J.J. Robinson

JJ Robinson has worked as a journalist for 10 years, including four as editor of the Maldives' first independent English-language news outlet, Minivan News (meaning 'independent' in Dhivehi). He was the Maldives' Reuters correspondent and its Reporters Without Borders representative, and has appeared on the BBC, Radio Australia, Al Jazeera and others as a Maldives expert. He has guest-lectured on journalism and the Maldives at universities in Australia and Sweden, and appeared on regional freedom of expression advisory panels for the UN. Prior to the Maldives he worked for Information Age - a business/technology magazine in London - and a family-run newspaper in the Australian outback town of Narrabri.

He is a Fulbright scholar and recipient of the Alistair Cooke Award in Journalism. After receiving an MA from the Columbia School of Journalism in 2015, he worked with Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) and the Open Society Foundation studying how independent media outlets around the world innovate to survive. He also has a BA in Journalism with Honors in English from Charles Sturt University in Bathurst, Australia.