April 19, 2007
[Cross-posted on e.politics.]
More from sprawling depths of Los Angeles — in a lunchtime presentation at the Knight Digital Media Center online politics seminar, Michael Skoler of Minnesota Public Radio gave a glimpse of an promising approach to integrating social media and traditional media to broaden a news outlet’s coverage. It’s potentially a good model for organizations or campaigns planning to use supporters to help tell their stories and to support their messages. Plus, they have some neat games you can play — for instance, why not build your own fantasy Minnesota Legislature (what more could we want from life?).
MPR’s Public Insight Journalism project builds a partnership with public radio listeners by bringing them in as both cited journalistic sources and as a channel for finding under-reported stories. The radio network has created a network of over 40,000 people who have volunteered to help with stories and regularly contacts individual members or groups of members if their expertise might be useful.
For instance, for a story that involves the Minnesota Islamic community, MPR might get in touch with members of the network who have indicated that they are Muslim. In some cases, members’ opinions or experiences might be cited directly, but in others their insights may work behind the scenes to shape the way stories are researched or presented. Also, MPR will occasionally run surveys to find out what stories or aspects of stories are being under-covered, which has led in the past to coverage of issues from angles that diverge from the all-too-common journalistic pack mentality.
This approach is a hybrid of citizen journalism and traditional journalism, since MPR’s audience isn’t writing or preparing stories directly, as they might on a newspaper blog. Instead, their experience is filtered through the expertise and judgment of MPR’s editorial staff, which allows the broadcast outlet to leverage the collective intelligence of their audience without surrendering control over the direction of coverage. They see it as getting the best of both journalistic worlds — journalistic standards still apply, but reporters get to go beyond the usual experts (the members of their “Golden Rolodexes”).
MPR has developed other ways to involve readers in stories and issues, for instance by including a “help us cover this story” button on all online stories to allow readers to add extra resources or correct errors. Much more up my alley, they’ve also built several online games based around issues of the day, with more to come. Balance the state budget! As someone who worked on budgetary issues in the Texas Legislature approximately 1000 years ago, I think that anything you can do to help the public understand the trade-offs involved in appropriating money is A Good Thing (the level of ignorance of some of the folks who used to call into our office was frightening). And, build your own fantasy Minnesota Legislature, Fantasy Football-style, with points for each milestone your team members reach in the legislative process (bill introduction, floor vote, final passage, etc.). Political nerd-fun of the highest order, let me tell ya.
Campaigns and advocacy organizations can learn from this project! You CAN involve your supporters without completely surrendering control over your message — social media isn’t an all-or-nothing proposition. Just don’t forget the fun factor….
By Colin Delany, 04/19/07 at 4:31 pm
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April 19, 2007
The conversation (NOT lecture) by Amy Gahran of the Poynter Institute’s E-Media Tidbits on how to engage readers and cultivate an online community sounded less like a lesson on how to be a better journalist, and more like one on how to be an activist.
She instructed the journalists to engage their online community by giving people rewards for their contributions, cultivating a team of core people who “feel invested,” engaging people in a discussion and utilizing email lists and forums.
Gahran’s discussion reminded me of my days as a teen activist, rallying my friends to boycott the neighborhood rodeo or trying to create a team of Goshen High School students to advocate for condoms in school. You want kids to show up to your weekly meeting? Bring cookies! You want teenagers to come to your rally? Enlist the football team and homecoming queen!
I thought I left that behind. Does the new new new journalism - the one that values an online community - require the tools of an activist? The cookie jar is ready.
By Hanna Ingber Win, 04/19/07 at 4:25 pm
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April 19, 2007
A theme that continues to come up during this conference is defining the rules that govern a blog. Some say the great thing about a blog is that there are no rules! The essense of a blog, John Amato from Crooksandliars.com says, is that it allows autonomy, independence.
“Nobody tells me what to do,” Amato said yesterday, when explaining why he prefers to post video to his site rather than to YouTube.
Maybe bloggers have independence and autonomy from mainstream media, but they keep throwing out more and more rules.
After I wrote my first blog for Pop+Politics, I was told that it needed to be more conversational, looser, breaking away from structure. It should read more like an email to my friends than an article for my USC Annenberg class. But isn’t that structure? Isn’t being told that you must use a conversational tone a rule? Where’s my autonomy? What if I love the inverted pyramid so much, I want to use it all the time?
James Joyner from OutsidetheBeltway.com said yesterday, “If you’ve got an editor, you’re not a blog.”
Do you agree with that?
Different media outlets have entities that they call blogs, and some are edited, some are not. Is Joyner right, and if there is an editor, they should rename their (so-called) blog?
Joyner also said that if you spend days on it, it’s not a blog.
Ok, I get the idea: raw material is best, or it’s at least the latest trend. But how do you create a rule like this? What if you spend hours on a posting? Does it get to be a blog then? What if you go back and edit it the next day? What if you spend days thinking about it?
More importantly, what is the purpose of creating rules for blogs? Is it to teach new blog users - like me - how to better communicate in this medium? Do these rule-makers have evidence that a conversational tone, lots of links, some contentious commentary and unedited material that was written in less than a day is most effective?
Or are the rules created because blogs are becoming mainstream?
By Hanna Ingber Win, 04/19/07 at 2:34 pm
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April 19, 2007
Jason Manning mentioned that some reporters seem interested in blogging because it seems hip or cool, or that it offers a certain “cache.” He said still others don’t want to blog for essentially the same reasons.
Stop - you’re both wrong! Could there be any worse reason for a reporter to blog or not blog than the hip or cool factor?
Reporters should want to blog (and maybe I should just end that sentence there…) because blogging encourages reader interaction, opening a dialogue between the journalist and the people about whom - and for whom - they report. It also allows the journalist to share more personal experiences from their reporting, perhaps to show more of their personality and, in some cases, to troll for sources or information for stories. Some reporters also see it as an opportunity to throw out ideas or rumors they’ve heard, but haven’t confirmed.
If a reporter doesn’t want to do those things, fine. But it seems silly to blog just because it’s hip or cool. And it seems even crazier to keep from blogging for that reason.
By Jessica Roberts, 04/19/07 at 2:00 pm
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