Visit the New Media Lab web site: http://nml.ru.ac.za

The New Media Lab (NML) was started in 1995 to educate journalists to create, produce, distribute, consume and interrogate digital information technologies as media platforms and tools for social communication. NML offers learners insight into the latest technology and technology strategy, preparing them with the intellectual skills to work in this environment in a manner that is critically reflective.

Students in the New Media Lab are empowered with the foundations to become knowledge producers in a modern newsroom environment. With the rapid technological changes facing media strategists and architects on a daily basis, learners are exposed to new developments and encouraged to critically evaluate them relative to their particular goals and direction.

NML staff are highly critical of technological development, particularly in terms of its impact on society and do not subscribe to any teleological ideology of progress. This vantage point gives staff the critical distance to be able to help students react calmly and intelligently when the technological foundations get rebuilt every five to seven years.

New Media Lab Vision

To foster digital journalism for critical public interest communication in South Africa

Mission

To integrate 'new media' into traditional journalism practice, challenging stakeholders to develop, innovate and adapt tools for critical public interest communication

Goals

• Educate journalism learners and the media industry

• Mainstream digital journalism in curricula

• Advance knowledge through dissemination of information and research

• Innovate and experiment with new media technology

• Engage with, and advocate on behalf of, industry and relevant interest groups

Stakeholders

• Learners

• Academia

• Industry

Outputs

• Education and training

• Research and publication

• Journalism