Michael Kinsley: Black and White and Dead All Over. And so, at last, there are two piles of paper: a short one of stuff to read, and a tall one of stuff to throw away. Unfortunately, many people are taking the logic of this process one step further. Instead of buying a paper in order to throw most of it away, they are not buying it in the first place.
The Fate of Newspapers
Phone and Cable Companies: Dangerous to Citizen Media
CNN: Report: Phone companies want Web providers to pay. Large phone companies are seeking payments from Internet companies for high-quality delivery of music, movies and other content that will move over their telecommunications networks, according to a published report.
This is a power grab, nothing less, by companies that much preferred the days when they were monopolies and are going to pull ever lever to bring back their “glory” days when customers had few if any choices.
Real World Intruding in Blogosphere
Minneapolis Star-Tribune: Facing suit, anonymous blogger lifts his mask. Lawyers who filed the suit say that Web logs and other new media should be held to the same standards of accountability as traditional media and journalism. Brodbkorb, a former operative for the Minnesota Republican Party, pledges to protect his source and to keep his website going.
Still Looking for that Aha! Moment on OPML
John Palfrey, my new colleague, says he gets it now about OPML. I confess that I still don’t quite grasp its importance. I am, I further confess, dense about some things. Still working to understand it better…
Update: I’m starting to get it now…
Microsoft's Continuing China Blog Censorship
Rebecca MacKinnon, in a detailed posting about Microsoft’s latest adventures in censoring Chinese bloggers, writes:
Microsoft’s MSN Spaces continues to censor its Chinese language blogs, and has become more aggressive and thorough at censorship since I first checked out MSN’s censorship system last summer.
This is depressing, if unsurprising. China clearly understands that American technology providers are only too pleased to help censor that dictatorship’s citizens, as long as these companies can still do business in the world’s most populous nation.
Robert Scoble, the Microsoft uber-blogger, has made several postings on this. His first one flatly disagreed with his company’s move, saying, in part:
I do believe in a slippery slope. If they come after you today, maybe they’ll come after me tomorrow. Gotta stop this kind of stuff while we’re still talking about you.
But in a subsequent posting, Robert went a bit soft on the company, saying:
One thing I’ve heard is that we spell out our terms of service very explicitly on MSN Spaces. Here in the United States we pull down stuff too at government request, like child pornography or other illegal content.
No kidding? Speech about political freedom is like child porn?
I’m betting Robert regrets writing that line. He was right the first time.
Learning from Tragic Misinformation
Jeff Jarvis, taking note of the horrible mis-reporting of the West Virginia mine deaths last night, says:
The next time I hear someone being haughty about professional news vs. citizen’s news, I’ll remind them of the West Virginia tragedy, where news traveled ahead of the facts, where everyone was horribly wrong.
Let’s all remember that, shall we?
Meanwhile, Steve Outing offers some sound advice to newspapers that printed erroneous headines, including:
Since newspapers are now publishing to multiple media formats, and because they (should have) collected e-mail addresses of their print-edition customers, they could have sent out an “urgent correction” updating the story. If the paper has a cell-phone news service, they could use that, too.
World Economic Forum's Slow-Motion Transparency
The World Economic Forum is going to do some “Broadcasting, Podcasting, Webcasting and Blogging” at its annual meeting later this month. Too bad they’re not putting everything out for public consumption, but this is progress.
Last year’s meeting produced a controversy when former CNN honcho Eason Jordan apparently said some stupid things (Washington Post) in an “off the record” session that predictably found their way online. But neither CNN nor the WEF ever coughed up a tape of the event, so we still don’t know what Jordan said, precisely — a ridiculous situation.
Suggestion to the WEF: Go for greater if not total transparency. You can’t hold panel discussions with lots of people in a bloggish world and expect that “off the record” means anything anymore in such venues.
Covering the Abramoffs, Citizen Style
The Center for Media and Democracy is looking for Citizen Journalists To Bust More Jack Abramoffs, and cites some digging that took place on the center’s valuable SourceWatch site, a wiki where people can add what they know about matters relating to PR, lobbying and other activities designed to move votes and money.
I’d call this citizen-activist journalism. We need more of it, from people all over the political spectrum.
BBC Opens History to New Interpretation
BBC: BBC News opens archives to public. The scheme allows people within the UK to watch, download, edit and mix the clips and programming for non-commercial programming.
Too bad it’s only in the United Kingdom. But it’ll be absolutely fascinating to see how people “remix” these clips, creating works that tell old stories in new ways.
Board of Advisors Named
Here’s the initial Board of Advisors for the Center for Citizen Media.
- Merrill Brown, national editorial director, News21, a Carnegie-Knight initiative on the future of journalism education; media consultant and founding editor-in-chief, MSNBC
- Jonathan Dube, editorial director, CBC.ca; publisher, CyberJournalist.net; columnist, Poynter Institute; membership chair and board member, Online News Association
- Richard Edelman, President and CEO, Edelman public relations
- Charles Eisendrath, director, Knight-Wallace Fellows, University of Michigan
- James Fallows, national correspondent of the Atlantic Monthly and author of many books including Breaking the News
- Michael Goff, consultant; founder of Out magazine; former general manager, MSN (Microsoft Network) and partner in Grassroots Media Inc.
- Paul Grabowicz, director of New Media Program at the University of California-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism
- Reid Hoffman, Founder and CEO, LinkedIn
- Joi Ito, enterpreneur and investor
- JD Lasica, executive director of Ourmedia.org and author of Darknet: Hollywood’s War Against the Digital Generation
- Lawrence Lessig, Stanford University law professor; author; co-founder, Creative Commons
- Rebecca MacKinnon, co-founder, Global Voices Online; fellow, Berkman Center for Internet & Society, Harvard Law School; former CNN correspondent
- Susan Mernit, principal in 5ive, a digital media consultancy
- Allen Morgan, managing director, Mayfield venture capital firm
- Craig Newmark, founder and chief customer service representative, craigslist
- John Palfrey, executive director, Berkman Center for Internet & Society.
- Oh Yeon Ho, founder and CEO of OhmyNews
- Steve Outing, senior editor, Poynter Institute for Media Studies; founder, Enthusiast Group
- Glenn Reynolds, creator of Instapundit.com blog; law professor, University of Tennessee
- Jay Rosen, journalism professor, New York University; author; editor of PressThink blog
- Orville Schell, dean, University of California-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism
- Hilary Schneider, senior vice president, Yahoo!
- Clay Shirky, writer, educator and consultant
- Lisa Stone, journalist; creator of BlogHer conference; former editor-in-chief, Women.com
- Jimmy Wales, founder, Wikipedia
These folks are some of the smartest and most thoughtful people I know. All are committed to a vibrant, diverse media ecosystem– and to helping ensure that tomorrow’s journalism will be honorable and strong.