The Novomedia Journalists Association held the 7th Annual journalist conference in Donetsk, Ukraine on November 5th and 6th. This conference gathered 130 journalists from all over Ukraine and guests from Russian Federation, Byelorussia and Latvia. Online broadcasting enabled 60 more journalists to take part in the conference.

Special Guests

The Novomedia president Ruslan Kukharchuk set the top aim of the conference to unite everyone’s efforts to create the christian informational infrastructure which consists of the people with the understanding of the different media purposes and inspired the participants to act during the 2011.

Having the tradition, Novomedia invited two special guests to the conference: the Moscow Times chief editor Andrew McChesney and pastor Gennadiy Mokhnenko who is also the anchorman of the Drugaya Perspectiva (“Alternative Perspective”) and Dva Portfelya (“Two Briefcases”) TV programs. 

The Andrew’s first speech took the listeners to the Jesus time Palestine. He asked what could the chief editor of the biggest newspaper in the country print on the front page the day Jesus was crucified? He offered 5 articles and proved that being purely professional no editor let any news about death of the teacher like Jesus appear on the front page. Especially if two more men died with him. Though this was the top news of the day. Nothing else could save people but the death and resurrection of the Son of God. Andrew convinced everyone to talk about Christ directly and between the lines in their articles. 

In the second block Andrew shared his experience and spoke of how the Moscow Times works. He answered questions and noted that his working day begins with prayer and it was God who helped the newspaper survive the crisis. 

Pastor, journalist and anchorman Gennadiy Mokhnenko drove the public hard with his seminars. “The work of the press center in our Good Changes Church is one of the fundamental reasons of our success” he said. Pastor Gennadiy Mokhnenko is known with his extensive social work with troubled children. He revealed the cause of the informational fiasco of many churches and called the media workers to unconventional thinking and non-standard methods. 

Home Assignment

The second day was more practical as new Novomedia projects were presented and many participants from different towns and cities shared their success in the cooperation with the local media. 

Tatyna Kulikovskaya, the member of the Novomedia board of directors, called the participants to work on specific projects. The public voted to make the 2011 the Year of family in their media and proceeded to small groups to work out the specific plans within the topic.  

Valentina Kritskaya, lawyer, journalist and the member of the Novomedia board of directors, sorted through the paragraphs of the law on protection of public morality. Than Denis Semenyuk, the head of the Internet Department of the Association, offered four methods of time management.

At the end of the conference everyone received the document of the decisions made. This is the sheet with the home assignment which was said of in the beginning of the conference. The participants had forty minutes to fill in the form and make the decision on the direction of his or her work next year. 

Pleasant Things

In the evening of the first day a video connection with Sergey Velbovets was established and he answered some questions. He is the member of the Novomedia board of directors and currently he develops media ministry in Canada. 

Traditionally participants took part in the TV and radio programs display and received professional advice how to make their programs better and more professional. 

Every hour there was a lottery and speakers gave the participants different pleasant gifts. 

“Discussions will not transform the media! Receive your home assignment for the next year!” This was the keynote and slogan of the 7th Annual Novomedia Conference.