Jen McClure's Ruminations

The Media as Peace Broker?

Jon Stewart interviewed Abderrahim Foukara of Al Jeezera on The Daily Show earlier this week regarding the conflict in Gaza and asked him if it is the media's role to broker peace when governments fail to try to do so. An interesting question about the role of the media. Thoughts?

Recounting the Long History of the Collaborative Media Proposal

The terms “collaborative media and collaborative journalism" are beginning to emerge as a way to describe a new approach to journalism and a new media model.  (Caveat: It also happens to be the name of the new company I am working to help develop.)  But what is “collaborative media” really and what is the history of this media model?

Over the past two decades, the Internet has increasingly allowed people to inform themselves through new channels and to communicate with each other more easily and widely. Web 2.0 tools have fueled the current citizen journalism phenomenon, allowing citizens to have a louder voice, to begin their own editorial pages, and in some cases viable news organizations, and to engage in genuine and unlimited discourse and debate. Individuals, nonprofit and political groups, educational institutions, religious organizations, and civic groups alike are immersing themselves in this world of new media and citizen journalism, in many cases independent of and parallel to mainstream media. Today the reader truly has become the writer – and now also has the tools to play the role of editor and publisher as well. More people than ever before in history have the ability to insert themselves into the journalistic process through blogs, podcasts, online videos and photos, comments, news ranking and rating systems and citizen media sites.

But the notion of a collaboration-based model is hardly new. In the 1920s – long before the Internet or Web 2.0 were even imaginable – American social theorist, educator and philosopher John Dewey suggested that the traditional conception of journalism (i.e., “publication”) is only one part of the journalistic process. News or journalism, according to Dewey, cannot realize its full value until the public participates in a dynamic conversation about the published information.

He wrote:

Publication is partial and the public which results is partially informed and formed until the meanings it purveys pass from mouth to mouth. There is no limit to the liberal expansion and confirmation of limited personal intellectual endowment which may proceed from the flow of social intelligence when that circulates by word of mouth from one to another in the communications of the local community.
(The Public and Its Problems, 219)

A thing is fully known only when it is published, shared, socially accessible. Record and communication are indispensible to knowledge. Knowledge cooped up in private consciousness is a myth… (176)

Dewey also asserted that journalism should not just be a static report of what has already happened, but rather that it should always be in a constant state of evolution as the community adds value by generating knowledge. His vision of the ideal relationship between the public and the press was based on his strong belief that the public should be involved and that this active participation should extend to the public’s role in the evolution of news stories. He believed that news was more than just printed words on a page, but rather an evolving, multi-dimensional story in which the public should be allowed to fully participate.

He rejected the ‘spectator theory’ of knowledge, instead advocating knowledge acquired by a collaborative inquiry and problem solving.  The ideal journalistic model, according to Dewey, was not based on a passive audience, but rather engaged citizens actively collaborating and interacting with the journalistic process – helping to create a dynamic and changing news story, rather than simply the receptors of information.  Dewey believed that communication and collaboration is foundational to the creation of the “Great Community,” and that citizens who actively participate in public life contribute to the formation of that community.

Dewey’s collaboration model has been closely tied to the public journalism movement  of the 19080s and 90s, but it seems to more closely reflect a vision of today’s blogosphere, citizen journalism and citizen-generated media (CGM), and Twitter-based journalism, which rely on knowledge-sharing, collaboration, debate, multiple perspectives, and a constantly updated, dynamic approach to addressing a news story or issue.

Dewey wrote:

The winged words of conversation in immediate intercourse have a vital import lacking in the fixed and frozen words of written speech. Systematic and continuous inquiry into all the conditions which affect association and their dissemination in print is a precondition of the creation of a true public…Ideas which are not communicated, shared and reborn in expression are but soliloquy, and soliloquy is but broken and imperfect thought. (Dewey, The Public and Its Problems, 218)

When he wrote the phrase “the winged words of conversation,” John Dewey could not possibly have imagined how that notion would come to life through the Internet and Web 2.0 technologies, for the Internet enables written speech to rise about the constraints of the printed word and Web 2.0 allows for user participation, openness, and collaboration.

Over the past two decades – more than 80 years after Dewey wrote The Public and Its Problems – new media and communications technologies have allowed people to inform themselves through online channels and enabled them to communicate with each other more easily, immediately, widely, and interactively than has ever before been possible or even imaginable. These new tools have fueled the current citizen journalism phenomenon, or what Dewey called, the creation of a “true public,” not based on geography, but on communities of interest – not reliant on mainstream media to meet its information or community-building requirements, but on a free-flowing, open, and dynamic exchange of ideas representing a multitude of perspectives.

At Redwood Collaborative Media we honor the rich history of the collaborative media model and believe that a collaboration model is the media model of the future. Stay tuned for more as we continue to learn and grow.

Note: Much of this post was excerpted from my master’s thesis, Realizing John Dewey’s Vision: From Public Journalism to Citizen Journalism to the Next Newsroom. I’ll be sharing more of my research for that work in future posts.

Wishing You a Peaceful New Year and Happy iPeace Day

Today is iPeace Day, and according to the folks at the iPeace social network (which I just accepted an invitation to join last week), you can make a difference in the world by just:

• Being peaceful
• Dedicate yourself to sharing your peace with those around you 
• Write a poem for peace
• Make a video. Post a video
• Organize a concert
• Play music in the streets for peace
• Plant a tree
• Organize a gathering
• Pray
• Light a candle
• Teach peace
• Meditate
• Run or walk for peace
• Organize a game or a match for peace
• Have dinner with friends
• Anything that will express peace – for you.
• Blog or write an article
• Live without fear

Not bad suggestions for today or any day, really. Check out and/or join iPeace at www.ipeace.me

Wishing you a peaceful new year.

The American Dream ... Revisited

Pollster John Zogby has released some interesting stats lately. He recently wrote, "Even in these uncertain economic times, my polling shows the American Dream is still alive and well, but is undergoing an historic transformation."

In his book, The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream, Zogby splits American Dreamers into two distinct groups: "Traditional Materialists" and "Secular Spiritualists."

Zogby defines Secular Spiritualists as Americans who are more satisfied with fewer material assets and less wealth.

"Secular Spiritualists are clearly the ascendant group, and in a June 2008 Zogby Interactive poll, they surpassed the Traditional Materialists," reports Zogby. (See more details on the poll here.)

But with this new-found "spirituality," we're not necessarily more optimistic.

In a separate Zogby poll, dubbed the New Year's Eve poll:

• 75% think the current year was worse for the world than the previous year, compared to only 39% who said that a year ago.
• Last year 59% said the current year was better for them personally than the previous year; this year only 32% said it was better.
• Only 43 % of respondents think next year will be better for them personally, compared to 59% who said that a year ago.
• Young people are more optimistic, with 57.9% expecting 2009 to be better
• Lower income respondents ($25K or less) are the least optimistic about the New Year
• Only 40% of respondents expect those born in 2009 to have a better quality of life than the generations before them

New Year, New Gig: New Media Company

When I finally finished my master's thesis and graduated from Stanford this past June, I vowed I would start blogging again. Well, here it is more than six months later, and this is my first blog post. Ugh - talk about writer's block!

But I now feel inspired write here again as I begin to embark on some new personal and professional projects. Professionally, I am branching out. Nearly five years after co-founding New Communications Forum, and later the Society for New Communications Research, our organization has grown and matured to the point where we will be bringing on an association management professional to help manage the day-to-day operations of SNCR. This is a very important and exciting development, as it will allow me to focus on supporting our Fellows' research, education, and publications initiatives. Look for some exciting new announcements and great new programs from SNCR in the coming weeks -- not to mention the 5th Annual NewComm Forum! Date and venue to be announced soon!

Now that I will have some extra help with SNCR and don't have to focus on writing my thesis anymore (yippee!), I've started to consult again just a bit -- and am very excited about my first project.

A few weeks ago, I helped an old friend and colleague, Ron Muns and his son, Andrew Muns to launch a new media company. Redwood Collaborative Media is a new B2B media company that creates highly interactive, integrated, and dynamic platforms for sharing knowledge, insights, and resources, and is dedicated to building deep relationships for professional communities. The company’s mission is to empower these communities through high quality information, education and training, and targeted online and face-to-face networking opportunities. The first such professional community is the Software Test & Performance Collaborative -- the result of an acquisition from BZ Media.

It will be fun and interesting to help develop this new company, and I'll share my learnings as we continue to grow and evolve the Redwood Collaborative Media concept. I also plan to use this blog to muse on other thoughts, questions, and ideas about new developments in media and communications, business, culture and other topics, so stay tuned. I hope you find it of interest and get involved in the conversation.

I wish everyone a very happy new year. To be sure, the current economic climate will be challenging for us all. But this challenge also presents us with exciting opportunities to tap into our creativity and spirit of innovation -- to be more flexible, more giving, more caring, more cooperative, and to take a new look at our old way of doing things and re-evaluate our priorities. So, here's to shaking things up in 2009! Best wishes to all!

Join me in the Next Newsroom

View my page on The Next Newsroom Project

Journalism that Matters - Part II - From Questions to Insights, Ideas, Inspiration & Initiatives

Day Two of the Journalism that Matters gathering consisted of small group discussions, and highly interactive, action-driven workshops focused on a wide range of topics, including: how to better embrace citizen journalists in the next newsroom model, updating journalism education, encouraging youth to be more civic-minded and active, policy issues - including net neutrality and their impact on online journalism models, the development of new business models, etc.

The result was a wide range of innovative ideas, insights and some new intiatives that will occur in existing and new newsrooms over the bext several months. Here's a sample of some of the participants' comments and insights that they shared at the end of day:

"I have a new understanding that professional and citizen journalists can come together tio produce something valuable - a new king of news model."

"Journalism can transform itself from reporting only about problems to reporting on problems being solved in news ways."

"We have a plan to collaborate with citizens - especially young people to re-energize the news."

"We will start a community needs database."

"Perhaps we need a new - or more names for "citizen journalism" to take into account that it's not all what we traditionally think of as "journalism," (uploading a photo, commenting, linking,...)

"We need to train citizens who want to act as journalists."

"We need to better articulate to the public what it is that journalists do - how we do it and why it's valuable."

"Professional journalists cover stories because they are news; citizen journalists share stories because they are living them or passionate about them."

"We should think about new business models based on the idea of a community newsroom and community supported news gatheirng."

"We need to learn from those on the ground who are experimenting with new media tools and models and having success."

"With more news consumption moving online, we need to consider policy issues like net neutrality, access to to the Internet, media consolidation and structural issues."

"The role of the journalist is evolving into that of a convener of conversations among complex groups and issues. "

"We need to address this shift in journalism education and curriculum."

"We need to consider whether just the vehicle of journalism is broken or is it journalism itself that is broken?"

"The values of journalism themselves need to change as we move tofrom the 1:many model to the many:many model of journalism. That requires a new covenant."

"We need to invest in and encourage young people to be more civic-minded and engaged, and see them as leaders in this new world of journalism."

"We need to better embrace ethnic communities in new journalism models and acknowledge and address the specific interests of these groups and provide relevant content to them."

"We need to remember that this is a business."

The event ended with many participants stating their commitment to starting, supporting, collaborating on and coaching others on "next newsroom" experiments. This action addressed the primary goal of the conference, which was to:

"Pick an ideal location, and start a news organization from scratch, using the best-available technology and ideas, and without the obligations or burdens of legacy processes or infrastructure. Where will it be, what will it look like, who will own it, and how will it run."

It will be interesting to see what happens next...

Journalism That Matters Conference Seeks to Envision & Create The Next Newsroom

The first day of the Journalism That Matters conference generated many more questions than answers.

With the overarching goal of helping to create and start the "next news organization," 160+ journalists, journalism professors, traditional and new media professionals, public advocates and citizen journalists gathered at George Washington University to discuss, debate and share ideas.

The event began today with a State of the Citizen Media Update, featuring a discussion with Jay Rosen, Faye Anderson, Cody Howard, Jan Schaffer, Peggy Kuhr, Merrill Brown and Dan Gillmor.

JTM co-organizer Chris Peck opened the discussion by stating that the age of citizen journalism has resulted in a "time of chaos" for traditional news organizations. The participants were then asked to pose some questions for the panel to address. Some initial questions that arose \included:

* What is the proper mix of pro and am in the new journalism model?

* What is the best way for us to ensure accuracy and balance?

* What will the successful business model look like?

* How can we get more of the public involved? How are young people involved and how will these burgeoning models help the next generation?

* How does citizen journalism work differently when you have different sizes and types of communities?

*Should there be a code of conduct for citizen journalists?

The panel discussed these questions and others. Here's a brief recap of some of the discussion:

Jay Rosen stated, "If more people participated in the press, the press would be better off, because people have the right to own and participate in the discussions of their country. Participation is not only good, but people have the tools now and are going to use the tools they have. Readers are now writers. Everyone has the power to participate."

Dan Gillmor responded, "We're in a great place on balance - we're seeing progress. There are thousands of experiments going on around the world now, but keep in mind that there will be some failures, but there will be an enormous amount of innovation in the next few years. Certainly there are problems with discourse, thoroughness, accuracy, independence, media literacy, but if we can address those, we have a chance of getting this right. I am enormously optimistic."

Jan Schaffer commented that more than ever before there seems to be an impetus for citizens to get involved in areas that traditional journalists have left uncovered. There are very interesting experiments happening in the nonprofit world and via think tanks, she said "I am also very optimistic. I think we need to be careful about calling it "chatter." It doesn't all have to be big-J journalism to have value."

Peggy Kuhl who has trained citizen journalists commented, that through that work she discovered that there are so many ways that you can mix what is happening out there and what peoples' interests are and how they want to be involved, that we don't need to choose between traditional journalism or citizen journalism, "it's not this or that, it will be a mix."

Jay Rosen described his citizen journalism project, NewAssignment.net saying, "I'm trying to figure out if there is such a thing as an open system, an open platform in news - not expanding an existing news organization, but trying to involve the thousands of people who want to get involved. We're driving down the cost for like-minded people to find each other, share information and collaborate - a lot of people can get involved, which would have been impossible before. At the same time that we have the old systems becoming more particpatory, we have the open systems trying to learn how to become more journalistic."

He continued, "If you can design a project where the mom that has one hour or week or someone who has ten minutes or someone who blogs as a hobby, and you can accept all those forms of what are effectively civic donations, that's a great start. We don't know how all those forms will work yet to result in high-quality journalism."

"Americans have never believed that journalism ever belonged to the professionalized press. The professionals need to ask themselves - what is the stronger press - one that is owned by 'us' the professionalized press - or a shared press, and I think the smart ones know that a shared press is stronger."

Rosen asked Jan Schaffer - "What did you have to change your mind about as you went from the newsroom to what you are doing now?"

She answered that as a journalist in a newsroom several years ago there was no desire to interact with readers. "Most journalists are really uninformed about what is happening in journalism. How can we get legacy journalism to pay more attention to addressing what is happening and want to pay more attention to citizens" she asked.

Schaffer also called for "Equilibrium " - the give and the get. "If they are out of balance you won't get much. People have to get something for their participation." She asked Merrill Brown what that might be. He answered that one of the things they are focusing on is "making it easy:" to upload a photo or article, get a press pass, connect with others in the network. These are important to participating. He then asked the audience, "How concerned are you that badly run newspapers are going to fail in this country in the next fews years and what can we do about that? is that important to you - if your local daily newspaper fails or is that just part of the evolution?" The audience discussed this and one participant stated - I think it's a false question. Newspapers are not going out of business. Brown responded that he has already talked to newspapers who have asked "Shall we start by just cutting out Tuesday?"

Rosen responded, "I think it would be a good thing if some of the bad papers fail. Then we could just start over. Without a common narrative it's difficult to see how a community can exist. But people share life, they share problems, and today they are more able than ever to share information, so I am not sure that the local newspaper is necessarily the best way to do this. Some of these newspapers have been doing this so badly for so long, they deserve to die."

Leonard Witt responded that we don't necessarily have just the backfence neighborhood community anymore. We have MySpace and other networked communities. In fact, this group may be more of a community to me than my neighborhood, because this is what I am interested in."
No matter where we are, we are connected to a community.

Rosen quoted DeToqueville, saying "Newspapers make associations, and associations make newspapers." This is just as true now, he said. DeToqueville was referring to the newspaper. But today we are referring to the web. That's why journalism is moving to the web.

He continued that for the first eight to nine years of the web, newspaper organizations simply re-purposed content (if they had online entities at all), showing that there was a huge misunderstanding of the web. "I don't know that we need to save newspapers. I do think we need to be concerned about news organizations."

Peggy Kuhl summed things up by saying "There is a hunger for information and news, both through traditional and nontraditional channels."

The session ended with the panel posing more questions for consideration:

From Faye Anderson: For awhile there was a debate about whether citizen journalists are journalists. Is a citizen journalist who practices journalistic principles and standards a professional or an amateur?

From Cody Howard: Where can the average news consumer go to find the truth?

From Jan Schaffer: Does there need to be a business model behind the citizen journalism movement or might it be just a part of the new volunteerism?

From Peggy Kuhl: What new skill sets do we need as we move forward?

From Dan Gillmor: If you have kids, are you teaching them to be independent thinkers?

From Jay Rosen: What are some everyday situations we encounter where we have to be journalists, where we have to 'file a report?' If we can start there, we can figure out what people already know about the naturally recurring acts of journalism.

More to come tomorrow. For more information on this conference, and to view and comment upon the proposed next newsroom business plan that will be the topic of discussion for this event, visit http://newshare.typepad.com/jtmnextnewsroom/