Moderator of round table discussions
As a moderator and interviewer, my goal is to make the discussion as engaging as possible. I try to research and coordinate the speakers’ points of view days before the event, in order to be able to later back up the discussion with interesting questions, statistics and examples.
At the end of October 2022, Alfa-media—assisted by the Secretary of State for Telecommunications and Digital Infrastructure (Department of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation)—organised a day of reflection called “Media literacy in the new Audiovisual Communications Law”. I had the opportunity to be the moderator of the round table “Media and information literacy: the current situation in Spain”.
Media and information literacy now appears in Spanish legislation, specifically under Article 10 of the Audiovisual Communications Law, which was passed in July 2022. All video-sharing platform operators and providers must now incorporate new skills and competencies relating to digital content and entertainment into their programmes.
However, those in the industry are unsure about how exactly this article is to materialise and develop. They’re especially wondering how it will affect operators if there is currently no corresponding sanctioning mechanism in place to deal with breaches. This is why these days of reflection are so necessary right now.
At the first more formal round table discussion, the need for a permanent dialogue between all those involved in the sector was clear. At the second round table talk, representatives from platforms for the elderly, the national cybersecurity institute INCIBE, the fact-checking organisation EFE Verifica, the national union of journalists FAPE and the association of media users AUC all agreed on the importance of reducing the digital gap among people over 60, the need to strengthen digital security across the board, and the importance of emphasising the fundamental role of educators and journalists. One of the conclusions of the discussion was a call for robust training in order to learn how to critically evaluate digital content, regardless of how it’s presented or on what platform it appears.