Latest news from 360 - Changing the World by Degrees.

I found this story on the World Service News on Monday:
'The British Development Charity, Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO), says the
overwhelming majority of the British public believes the developing world
exists in a permanent state of doom and disaster. When VSO asked more than a
thousand adults what came to mind when they thought of the developing world,
more than eighty percent of interviewees came up with very negative
associations, such as war, famine and starvation. The charity puts much of
the blame for these attitudes on vivid television images on news programmes.
VSO argues the need for much more balanced attitudes because its says
stereotypes and prejudice are dangerous for race relations in Britain and at
the level of global politics.'

Is the story true? Do we have mainly negative views of the Third World? I
have to say that in the last year, working as an African reporter for the
World Service, the stories that come in do reflect that point of view.

Maybe it's time to do something about it... In a nutshell, 360 is trying to
address that image - and show that where there are problems, world-wide,
people are working hard to solve them.

Slow but steady progress has been the theme for the 360 site over Christmas.
Plenty more stories are coming in to our prototype site about efforts that
people are making world-wide to make life a little better for everyone. Just
a reminder - the site is (or will be) a 'Good News' site which supports
projects that fit into stories which have relevance to Kofi Annan's United
Nations four key challenges to address the humanitarian needs of the world:

• Eradicating poverty.

• Fighting against AIDS and other preventable diseases.

• Resolving armed conflicts.

• Protecting the environment.

It's also going to be a chance for people who take part in it to 'prove'
themselves as a researcher, photographer or even a film cameraman or woman.
We'll be putting up photographs and even video of selected projects - shot
by 360 researchers.

And I'm talking to the news editor of BBC4 - the new channel which will
concentrate on news and documentaries and projects such as ours. They are
interested in using 360 as a resource for news stories so, you never know!
Something you post up might get you onto the TV news.

You can see how far we've got on the 360 site on h2g2 but the proper 360 site is going
to be up in mid-January under the URL www.bbc.co.uk/360, when people can join
it independently of h2g2. Currently a lot of people out there can't cope
with the complications of registering on h2g2 before they post on 360.

If you can think of a story but aren't sure if it's suitable for the site,
then post it anyway! We aren't only looking for state of the art stories.

One of my favourites so far is 'ChocAid' which sells Belgian chocolate and
gives a percentage of profits to Third World projects.

Their motto is:

'Eat Chocolate - End World Hunger.'

Thanks!

MaggyW

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