MediaRating: News server Romea.cz has been given the highest A rating for upholding journalistic standards

The MediaRating of the NFNZ is a tool for tracking how Czech domestic editorial boards are upholding basic journalistic norms. This most recent assessment focused on online news servers, print dailies and also magazines.

According to the methodology used by the NFNZ, several media outlets have improved their editorial work and their transparency vis-a-vis their readers. Those said to have improved are the Deník franchise, the Euro weekly, Forum24.cz, Reflex.cz and the RESPEKT weekly.

“A long-term problem continues to be the erasure of the boundaries between genres, which leads to an inability to distinguish news reporting from commentary,” the NFNZ said in a press release. News server Romea.cz, which concentrates on issues related to the Romani minority and on the fight against racism, was assessed for the first time this year.

The articles assessed were from October 2022 to August 2023 and the news server immediately was given the highest A ranking. That means Romea.cz upholds high journalistic standards, is transparent, and is professional in its approach to its content.

News server Romea.cz is one of the highest-quality, most reliable media outlets in the Czech Republic. “We are very glad to have been assessed by the NFZN and to have received the highest possible A ranking. News server Romea.cz has been ranked among the websites with original content and is among 18 websites with the highest possible ranking. We have also ended up in the company of media giants such as Seznam Zprávy, Deník N or Aktuálně.cz,” said the director of the ROMEA organization and the Editor-in-Chief of Romea.cz, Zdeněk Ryšavý.

“Being included in the assessment has made it possible for our news articles to be reprinted on the main page of Seznam.cz in what they call the Newsfeed. Naturally that is opening up a way for other readers to find us and increases the number of visitors to our server,” Ryšavý said.

The controversial ParlamentniListy.cz has slightly improved and received a B ranking. The reason for this is reportedly its change of owner, improved citation of sources, better identification of advertisements and the editors’ transparency.

The media publisher Mafra, which is associated with former Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, remains in a conflict of interest, as does the weekly Naše Pravda [Our Truth], which is connected with the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSČM). David Klimeš, Executive Director of the NFNZ, said the improved editorial work and transparency of many Czech media outlets send a positive signal at a time when the media in Central Europe are under pressure.

Klimeš warned that it would be a mistake to be satisfied with the fact that the Czech media are not under any fundamental political pressure today. “We take this to mean that after the era of Andrej Babiš, the media have gotten some room to take a breath, and they should use this space to achieve the highest possible quality and transparency. That’s the only way they will be able to resist pressure if times get worse. I’m glad the new MediaRating proves that many media outlets are doing their best to achieve that,” he said.

The NFNZ project assessing the upholding of fundamental journalistic norms has just completed its fourth year. The MediaRating is an independent, transparent, widely-recognized instrument for assessing editorial boards’ work, i.e., their upholding of fundamental journalistic standards and their increasing the media literacy of media consumers in the Czech Republic.

MediaRating provides an overview of how the analyzed media handle information and provide it to their readers, and it is also a guide for firms advertising with specific media outlets. It differentiates media for which the production of original content and the upholding of journalistic standards is a priority from those which just take content from other media, recycle it, and do their best to make money from it.

“The MediaRating of the NFNZ is based on three principles which we consider the foundation of professional journalistic work: Media transparency, honest referencing of sources, and working with content in a professional way,” the NFNZ press release said.