We are holding an event to introduce the people of North Manchester to the Community Reporters project.

The event will be on 1 December 2006 from 10:00am until 1:00pm

People will get the chance to try out some of the equipment and techniques that reporters can use.

Create a Personal Website and send text, pictures, videos and audio to it !!!
Would you like to improve your Basic English, Grammar or Computer Skills?
Would you like to try Digital photography, MP3 recording or Blogging?

Then come along and see what we have to offer:

* Basic Skills
* Blogging
* Word Processing
* Digital Photography
* Video Recording & Editing and Audio
* Create your own Stories and Publicity Online
* Join a Media Club to help you Produce Content

For more information contact Graeme at MCIN on 0161 230 1430 or email info@mcin.net

We will be holding two workshops this week.  One tomorrow (2 November) for the Whitemoss Club for Young People and one on Friday (3 November) at Trinity Church.  We will also be holding a workshop on Tuesday next week at Manchester Foyer.

If you are interested in attending future workshops please contact Graeme on 0161 230 1430 or email him at graeme@mcin.net

As reported we held a workshop for a number of voluntary sector groups on 24 October.  In all 6 groups were represented.  The workshop was very productive and we hope to be able to bring you RSS feeds from their blogs once they have set them up.

We will be holding a workshop for voluntary and community groups next Tuesday (24 October).  The groups attending will be given an introduction to the project and we will get them started on setting up blogs for themselves and for their organisations.

Once the blogs have been set up we will take feeds from them and their information will be appearing on the front page of the myManchester website.

We have run a Community Reporters course for the Chinese Women’s Centre, Wai Yin, focusing on video production. This will enable them to edit the videos that they have taken of community events and to upload them to a blog that can be fed into their website and the ethnicity site. A group is planning to meet on a regular basis to plan video coverage of upcoming community events.

We have been approached by Victor Gonzalez - a lecturer in the Department of Informatics at Manchester University.  He is interested in working with us on the Community Reporter project.

We had a very productive meeting with him on Monday (21 August) and more information about how we are going to work together will be posted here.

Community reporters can now see their stories published on the myManchester community portal at www.mymanchester.net

MCIN, who run the portal, have completely redesigned the site and now stories from community reporters take pride of place on the front page of the site. There is also a section of the site specifically dedicated to stories from the local community.

So check it out.

On Tuesday 27^th and Wednesday 28^th June MCIN (Manchester Community Information Network) organised a visit for two groups of Community Reporters to the BBC in Manchester to look behind the scenes at North West Tonight, the BBC flagship local news programme.

Over the two evenings these included three Deaf people from Trafford Deaf Users Group, three Deaf people from Bury Library’s Hearing Impairment Unit, three from Chatterbox, three from Cheetham Hill and three from the North Manchester “Production Crew”.

A BSL interpreter was on hand on both evenings to ensure that the Deaf people could fully participate in the visit as there were opportunities to ask questions and talk about project throughout visit.

The groups were met at BBC reception by Jim Clarke, News Editor of North West Tonight. They then went up to the BBC canteen and over coffee and tea Jim gave a bit of history of the BBC in Manchester, future plans and his role.

After a question and answer session the tour began. Visitors saw behind the scenes, including the news room and the control room. Most exciting of all was being able to sit in the studio whilst the programme went out live with some of the group listening in to the on floor direction through headphones.

After the show had gone out the groups met North West Tonight presenter Gordon Burns who explained what goes out behind his desk, including checking the running order for the show and how he worked the autocue.

The groups also had a chance to meet Diane Oxberry weather presenter.

The visit to the BBC was an inspiration. A number of Community reporters are going to put their experiences online using photos, audio and text whilst others inspired to create and complete their video projects.

Keep checking or subscribe to the site for latest updates.

At the end of September we are planning to launch the community reporters and associated community websites that house the content and, more importantly, showcase people’s work.

Once you have taken part in our workshops, you may find that you still need support in creating stories and news.

Don’t worry - we will still be able to provide you with one-to-one support, providing we don’t have other commitments.

If you need support don’t hesitate to contact Graeme or Jane on 0161 203 4422 or by email at info@mcin.net