This meeting within the project SEE Media Observatory took place in Novi Sad on 23 April 2013.

National consultations on «South East European Media Observatory» project were held on 23rd of April 2013, in Novi Sad School of Journalism. After short brief of project goals and activities, prof Ph.D. Dubravka Valić Nedeljković and Ph.D. Jovanka Matić, who are both researchers on this project, led discussion on how important is to contribute in developing this project strategy.
Participants of discussion were MR Kalman Kuntić, Provincial Secretariat for Culture and Public Information of AP Vojvodina, MR Atila Marton, Deputy Managing Editor of the Public service Vojvodine and Samo Zjak, director of Slovakian magazine Hlas Ludu in Vojvodina.

At the beginning of meeting Jovanka Matić said that we are facing with lack of dialogue between the public and the public service. She also said that by participating in this meeting and also in developing project strategy we are making this project progress more effective.
The main topic of discussion was media ownership. Participants discuss research which was done in the last few years, what was done within those research and what should be done in the future.

"The transformation of the media system in the whole of Eastern Europe, including Serbia was not successful and has brought serious problems that are reflected in a poor transformation of ownership, elimination of multilingual media more dependent position of the media in relation to political and economic power centers», said Dubravka Valić Nedeljković adding that state is not capable or interested in changing anything at the moment. Political parties are comfortable with the status quo, and with weakened and dependent media. At the same time, journalists are not willing to push more for change because of previous collapse and also because of how little credibility the media has.
About media freedom MR Kalman Kuntić said:"Freedom of the media is very debatable and depends on the owner». MR Kalman also pointed how important is the role of CSO in supporting journalists to continue with fighting for media integrity and their rights as journalists.

As Vojvodian is known for its multiculturalism MR Samo Zjak was talking about minority media and its role in society. He was also pointing on problems that they are facing mainly also about media ownership and political influence, which is as he said even more influential in minorities media.
Through analysing other research results they were making conclusions on what should be done during Media Observatory project. Participants noted a conflict in the media community about the direction of further media reforms. They offered several recommendations about topics which should be checked during project researches. Some of them are public-private partnerships and different models of funding at national and local level. They also pointed to the lack of professional media resources, the effectiveness of self-regulatory practices and lack of knowledge of journalistic ethics.
The participants called for more systematic and longer-term media research, introduction of new methods and techniques, as well as independent research consortium which should not only come from the field of university and institute, but also from non-governmental organizations.