It’s a great honour to be asked to speak again at News:Rewired, a conference in London Victoria about the future of journalism.
We’ve been asked to speak on a panel on Investigative Journalism and this time we’ll be placing active VB readers and contributors at centre stage.
The other panellists are frankly stellar, with Iain Overton from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, Paul Lewis, special projects editor at the Guardian and Christine Spolar, responsible for Special Investigations at the Financial Times all presenting … Oh and little ol’ VB.
The strength of citizen involvement
The presentation will focus on how groups of interested citizens can be a force in Investigative Journalism.
Something, dear VB commentators, you amply illustrated with the Dave Burbage Consulting Ltd expose.
We’ll highlight the blizzard of investigative comments left on VentnorBlog following the story about the release of the £500 IWC expenses.
Unravelling the thread
VB commentator, Media Watcher, spotted quite a lot of money going to now infamous Dave Burbage Consulting Ltd.
This tug on the thread, led to the unravelling of a huge story that then passed through VB, across the other Island media, local politics and nationally into Private Eye’s Rotten Boroughs column.
The unveiling caused outrage – not only at the amount of council money being paid, but that this tidy sum was to a limited company rather than an individual.
We’re looking forward to finding out polishing up our investigative techniques while we’re there, so hope to be unearthing more on the Island soon!
