panelists for their insightful and exciting presentations.
"The way he explained it was easy to understand, including for me, who is participating in this journalistic event for the first time," they added.
[You can still attend the event up to Aug. 19. Kindly submit your RSVP to https://bit.ly/TJP40MediaLiteracyBootcamp. For additional information on the speakers and the current events, check out the website at http://thejakartapost.com/40-years.]