Independence of the News Media

Loïc Ballarini is Associate Professor of Information and Communication Sciences at the University of Lorraine, France. Ballarini is also a former journalist and has co-edited three French language books. His research focuses on the place and the role of journalism in the public spheres.

• 1. Introduction.- 2. The Funding of Press and Online News in France: Developments and Challenges.- 3. French Media: can crowdfunding serve pluralism?.- 4. Crowdfunding: does it make a significant contribution to community and independent media in Quebec?.- 5. Audiences and readership of revolutionary leftist media: The “media leader” hypothesis.- 6. Occupation: “Net Cleaner”. The socio-economic issues of comment moderation on French news websites.- 7. The Local Press as a Medium to Create Diversion.- 8. Media coverage of the coalbed methane (CBM) controversy in Lorraine, northeast France. How the regional daily press boosted the social acceptability of an unpopular project.- 9. The Transnationalisation of Information and Journalism: The Case of Arab Media.- 10. A conditional offer. The strategies employed in the field of power in Morocco to control the press space.- 11. The Algerian press: deregulation under pressure The new forms of control or the "invisible hand" of the state.- 12. Tunisian Post-2011 Private Presses: Economic and Political Mutations.- 13. Fortune and misfortune of the Egyptian private press. Sociohistorical study of a place of production of information.