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A24 Media asks Africans: What's your story?
A24 Media asks Africans: What's your story?
The clamour of voices calling for “African solutions to African problems” has grown ever louder of late. As African journalists, this means telling our own stories, instead of having the continent reflected back to our readership through Western news agencies. But, in all this talk and theorising, something gets lost: We forget to take notice of people and organisations who are trying to do just that. Enter Salim Amin and A24 Media's “What's Your Story” project. By THERESA MALLINSON.
“What's Your Story” is the latest venture of A24 Media, which Salim Amin co-founded with Asif Sheik in 2008 as an online video news agency for African content. This project was an extension of his father's work at CameraPix, in which Amin and Sheikh both still play an executive role. Thus, the story behind the genesis of “What's Your Story” comprises several other stories – fitting for a website that intends to provide a platform for the many stories of Africa.
Amin's father was, of course, the legendary East African photojournalist Mohamed “Mo” Amin, who founded CameraPix in 1963 when he was just 20 years old. He died, tragically, in the hijacking of Ethiopian Airlines flight 961 in November 2006. In between, Amin senior covered a multitude of independence day celebrations, coups and civil wars in Africa, brought the 1984 Ethiopian famine to global attention and was awarded an MBE, among numerous other accolades.
Salim Amin begins his award-winning documentary, “Mo and Me”, by narrating: “For the last 10 years I have been on a journey to emerge from the shadows of a man who appeared to me, quite often, larger than life. Looking back now I can see it was all necessary, for me, him, and the work he had dedicated his life to.” And Amin junior's work is not merely a continuation of his father's work, but an extension. As well as taking over the reins at CameraPix, he founded the Mohamed Amin Foundation, to train young African journalists in television and film, in 1998 and A24 Media in 2008.
“The reason we started it was we felt there was a large gap in the market for good African content. It was not easily available; there was really no place for people to find it. They really didn't have a place where they could find quality content, as well as content that had been verified by a reputable news source,” Amin says.
Today, A24 Media partners with Al Jazeera and the BBC, among others. There are more than 2,000 features available from 40 countries. Crucial to A24 Media's philosophy, is paying its contributors decently, and fairly, for their work – a welcome move for African freelance journalists who perennially struggle to make ends meet. “[We wanted to] try to improve the lot of African freelance journalists on the continent – to give them a platform to showcase their work, to give them a connection with possible clients who would be interested in their work. I found it was always a problem for freelancers to maximise the revenue in African and globally,” says Amin. “We have a unique model in that we give 60% of revenue back to the contributors and, more importantly, they maintain copyright.”
As with any start-up, it hasn't always been smooth sailing. “It's been a challenging set-up. It's not easy with new media – things change all the time, you really have to get yourself established,” says Amin. “I think we're slowly getting there. We've got a lot of international partners, a lot of African broadcasters that pick up our content. A lot of the struggle has been getting ourselves known as content aggregators, not content producers.”
Amin's latest venture, “What's Your Story”, was born out of A24 Media's experiences on the continent. “We spent three years establishing our reliability and credibility in delivering professional content, and we realised we were not really catering to the people on this continent, or Africans in diaspora. There was not really an area or a space where people could come, talk, comment and give their opinion about some of the stories around what's happening in Africa.” Amin says. “Everywhere I've gone and travelled on the continent to promote A24 Media and Pan-African Media, I've always been asked this question: Why should someone in Nigeria be interested in Nairobi; why should someone in Joburg be interested in Juba? What are the connections we have? We have many different histories, philosophies, backgrounds. Where can we connect this identity?”
Amin's father was, of course, the legendary East African photojournalist Mohamed “Mo” Amin, who founded CameraPix in 1963 when he was just 20 years old. He died, tragically, in the hijacking of Ethiopian Airlines flight 961 in November 2006. In between, Amin senior covered a multitude of independence day celebrations, coups and civil wars in Africa, brought the 1984 Ethiopian famine to global attention and was awarded an MBE, among numerous other accolades.
Salim Amin begins his award-winning documentary, “Mo and Me”, by narrating: “For the last 10 years I have been on a journey to emerge from the shadows of a man who appeared to me, quite often, larger than life. Looking back now I can see it was all necessary, for me, him, and the work he had dedicated his life to.” And Amin junior's work is not merely a continuation of his father's work, but an extension. As well as taking over the reins at CameraPix, he founded the Mohamed Amin Foundation, to train young African journalists in television and film, in 1998 and A24 Media in 2008.
“The reason we started it was we felt there was a large gap in the market for good African content. It was not easily available; there was really no place for people to find it. They really didn't have a place where they could find quality content, as well as content that had been verified by a reputable news source,” Amin says.
Today, A24 Media partners with Al Jazeera and the BBC, among others. There are more than 2,000 features available from 40 countries. Crucial to A24 Media's philosophy, is paying its contributors decently, and fairly, for their work – a welcome move for African freelance journalists who perennially struggle to make ends meet. “[We wanted to] try to improve the lot of African freelance journalists on the continent – to give them a platform to showcase their work, to give them a connection with possible clients who would be interested in their work. I found it was always a problem for freelancers to maximise the revenue in African and globally,” says Amin. “We have a unique model in that we give 60% of revenue back to the contributors and, more importantly, they maintain copyright.”
As with any start-up, it hasn't always been smooth sailing. “It's been a challenging set-up. It's not easy with new media – things change all the time, you really have to get yourself established,” says Amin. “I think we're slowly getting there. We've got a lot of international partners, a lot of African broadcasters that pick up our content. A lot of the struggle has been getting ourselves known as content aggregators, not content producers.”
Amin's latest venture, “What's Your Story”, was born out of A24 Media's experiences on the continent. “We spent three years establishing our reliability and credibility in delivering professional content, and we realised we were not really catering to the people on this continent, or Africans in diaspora. There was not really an area or a space where people could come, talk, comment and give their opinion about some of the stories around what's happening in Africa.” Amin says. “Everywhere I've gone and travelled on the continent to promote A24 Media and Pan-African Media, I've always been asked this question: Why should someone in Nigeria be interested in Nairobi; why should someone in Joburg be interested in Juba? What are the connections we have? We have many different histories, philosophies, backgrounds. Where can we connect this identity?”
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