So, Loeries is almost upon us, with the festival weekend kicking off this Friday, 1 October 2010 (eish, when did it get to be almost October?!); the Africa Media Leadership conference is in full swing in Tanzania (follow on Twitter); and the ANC NGC ended last week and there appears to be some positive developments with respect to the proposed media appeals tribunal. The Avaaz petition in defence of South Africa's media freedom is also nearing the 30 000 signature mark. On the newspaper front, The New Age newspaper continues to make the news: it put out its first edition, a special one for Heritage Day, last week but its publisher Atul Gupta was arrested over the weekend... Some interesting reads are Media24 Investigations head (and former Daily Dispatch editor) Andrew Trench's blog post on his impressions of this sample edition and the M&G Online's editor Chris Roper's column on the paper's brand-building ad campaign. Oh, and the Sunday Times has also announced various tweaks and additions to its content, coming to you this Sunday 3 October. And then, there's News Anchor Barbie, all pretty in pink... A couple of the more interesting critiques I've stumbled across are Sandbox World's Journalism Barbie and The University Star's Barbie can be a multimedia journalist. A luta continua! Simone Puterman (@SimoneBiz) Managing editor PS In this week's Ornico Ad Showcase, we feature TV ads for Mugg & Bean, Vodacom, Nestlé Country Fresh, heat magazine and Robertsons, and radio ads for Medi-Clinic, Wimpy, Chivas Regal, FNB and Mercedes Benz.
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