EBTICAR-Media is supporting innovative projects run by online information stakeholders in the Arab World

Development of the online media is profoundly changing production methods and the ways in which information is accessed throughout the world. Thanks to European Union funding amounting to EUR 1.5 million over three years (2014-2016), EBTICAR-Media is providing solid support for the most dynamic stakeholders within this historic movement that is now sweeping through the Arab World in particular. EBTICAR-media (standing for E-Booster for Technical and Innovative Contents in the Arab Region, with "ebitcar" also meaning "innovation" in Arabic) has set itself the target of monitoring the development and organisation of online media in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Palestinian territories, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon through the award of subsidies for the most innovative projects.

EBTICAR-media is aimed at institutions, companies, associations and community groups that offer online news content and wish to strengthen, enrich or structure their offering.

The projects selected by EBTICAR-Media will aim to strengthen the editorial, technical or financial competence of online media stakeholders. The deadline for applications is 8 March 2015. Those heading up the preselected projects will be invited to attend a meeting in Beirut in June 2015, where they will be able to present their project to a panel of judges. Ultimately, the chosen projects may each receive a subsidy of between EUR 30,000 and 60,000 per institution.

A total of 11 projects have already been selected, following the first call for projects launched by EBTICAR-media in April 2014: Arablog, ARIJ Middle East/North Africa Research & Data Desk (Jordan), Inkyfada (Tunisia), Revamping Mashallah News (Lebanon), FRAME / Collective Photo Documentary (Lebanon), New Syrian Voices (Syria), Innova Tunisia (Tunisia), Radio M (Algeria), Tunisie Bondy Blog & Speak Out Tunisia (Tunisia), and Vizualizing Impact (Lebanon).
To discover more about the projects, click here.

To access the full text of the EBTICAR-Media call for projects and the application form, please visit the website.

EBTICAR-media is run by CFI in partnership with the Babelmed Mediterranean portal (Italy) and the Samir Kassir and Anna Lindh Foundations (Lebanon and Egypt, respectively), with technical support from Expertise France.

This initiative forms part of the "4M – journalism and social media" programme that CFI has been developing over the last four years in the Arab World, Africa, the Balkans, the Caucasus and South-East Asia, and which offers workshops, training courses, advice and monitoring of not only technical but also editorial aspects to traditional online media or pure players.