Now, northern network

THIRTY-SEVEN freelances working in the North West, the North East or Yorkshire and Humberside gathered in Middlesbrough on 19 February for a useful exchange of views and information. The meeting was initiated by NUJ Teesside Branch, and found itself focusing on the challenges and opportunities of the new electronic media.

Mike Holderness and Martin Jenkinson introduced the subject as a writer and a photographer respectively. Freelance Organiser Bernie Corbett described the negotiations with the Guardian and other publications, and Mike Hally stepped in at short notice to describe the Northern Freelance Network and its success in stopping the BBC's slide down to the Great Wen.

Participants were heartened to hear how well the NFN and the Editorial Photo UK experiments in online organising were working. It is certainly time for writers elsewhere to launch similar initiatives.

© Mike Holderness

• Northern freelances get results Mar 2000
• Northern Freelance Network launch Jan 2000