Let the Journalists Live

What distinguishes the Golden Pen media contest from other competitions that identify who’s who in the media is, above all, its approach to selecting the best. Here, winners are determined by readers, listeners, and viewers themselves rather than by a highbrow jury. The contest organized by the National Journalists’ Union of Ukraine and the Center for Socio-Political Technologies is based on an annual sociological survey that gauges the media preferences of those questioned. So it is only natural that a significant part of the questions The Day put to Golden Pen President Larysa Medina and executive secretary Leonid Pohranychny when they visited our newspaper were about the fairness of the competition. For it is no secret that the criteria which guide experts (impartiality, authenticity, etc.) and the main criterion of media consumers of whether or not something is interesting or uninteresting can sometimes bring about highly contradictory results. Besides, as local practice shows, one political situation or another can have a fairly noticeable influence on the media preferences of media consumers. So, in this respect, it does not seem right to determine contest winners by the results of annual surveys (unfortunately, the organizers lacked funds for more regular surveys). At the same time, what makes this contest precisely such a unique event is an understanding of the tastes of readers or viewers. Another detail: prizes are awarded in one of the ten nominations not to a specific individual but to the best feature (in the case of newspapers) or program. Besides, the organizers of the Golden Pen say they try not only to name the best media personalities but also arrange a party for journalists, give them a regular opportunity to socialize and even make friends. Let us admit this is important, given the absence of corporate feeling among the Ukrainian masters of the pen and microphone.