Sponsoring news organization: Minnesota Public Radio
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Operated by: American Public Media
Founded: 1967
Community engagement initiative launched: June of 2003
Online Engagement Leader: Andrew Haeg
Software used: Custom developed platform now distributed by American Public Media's Center for Innovation in Journalism; has also used QuestionPro for surveys and public participation in some projects
On one level, radio is the most successful medium in implementing "news-as-conversation" -- it's called talk radio. But when it came to Public Insight Journalism, MPR reached out online, in essence using the Net to radically enlarge the Rolodex of MPR's reporters and producers.
MPR's Public Insight Journalism initiative, unlike many of the print news organizations profiled here, is reaching out to listeners as sources rather than as producers of content. While the Public Insight Journalism initiative also invites listeners to submit commentaries (see MPR's Commentaries page to read what listeners have submitted) and has started a wiki to create a resource on Minnesota's music scene (see Minnewiki), the major results of the Public Insight Journalism project have come in the form of the many radio stories that have resulted from collaboration between MPR reporters, producers, and their new sources. This collaboration has resulted in stories about economic insecurity among Minnesota residents, how personal choices affect global warming, and shootings in Minneapolis.
Further Reading:
- Minnesota Public Radio sues Gore-founded Internet TV network, AP, February 2006
- "Will MPR's "Public Insight Journalism" Save News Integrity?" -- Leonard Witt, PJNet Today
- "Fear, Loathing, and the Promise of Public Insight Journalism," Michael Skoler, Nieman Reports, Winter 2005
- A press release about the creation of the Center for Innovation in Journalism, April 26, 2006
- Beyond Broadcast, 2006, a May 12 & 13 panel discussion with, among others, Bill Buzenberg, Senior Vice President of News, American Public Media/ Minnesota Public Radio. The blog format of this article allows for listener/reader comments -- enticing AJ Liebling, among others, to post a remark.
