This article presents the attitudinal response of rural villagers in Papua New Guinea to mobile telephony, based on a threshold study made during the early stages of its adoption. The research indicates that the introduction of mobile telecommunications has generally been viewed positively, with mobile phones affording social interaction with loved ones. Nonetheless, negative concerns have been strongly felt, notably financial costs and anxiety about mobile phones aiding in the coordination of extramarital liaisons and criminal activities. The communities investigated previously had scant access to modern communication technologies, some still using traditional means such as wooden slit drums, known locally as garamuts. The expansion of mobile network coverage has introduced into communal village life the capability to communicate dyadically and privately at a distance. Investigation into the adoption of mobile phones thus promotes understanding about traditional means of communication and notions of public and private interactions.

A programme organised by the author for journalism students to do practical work overseas has seen small groups engaged in intercultural learning and working as foreign correspondents for campus-based media outlets. Since 2000, 60 students have joined nine tours of 10–20 days in nine countries of Europe and the Asia-Pacific region. They obtain credit for a full elective subject, e.g. an individual study unit, and may negotiate additional credits.  This investigation concludes that such programmes can occcupy a valuable place in core curricula; relate to increasing demand for 'real world' learning and internationalisation, and can be integrated into degree structures without undue stain on resources.

This article updates research by the writer on overseas reporting trips for Australian Journalism students, conducted since 2000. It describes changing educational contexts, with expanded internationalisation and work integrated learning. A precursor of both, the trips project provides a Faculty-level model for implementing such changes. Previous research, to 2008, recorded 60 students making nine field trips, to Southeast Asia, China, Papua New Guinea or Europe. Participants working as foreign correspondents for campus-based media outlets, would apply that experience to theoretical work, e.g. on international journalism or inter-cultural issues. The research has supported arguments for internationalisation of the curriculum, positing that intensified experience will concentrate the mind, improve skills and stimulate reflection. The present work goes further, with more individual and detailed probing of student responses. As a case study, nine participants travelling to South-east Asia and Europe in 2012 documented their experience and their reflective work. The investigation concludes such travel programmes can be highly effective in core learning.

A reporting field trip by Australian journalism students to New Caledonia and Vanuatu in mid-2014 produced markedly differing impressions of the neighbouring island societies, linked to their 'independence' status-one as an integrated territory of France, the other as an independent state. The field trip, one of a series from the Queensland University of Technology, aimed at developing reporting skills through work in unaccustomed territory, especially different cultural settings. Over 17 days, six students and the coordinator, and author of this article, generated 18 feature-length reports for online outlets and a radio documentary. The article synthesises the collected work from the field, producing a thematic statement of findings. It records broad consensus in New Caledonia in favour of enacting the Matignon and Noumea Accords on independence, while noting an undercurrent of unresolved conflicts. It characterises public life in Vanuatu in terms of a democratic spirit, and the invocation of traditional ties within society, as the country grapples with problems of development and impacts of the outside world. This work is interpretative, concerned with identifying processes underlying events in daily news. It is proposed as a first step towards a scholarly construction of meta-analyses of the interpretative and informative power of journalistic reporting.

Pacific Journalism Review has consistently, at a good standard, honoured its 1994 founding goal: to be a credible peer-reviewed journal in the Asia-Pacific region, probing developments in journalism and media, and supporting journalism education. Global, it considers new media and social movements; 'regional', it promotes vernacular media, human freedoms and sustainable development. Asking how it developed, the method for this article was to research the archive, noting authors, subject matter, themes. The article concludes that one answer is the journal's collegiate approach; hundreds of academics, journalists and others, have been invited to contribute. Second has been the dedication of its one principal editor, Professor David Robie, always, somehow providing resources-at Port Moresby, Suva, and now Auckland-with a consistent editorial stance. Eclectic, not partisan, it has nevertheless been vigilant over rights, such as. monitoring the Fiji coups d'etat. Watching through a media lens, it follows a 'Pacific way', handling hard information through understanding and consensus. It has 237 subscriptions indexed to seven databases. Open source, it receives more than 1000 site visits weekly. With 'clientele' mostly in Australia, New Zealand and 'Oceania', it extends much further afield. From 1994 to 2014, 701 articles and reviews were published, now more than 24 scholarly articles each year.