[ecrea] new e-book: Hard-Pressed, A quarter-century of media transition

Transitions is pleased to announce our latest e-book:

Hard-Pressed <http://Hard-Pressed%20>: A quarter-century of Central and 
Eastern Europe's media under the pressures of autocracy, corruption, and 
capitalism, with a foreword by Peter Gross.

The fall of communism brought with it expectations of an unfettered 
press safeguarding the young democracies of Central and Eastern Europe. 
But for the region's media, the past quarter-century has turned out to 
be much less uplifting. From oligarch-controlled television stations to 
politically partisan newspapers, from woeful ethical standards to 
outright corruption, the media often fall far short of acting as 
independent watchdogs over their societies, despite the existence of 
some scrappy publications and feisty reporters willing to uncover 
official wrongdoing and expose poor governance. If that weren't enough, 
the region's press has been hit hard by the same trends transforming the 
media around the world, including an explosion of alternative forms of 
entertainment, the growth of social media,  decreased advertising 
revenues associated with the rise of the Internet, and general economic 
malaise.

Hard-Pressed: A Quarter-Century of Central and Eastern Europe's Media 
Under the Pressures of Autocracy, Corruption, and Capitalism is a 
compilation of articles from TOL and Transitions, our print predecessor, 
tracing this halting transition over the past 20 years.

Transitions <http://www.tol.org> is a leading Internet magazine tracking 
events and developments in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia.

Peter Gross is the director of the University of Tennessee's School of 
Journalism and Electronic Media and one of the world's most foremost 
experts on the media in Central and Eastern Europe.


Jeremy Druker
Executive Director and Editor in Chief
Transitions (TOL) ¦ www.tol.org <http://www.tol.org>
(jeremy.druker /at/ tol.org) <mailto:(jeremy.druker /at/ tol.org)>