Cit Media

As we work to build the Center for Citizen Media in coming weeks and months, we envision three basic missions. They are:

• Research, Analysis, Advocacy: Working in-house and in collaboration with others, we will do or commission original research into some of the key questions surrounding citizen media, such as its impact on public knowledge and opinion. We must also understand the genre’s future, and will highlight factors that could either help or deter its development; these include financial sustainability, legal issues and international adoption. Simultaneously, we will speak out on the need for responsible citizen media and its value in a democracy.
• Best Practices and Tools: We’ll catalog the people and organizations working in the citizens’ media sphere, and highlight their work on our Web site, flagging what look like the best for special attention. We’ll identify the technological tools that people will be using in creating tomorrow’s journalism and other media, in part by working with technologists to help them add appropriate features. These tools, too, will be highlighted online, again with special attention to the ones that appear to work best. The website will also become a test bed (or playground) for trying out various methods.
• Education, Training, Consulting: We’ll work with people at all levels of citizen journalism — citizens who want to participate in the process; media professionals who want to use these technologies and want to work with citizens; companies that need to understand what is happening; and others.

We hope this site will be a place where people discuss ideas, techniques, tools and more. What you know is considerably more than what we know, and we need to help each other learn.

Two reminders:

First, we won’t be the only people doing such work, and are anxious to collaborate with others. Without your ideas, and your help, we won’t get nearly as much done as we’d like.

Second, we are not the Center OF Citizen Media — that’s an oxymoron in an increasingly decentralized media ecosystem. We are a Center FOR Citizen Media. There is a world of difference.

Interesting: MacMall is selling a Podcast Kit for podcast creators.

If you have the time and the inclination, our lunch-time discussion about citizen media at the Berkman Center is here (MP3 file). Ethan Zuckerman blogged it comprehensively and was unfazed by my tossing one of the questions to him (he knew much more about the topic). David Weinberger, who also has copious notes, decided that we’re heading toward the “end of coverage” (I disagree; but that’s for another time). In all, a terrific discussion…

Dave Winer has posted a Diagram for HyperCamp, which looks like a great way to hold a gathering. My only caveat: The blogging table may be too big. I’d have a few tables, with enough distance between them, where people could collect according to specific interest and hold a conversation while they were blogging.

I wonder what would happen if a traditional newspaper reconfigured its newsroom in such a way, even temporarily. Might produce some interesting journalism.

I’m at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society this week, doing paperwork, figuring out where to get coffee, getting a library card and Harvard ID, etc. Pictured are two of the Berkman Fellows, David Isenberg (left) and Ethan Zuckerman. (The photo is blurry on the right partly because I shot it with my Treo. Sorry.)

Denise Howell has a detailed blog posting about the American Bar Association panel I joined last week in southern California: “Who Owns The News? Attempts by sports organizations and entertainers to control coverage.”

My major point was that in the age of bottom-up media, controlling everything is impossible — and a lousy idea in any event.

Mark Glaser, one of the best journalists covering the emergent-media sphere, is launching MedaShift in conjunction with PBS. It’s bound to be terrific. More when it launches…

Danny Glover (National Journal): Beltway Blogroll: The Courtship Of The Blogosphere. The bloggers not only welcomed the lavish treatment and exclusive access bestowed upon them by the Republican National Committee and the Senate Republican Conference; they basked in it without reservation. They dropped names (White House adviser Karl Rove was the favorite), heaped praise on their news subjects and celebrated their chance to imbibe in the trappings of power.

Even for “independent” bloggers, access to power can be a heady experience. It doesn’t typically improve the journalism, as we’ve seen repeatedly.

Apple says no when I attempt to view one of its “Photocasting” pages with Firefox 1.5, the most up-to-date browser on the planet in most respects, and definitely the one that is becoming the browser of choice for many of us.

Photocasting with Apple’s iPhoto product is basically like podcasting with pictures — a relatively easy way to put your stuff on the Web for others to see. It’s a good idea.

But at the moment, Apple doesn’t want us using Firefox (and I don’t know what other browsers) to see the results. It insists on Safari, Apple’s own browser.

Kevin Yank calls Apple the “new Microsoft” — and in the case of online music there’s certainly some truth in that notion. I have to believe that in this case the problem is less mean-spirited. Apple probably rushed this product feature out the door, testing only on its own browsers. We’ll know soon, because if this exclusionary tactic persists, it will tell us mainly that Apple is more foolish than we might have guessed.

Joi Ito: Live Door raided last night. Horiemon has been rubbing old-school Japan the wrong way by challenging the establishment with clever financing and takeover attempts of the media etc. I can see how he would get targeted. On the other hand Japanese companies like his tend to be sloppy so I wouldn’t be surprised if they find something. It would be unfortunate if they end up slapping Livedoor down since I think he was serving an important function in Japanese business and this looks like a typical set-up.