The organisers of the 11th Weekend Media Festival which will be held in the northern Adriatic town of Rovinj on September 21-23, on Tuesday presented the programme for this, the largest regional conference of professionals in the communication industry.

“This year’s festival has very interesting partners – France and Germany. The entire old Rovinj tobacco factory will be dressed in the spirit of urban Paris and Berlin, and visitors will be able to enjoy their culture, art and lifestyle,” the festival’s director Tomo Ricov said adding that they expect more than 5,000 visitors during the festival.

More than 140 speakers will hold lectures, panel discussions and workshops during the event.

The festival has a tradition of exploring changes on the media market, both on the local and global level, and the programme director, Nikola Vrdoljak, said this tradition would particularly come into focus during a panel discussion on restructuring the media market.

“We are witnessing a growing number of media acquisitions in the region, which has consequences on consumers, as well as policies of individual countries,” Vrdoljak said.

A lecture on the media coverage of the crisis in Agrokor, Croatia’s largest privately owned company which was taken over by state-appointed management after nearly collapsing in 2017 will be organised as well, Vrdoljak said.

The lecture will be aimed at discussing whether the media assisted or hampered the controversial law on state-appointed management, dubbed Lex Agrokor, which was drafted specifically to save the struggling conglomerate in 2017.

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