Recent Stories
-
Opportunity rather than threat
Too many journalists still see new media as a threat. It's Google's fault we're slashing jobs, they'd say. If it wasn't for the Internet, we'd still have a business model and good journalism.
This ignores media consolidation and a focus on a brand of objectivity that isn't honest. Presenting two extreme points of view on an issue can be part of a story but it should never be the story.
It just isn't news that lefties and wingnuts disagree with each other, but that's really the ONLY story you're getting day in and day out from cable news. They say this, but they say that. Implied in this dichotomous approach is that one side is correct and the other side wrong. In fact, it's quite possible for no one to be right or for everyone to be correct about some things and incorrect about others.
Conflict journalism is easy journalism. Community journalism entrepreneurs are finding new markets because they refuse to divorce honesty from the news. They refuse to be lazy. They refuse to suggest that they all of the answers or that they have any answers. They are not content to say that once they have laid out the problem in 40 inches that their work is done.
They are willing to live as journalists, to answer the secular vocation.
-
Where's the New Old Guard?
With the announcement of Carl Kasell's mostly-retiredment: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=45&aid=173978 it leaves me to wonder who is or if anyone can replace the individual institutions in media.
Couric for Rather, Gibson for Jennings, Williams for Brokaw...notice anything? Case by case, there has been some serious loss of cache. It's not Katie Couric's fault that media are fragmenting. Current anchors are often excited to point out ______ would never make it today. Blank being Cronkite or even Murrow.
Ok, maybe Murrow would still make it, but the basic idea is people who are more about content than package are supposedly winning out now.
Kids today.
I don't know if I buy it. Cronkite probably would make it today. He wouldn't be the singular, shared experience that he was. Something lost, something gained. Maybe you should focus on being your own, personal Cronkite instead of bemoaning the fragmenting of identity politics into...several identities politics.
-
SPDY Delivery
Google sorta kinda announced the creation of an entirely new internet (http://dev.chromium.org/spdy/spdy-whitepaper).
It probably comes as no surprise to people that Google is trying to make the internet faster, but that they have a new protocol to replace HyperText Transfer Protocol is interesting.
What kinds of revolutions will it take for browsers and networks to utilize SPeeDY? Dunno.
If it creates a new tier online, newspapers had darned sure better be in the top tier and had probably better figure out how to monetize the new version of their sites when the times comes.
-
Controversy Continues As FCC Votes Unanimously To Consider Net Neutrality Rules
Anyone optimistic about potential new FCC rules? Concerned? What kind of approach to net neutrality will be best for journalism?
From Mediapost:
Controversy Continues As FCC Votes Unanimously To Consider Net Neutrality Rules
The Federal Communications Commission voted unanimously on Thursday to consider Chairman Julius Genachowski's proposal that the agency enact net neutrality regulations.
But the two Republican members of the commission said they disagreed with much of the substance of the rules, which would generally prohibit broadband service providers from impeding traffic online.
-
The biggest debate no one's talking about
White Space Internet on Gizmodo
Gizmodo is someone, I guess, but in the last few months of gizmo/google/iphone/balloon loan/balloon boy news, when was the last time you heard about white space in the TV band being used for Wi-Fi access?
I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's not if the TV band is used for Internet access it's when and how. That seems to be the debate between Computer-Tech and the National Association of Broadcasters.
As a tech nerd and former television reporter. I'm torn. To regulate or not to regulate. On the one hand, deregulation seems to have utterly destroyed our economy. On the other, it might mean cheap internet even on my cousin's farm at an undisclosed Missouri location, which is where people in my family go to escape...the Internet. Hmm.
The implications for new media are many. Wi-Fi devices could bleed over your TV signal, or, more interestingly your neighbor's Wi-Fi devices could bleed over your TV signal during football...or glee. Alternatively, regulation could make things cost more.
Well, as they say in TV (at least this week), when you start sounding like Alan Greenspan, it's time to shaddup.
-
Busy Day at the J-school
The J-school is honoring media leaders with the Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism.
Of concern is how long we will be able to offer these prizes, either because of industry shrinkage or because of lack of interest in journalism schools.
Student interest is high, but is that sustainable if new jobs are not being created over the next 15 years?
Of interest might be the honoring of Slate.com as an entity rather than an individual. Does this highlight what is important about web developments as collaborative efforts? Is it difficult to choose just one person from Slate who deserves the honor?
Is Slate your friend, enemy, some kind of frenemy? Depends on your audience, your business model and your outlook.
-
Calls for papers
Things always seem to be happening so fast and yet not much progress seems to be made on finding a profitable new model for new media. How much of it is the business environment, the economic downturn, and how much of it is the business itself?
What examples are there of businesses or whole industries surviving the Great Depression against all odds?
P&G, Chevrolet, Kellogg's all maintained ad budgets during the Depression, and they gained on the competition (source: http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=178334 -which sites a dozen other sources).
This might be mean newspapers are at a disadvantage in that they haven't had to advertise on other media since they were the main advertising medium for so long.
Where's the research and innovation into advertising newspapers themselves and all that come with them?
If people care, Seth and I can look for it. What do you think?
-
Phone revelations have broad implications
Clyde Bentley pointed out today after seeing an ad blitz the plethora of Google phone offerings being made across cell phone service providers.
Where Google has tread before, media companies lie reeling in its wake. Could this happen to cell phone carriers? makers? How might that affect journalists? For example, is our rush to iPhone-land premature?
Does this serve as a warning for diving into any new media offering?
-
Welcome to the NewNewsMedia Website
We have recently made a number of updates to the NewNewsMedia site in order to bring you the best tools for connecting with one another.
If this is your first time here, then we hope you take some time to explore the resources and join a discussion. If you have been here before, then please take some time to update your profile and share a little bit more about yourself.
Please drop us a comment and let us know what you think of the site!
NewNewsMedia is created by and for people who care about communities and journalism, sponsored by a generous grant from the Pew and Knight Foundations.
