Den celebrated the 18th anniversary of our website on February 7! During these 18 (!) years, it went through a difficult development path from the electronic version of the newspaper to a large-scale independent platform for discussion. The website has offered only the most interesting projects, some of which marked the first or the best implementations of new ideas in Ukraine. For example, “Museums Online” is an unprecedented project, offering anyone an opportunity to visit a number of Ukrainian museums, examine each exhibit, listen to tour guides... without ever leaving home. Meanwhile, by developing such projects as “Ukraine’s Family Album” and “Ukraine’s Intellectual Map,” we show that everyone can fill gaps in Ukraine’s history by writing down their family’s story or revealing memorable buildings erected in their city or village... All these projects are satellites of our major web project called “Ukraine Incognita.”
Den’s website always has on offer interesting and topical photo stories, video scenes and conversations with interesting people (both presented by Den-TV), original blogs, full versions of interviews and texts that have had short versions published in the paper, infographics, the leisure bulletin, and more. If you start your day with our website, you are assured of getting everything important; this is confirmed by our regular readers who have joined in the congratulations on the occasion of Den’s electronic version’s birthday.
COMMENTARIES
Yurii KOSTIUCHENKO, scientist, expert in aerospace research and applied safety issues:
“I cannot imagine anyone failing to take heart and become excited at smelling the odor of fresh ink and feeling that incomparable touch of a fresh newspaper page in their hands. At least, I do not know such people. Still, we must be realistic and recognize that the amount of information in today’s world is growing, and, relying on traditional media only, we cannot master even a small part of the daily flow of news, opinions, and analytics. We consume more information in a month these days than the average inhabitant of Europe received in their lifetime in the Enlightenment era, encompassing the 17th and 18th centuries. Even though we have learned to process information by almost 60 percent faster, it does not help much, so the humankind and society need significant changes in how media and public communication tools work. This does not mean in the slightest that the print media are living on the borrowed time, just as the theater did not end with the advent of cinema, and painting did not die with the invention of photography, but a format expansion is in order. Moreover, it offers new opportunities for the traditional printed media.
“The media go beyond purely informational functions in our age. Their objectives widen, as they work to ensure human adaptation to changes in habitat. To do this, the media have to become flexible and effective tools of communication, including multilateral communication. To achieve this, the print media, for example, branch out into other formats, including TV, radio, and most importantly, the Internet. Here, the reader is transformed from the mere consumer of information services to an active participant in the information process, an agent of the communication space. We communicate with each other, look at the world not only through the eyes of journalists or editors, but also by forming a joint multi-dimensional information environment, with the media’s role limited to setting general coordinates, criteria, and maintaining quality standards. It is a fundamentally, qualitatively different concept of information space formation, it means creating public communication tools of the future. This should be seen as an important prerequisite for social progress. This is why we must welcome the popular print media’s branching out into the Internet environment. Of course, it applies only if we do not transform the digital space into an environment filled with propaganda and information warfare. But that is totally another story...
“Speaking of Den’s Internet service, my sympathies as a reader are with the ‘Ukraine Incognita’ project. In my opinion, this is one of the best cultural and educational projects in today’s media environment, which aims at the general reader and has content which is largely dependent on user contributions.
“Certainly, Den’s pages on social networks are very important and interesting for the social adaptation drive, especially the already popular Solo... group on Facebook. This group has seen an interesting intellectual environment emerging around it, separate communities being created and new ideas forming. Actually, to be not just a distributor of imposed stereotypes, but rather a laboratory for new ideas – this is a perfect job for a quality media outlet.
“The path to success must look this way now, involving permanent dialog in the maze of digital networks.”
Natalia HOSHYLYK, Associate Professor of English Philology at Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University:
“I have been a reader of Den, my favorite newspaper, for eight years, and my first encounter was precisely with the newspaper’s online version. One of the challenges of the modern world, both in Ukraine and elsewhere, is information, its amount and quality, making quality content paramount in modern journalism, as it contributes to the development of society and makes people think. Den is one of the few strong points of the Ukrainian society, with access to it facilitated by the publication’s multimodality.
“Among Den’s Internet projects, my favorites are Den-TV, letting one see and hear everything that is left out of the newspaper itself, and ‘Ukraine Incognita,’ in particular its ‘Museums Online’ subproject, that reveals and shows to the global community and Ukrainians themselves the Ukraine which they have forgotten or never knew, but which is the real one nonetheless.
“We often hear that the Internet is full of garbage, and finding quality information there is impossible. Den’s readers disprove this pronouncement by their own example, call for greater attention to one’s information hygiene, and invite everyone to read and watch Den!”
