Just finished writing up as rapporteur for the recent JRF/Bevan Foundation conference at the Atrium in Cardiff (first visit, nice building ), relevant links can be found in this document. Really got me thinking in terms of how we frame our ‘media culture’ these days, that ‘traditional’ broadcasters are disguising depictions of poverty in other formats e.g. The Secret Millionaire, and it’s tragic in some ways that the debate is being conducted in theses terms. The whiff of deserving and undeserving poor, philanthropy as the desired model etc.

However, there’s also some hope: ‘ media’ is now far more ubiquitous, a process which will probably only accelerate, and there’s far more scope now for people to tell their stories using the technology they have to hand, whether that’s through the digital storytelling movement, or third sector organisations finally beginning to get to grips with using this tehnology for case studies etc. Reminds me again of Illich for some reason.