A journalistic approach to the human condition.

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A Report on Reporting on Bangladesh // Zur Berichterstattung über Bangladesch

November 17th 2024 | #Bangladesh #Deutsch #English #Fotography #Report

/ Deutsche version weiter unten /

As you might have noticed, I had the rare opportunity to visit Bangladesh this year in the context of a press trip organized by the German association for the United Nations. I was equipped with my microphone, camera and laptop, some years experience and a rough idea of what I was getting into - and it turned out completely different from anything I could expect - even though I even prepared myself by already diving into one of the large topics beforehand, the Rohingya Refugee Situation. Little did I know then, that in the end, I'd tell the story of a young man who was almost murdered by Bangladesh police, for the crime of going to school. If you listen to any of my stories from Bangladesh, that is the most important one. Here are some more...

/ Deutsch /

Wie ihr vielleicht mitbekommen habt, hatte ich dieses Jahr die seltene Gelegenheit, Bangladesch im Rahmen einer von der Deutschen Gesellschaft für die Vereinten Nationen organisierten Pressereise zu besuchen. Ausgerüstet mit Mikrofon, Kamera und Laptop, einigen Jahren Erfahrung und einer groben Vorstellung davon, worauf ich mich einlasse, kam es ganz anders als erwartet - obwohl ich mich schon im Vorfeld mit einem der großen Themen, der Rohingya Refugee Situation, beschäftigt hatte. Damals ahnte ich noch nicht, dass ich am Ende die Geschichte eines jungen Mannes erzählen würde, der von der Polizei in Bangladesch fast ermordet wurde, [weil er zur Schule ging] (https://radiocorax.de/kein-ende-in-sicht/). Wenn Sie sich eine meiner Geschichten aus Bangladesch anhören, ist das die wichtigste. Hier sind noch einige mehr...

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Reflections of Modernism

November 8th 2024 | #Armenia #Civil Society #English #Feminism #Fotography

The world is a crazy place, but windows - you find them everywhere. Currently, I'm looking at quite similar windows in Zagreb (more on Zagreb at a later date), but the architecture of the socialist world reborn as capitalist societies is quite universal. Here we see a postmodern glass facade reflecting an old soviet building block in Yerevan, the capital city of Armenia.

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A window to the sky // Ein Fenster in den Himmel

July 5th 2024 | #Deutsch #English #Fotography

/ Deutsch weiter unten /

The play of lights along this art installation next to the Hamburg city hall looks like a boring postmodern small tower, but standing inside and looking up...

I'm also quite happy with the pictures for the audio city tours that Radio Corax did in Hamburg. There's one on more focused on the city itself, where I managed to capture the juxtaposition of the old, historic Gängeviertel and it's surrounding postmodern urban landscape in the early morning sun. The second audio city tour focuses more on political struggles, so it made sense to use an image of the original graffiti, which has become a well-known slogan in the German autonomous scene.

/ Deutsch /

Das Lichterspiel dieser Kunstinstallation neben dem Hamburger Rathaus sieht aus wie ein langweiliges postmodernes Türmchen, aber von Innen mit Blick nach oben...

Auch mit den Bildern für die Audio-Stadtführungen, die Radio Corax in Hamburg gemacht hat, bin ich recht zufrieden. Es gibt eine, die sich mehr auf die Stadt selbst konzentriert, wo es mir gelungen ist, das Nebeneinander des alten, historischen Gängeviertels und der umgebenden postmodernen Stadtlandschaft in der frühen Morgensonne einzufangen. Die zweite Audio-Stadtführung konzentriert sich mehr auf politische Kämpfe, daher war es sinnvoll, ein Bild des ursprünglichen Graffitis zu verwenden, das zu einem bekannten Spruch in der deutschen autonomen Szene geworden ist.

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A fire salamander in the forest

June 17th 2024 | #Deutsch #English #Fotography

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The Mudéjar Courtyard of the Real Alcázar in Sevilla

April 8th 2024 | #Deutsch #English #Fotography #Spain

A small cut-out of the Mudéjar style part of the Real Alcázar de #Sevilla in #Spain. This part was built in the 14th Century by Pedro I, whose life I recommend reading up on, as it's quite a tale. The Mudéjar style itself is an interesting choice, as the Catholic conquerors destroyed the original Palace of the Muslim era in Al-Ándalus to later copy the same architecture and even had craftsmen from the Muslim Nasrid Dynasty in Granada help with the construction.

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Paper Cut Audio Editing for Radio Journalism

April 1st 2024 | #English #Open Source

tl;dr: It's no longer necessary to slowly listen to audio for editing interviews, you can do it with simple text files. Work as fast as you can read!

There is now a way to edit (automatically generated) audio transcripts in a text editor like Vim(!) and then tell the computer to apply all the changes in the text to the corresponding audio(s). No more slow cuts in audio tools like Audacity/Tenacity or painful transcriptions by hand. Instead fast, efficient and nerdy. This changes my radio production workflow fundamentally. And the best part is, we don't need expensively licensed software from some startup to do it, it's possible with open source tools that are easily available and adaptable to our specific needs.

Disclaimer: The following text describes a workflow that might seem daunting for people who don't use linux or have never opened a command line interface. I've tried to make it an interesting read anyway, for the less technically inclined, you can stick to part I and III, just skip part II.

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The Riverside of the Brahmaputra

March 5th 2024 | #Bangladesh #Deutsch #English #Fotography

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Bauhaus in Dessau

February 4th 2024 | #Deutsch #English #Fotography

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Daily Driving the Pinephone Pro

January 29th 2024 | #Digital Rights #English #Open Source

A Pinephone Pro running SXMO on postmarketOS tl;dr: I've used the Pinephone Pro running postmarketOS with SXMO for long trips and as a main phone for a while. I love the freedom the Pinephone Pro gives me to work with FOSS software for so many things and that it helps me to elude the smartphone doom spiral. I hate that I still feel bad using it as a phone (terrible audio) and that it constantly has annoying glitches everywhere. But the feeling when something suddenly works because someone was so awesome to implement it is great every time the software matures. I hope those days are near where this moment comes for call audio, battery life and camera support.

That being said, here's some background, what works, where it glitches and what you can expect from linux on this mobile phone.

Update 2024-06-23: I've switched to stable v23.06. due to a bug with the disk encryption. Also I now recommend using cronie for reliable cronjobs, as it deals better with suspend, and I've found a way to bypass reboots after modem crashes.

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Armenia between Change and Apathy

April 7th 2023 | #Armenia #Civil Society #Deutsch #English #Feature

(deutsche version weiter unten)

The Cascades of Yerevan, that important tourist hotspot on any sightseeing tour of the city, are also quite symbolic of politics and society in Armenia. Elegance meets evening spectacle here in a Soviet-style monumentality that ends abruptly in a construction site, unfinished and also sold to an investor who promised the completion of the site.

Die Kaskaden in Jerewan bei Nacht und das Gespenst eines Strommasts. Grafik: Lente/RadioCorax (CC BY-NC-SA) But every new crisis in the country is a welcome reason to delay further investment. From the top of the cascades, in good weather, the view would fall on Mount Ararat, Armenia's holy mountain - which today lies in Turkey. The border: closed. In this place in Yerevan, social problems and international conflicts unfold in all directions, like cables on one of the city's electricity poles. An exploration of the reality of life and perspectives for the people of Armenia.

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