CMC Conference

---

Having been awarded one of only fifteen places on the Media Net Academy at the Churches Media Council Conference, turned up excited by the prospect of three days at working at the crossover between the media (specifically, the web/internet) and Christianity. The general gist, as I understand it, is that many Christians see the media as a place of ‘evil’, and by encouraging more young Christians into the media maybe we can change the perception of this…

We were soon introduced to each other as a big group, then divided into streams. Our ‘web stream’ was Elizabeth (a journalist), Fran (PR), Gareth (radio DJ), and myself. Rachel, our trainer, talked us through our aims for the site, etc, and then introduced us to ‘wetpaint’ so that we could concentrate on site structure and content, rather than the technological aspects (perfect for me!). Rachel was worried that this would all be ‘too basic’ for me, as the others had not really done any web work, whereas I have quite a portfolio on mydesigna! I found it a confidence booster to realise how much I knew, and know that a web editorial position would be well within my reach (I was getting interviews for such before I got the Manchester post, so I don’t know why I was so surprised - I just thought that a couple of years out of the field would mean that the knowledge I had would be irrelevant, but it’s skills that are not so technology-dependent).

The three days are a bit of a blur of decision making, attending elements of the conference in order to report back on it, and late nights pulling the content together into a coherent structure, finding images, and coming to agreements about how it should look. On the final morning, Fran & I presented the web site to the other conference delegates, a number of whom were high profile media people, with a time limit of two minutes! The website is still available online at: Wetpaint: MediaNet Academy.

Off to Winchester, then France, then Winchester, then Cornwall, then Devon, then Bournmouth, then back to Winchester for the end of the month!

---

Photos

The Hayes
Beautiful, hey?!

Patrick Dixon, Futurologist
What, a futurologist - what's that? Keeps an eye on upcoming trends, and lets businesses know what they should be doing to prepare for them is my understanding of it!

MediaNet Academy Trainees
See the website for more info...

Interesting view...
...from the bedroom: car park, ducks, lake, cows, a motorway! All in one small space!