Highway Africa

By Belinda Hamburee & Shakeman Mugari

Success to every multimedia project is not the sophisticated gadgets but the quality of the content. That was the underlining message of the key speakers during the Digital Citizen Indaba (DCI) on blogging.

“Content is king,” said Carly Ritz, the Multimedia editor of The Times of South Africa. She said while an organisation might have a good team that is innovative with technology in the end, the success of any project is in the content.

“My team is young, innovative and can adapt to new skills but the real challenge is in channelling their skills toward producing quality content.”

That seems to be the challenge for almost every multimedia organisation in South Africa and

“The question is how can multimedia newsrooms get innovative teams and still be good reporters as senior journalists?”

According to DeWaal Steyn from Die Burger the buzzwords in multimedia are Web 2.0, podcasts Vlogs, Blogs, streaming media and Vlobituaries but that is not what it is all about.

“It is much more than that. Multimedia is a new way of telling stories,” Steyn said, adding that multimedia goes beyond just the addition of visuals and audios.

“You never see readers clamouring for online media. What is interesting is the in-depth news.”

But Ritz does not agree with Steyn. She argues that what is important is to show what the newspapers cannot. “Emotions, action, arts, theatre and music are what make the online editions interesting.”