Al Jazeera English...Setting The News Agenda

The competition is on folks...It is on!
In its first day of broadcasting, Al Jazeera English has managed not only to have a news agenda of its own but to actually top up major news agendas in the world.

America is so scared of it that it closed its market so Al Jazeera won't get any distribution in the U.S.

The BBC is definitely taking notice and not without reason.
Even when it was just an idea Al Jazeera English was bound as an imminent threat to the veteran network. BBC and major world media players have taken control of informing the world about the Middle East as far as anyone can remember.

They had a say in what the west knew and did not necessarily need to know about the Middle East. Even when Al Jazeera Arabic came out, clips of it were shown through western media.

Now,however, Al Jazeera English promises a fresh prespective on world news. Voices from the Middle East will be heard in the language of the west hopefully portraying a fairer and a more genuine picture of this part of the world without losing its journalistic balance.

Only on its first day Al Jazeera English has managed to tread into territorries its much older rivals haven't touched upon.

An exclusive interview with Joseph Kabila after his presidential election win in Congo, special reports from Darfur ,Mogadishu and Harare to name a few.

The thing I loved the most were the headlines of News Hour that went from Doha to washington to London then back to Doha.

The news content was balanced and comprehensive and until now it's lived up to all expectations.

Yet, huge specualtions surround the channel.
Will it keep up the momentum? Does it really have a new perspective or is it a way of spreading an Islamic agenda to a western audience? If it's funded by the Emir (head of state) of Qatar, how independent is it? Can it critisize the Qatari government for instance?

Whatever the answers to those questions are, Al Jazeera English, less than 24 hours old,is already giving the media big boys a run for their money and has everyone tuned-in.

Articles about Al Jazeera English:
A new Channel Arrives
Al Jazeera Hits Airwaves
Cairo Freeze Blog
Al Jazeera English