Social networks are a huge part of our lives. We use them to meet people, to get jobs and tap into every aspect of every person I know's social networks to get sources for my stories.
Online social networks have expanded what has been traditionally understood as a social network to create an expansive web on the Web of the people who know, the people they know and everyone in between.
From LinkedIn to Facebook to Twitter to the vlog communities on YouTube it seems like every aspect of our lives and our time spent on the Internet are touched by social networking.
New York Times columnist (I like him a lot can you tell?) Nicholas Kristof writes at the end of his biweekly column, "I invite you to visit my blog, On the Ground. Please also join me on Facebook, watch my YouTube videos and follow me on Twitter."
While the importance of instant communication with one's social network through Twitter is usually beneficial (and often benign) there have been concerns about misinformation being spread quickly through the site. As the swine flu situation escalates, misinformation was spread on the network.
In the CNN article about the spread of the flu and information about it specifically on Twitter, the Al Tompkins of the Poynter Institute said information needs to be put in context by journalists, especially given the fact that so many deaths from the common flu occur each year and go underreported by the news media.
There are stories all over the Internet about employees getting fired because of something posted on Facebook or potential employees not getting hired because of their rowdy college Facebook pictures. (My brother was a Purdue cheerleader. ESPN used his Facebook photo, which featured him bonging a beer while sitting on a toilet while wearing his uniform, on a special about the dangers of Facebook to college athletes.)
Yet while there are cautionary tales about social networks, Forbes magazine recently wrote an article about why CEOs need to utilize social networking. The tagline of the article read, " Web 2.0 is no longer just for teenagers.) Tonight, I'll be having dinner with Father Garanzini, and I plan to advise him to take back his student-run (as a joke) Facebook page. I think he could actually utilize the page to communicate with students about what he is doing and what is going on with their university.
And the future is always just around the corner. The Huffington Post's Stephen Balkam declares, "Twitter is so ten minutes ago" in his article at Qik, a site that lets you upload videos directly from your cell phone to its Web site to share with your followers.
As a proud digital native, I like to think that I can utilize social networks to my advantage more so than older generations. I like to think that I recognize the importance of online social networking hence why I said I'd pay for Facebook.
However, just to voice some of my deep true feelings about social networking. I think it consumes a lot of time and effort. If I read a good article those in my social network benefit if I post it on my Facebook and/or Twitter accounts; however, I know if I go to Facebook and post it then someone is going to IM me or I'm going to need to respond to a wall post or an event invitation. AND THEN IT CONSUMES MY LIFE AND I JUST DON'T HAVE TIME FOR IT!
Monday, April 27, 2009
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Journalism is essential to democracy ... or is it?
Reading Eagle columnist Dan Kelly makes fun of the alarmists who say that the end of the U.S. as we know it is here because of the socialist President Barack Obama, but he also says, "If the end of our nation is near, it won't be due to an imaginary historical clock. But because too many of us seem to think we can survive without newspapers and the protection they afford us."
As newspapers across the country as slashing staffs, losing ad revenue and losing readers to the Internet, some wonder if they'll survive the economic crisis and this shift in the business model.
And if newspapers don't survive will democracy?
And others ask do we really need the mainstream media agenda setting for us when we can find our own news, the kind of news we want to read/watch all over the Internet?
A recent Pew Center poll even shows that only 43 percent of Americans believe that losing their local community newspaper would hurt civic life a lot.
But these everyday Americans are forgetting the reason that freedom of the press is enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Felix Frankfurter said, “Freedom of the press is not an end in itself but a means to the end of achieving a free society."
According to this picture from the Newseum in Washington, D.C., President Thomas Jefferson said, "Were it left to me decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or a newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate to prefer the latter."
(I saw this and I heard there was a video of you there, but I didn't get to see that.)
Both Chicago newspapers have declared bankruptcy. There are rumors that by the end of the summer the Chicago Sun-Times will fold completely or turn into online only. Can you imagine? Chicago it's really a one newspaper kinda town, but we might be soon.
The oldest newspaper in Colorado, The Rocky Mountain News, has closed along with the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
Final Edition from Matthew Roberts on Vimeo.
The lose of newspapers will hurt democracy because people will not be exposed to diverse views instead they will seek out only what they want to see and hear: the idea of the Daily Me, which is Nicholas Negroponte's idea of a virtual daily newspaper customized for an individual's tastes. We find this Daily me by seeking out the opinions and news stories that we agree with online not by consuming the hopefully objective news of the mainstream media.
New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristoff wrote in a recent column, "The decline of traditional news media will accelerate the rise of The Daily Me, and we’ll be irritated less by what we read and find our wisdom confirmed more often. The danger is that this self-selected “news” acts as a narcotic, lulling us into a self-confident stupor through which we will perceive in blacks and whites a world that typically unfolds in grays."
Not to mention the extremely important role that newspapers play as the fourth estate and the watchdogs of the government.
The importance of investigative journalism in the public interest is widely accepted, but not that many people seem to be worried about what will happen when newspapers are no longer around to provide this important public service.
ProPublica, (where I once I applied for an internship) an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest, was created to offset the decline in real investigative journalism across the country.
So will there come a day when the federal government acknowledges the role of newspapers in keeping themselves in check. Perhaps.
Maryland Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin proposed legistlation that would allow struggling local papers to declare themselves non-profits so that they could stay afloat. My first thought was, "Finally, someone came up with some idea of how to help newspapers because I don't honestly haven't seen them doing much to help themselves."
Yet as a journalists it's difficult to imagine taking a government handout and still being able to be an effective watchdog.
Helena Deards of the Editors Weblog questioned the effect such subsidies would have on the media. "A newspaper may hesitate to contradict or criticise a body upon which it is financially dependent, and that small hesitation could amount to a large flaw in the democratic ideal of an independent media. In the same vein, dependent on how subsidies were distributed, they could have no effect at all upon the editorial line of a publication," she wrote.
Finally, there are those who are willing to stoke the fire burning beneath newspapers until the whole establishment burns down. Jack Shafer wrote in Slate, an online magazine, that it's time to kill the idea that newspapers are essential to democracy.
"The only group that holds a consistently high opinion of newspapers is newspaper people," Jack Shafer wrote.
OK, I'm not going to lie. This is probably true, but I think that's what most frustrating sometimes is that people don't realize what important work we do.
The Daily Me and the lack of investigative journalism will hurt democracy in America, and every American citizen should be concerned about the decline of the newspaper industry.
As newspapers across the country as slashing staffs, losing ad revenue and losing readers to the Internet, some wonder if they'll survive the economic crisis and this shift in the business model.
And if newspapers don't survive will democracy?
And others ask do we really need the mainstream media agenda setting for us when we can find our own news, the kind of news we want to read/watch all over the Internet?
A recent Pew Center poll even shows that only 43 percent of Americans believe that losing their local community newspaper would hurt civic life a lot.
But these everyday Americans are forgetting the reason that freedom of the press is enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Felix Frankfurter said, “Freedom of the press is not an end in itself but a means to the end of achieving a free society."
According to this picture from the Newseum in Washington, D.C., President Thomas Jefferson said, "Were it left to me decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or a newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate to prefer the latter."
(I saw this and I heard there was a video of you there, but I didn't get to see that.)
Both Chicago newspapers have declared bankruptcy. There are rumors that by the end of the summer the Chicago Sun-Times will fold completely or turn into online only. Can you imagine? Chicago it's really a one newspaper kinda town, but we might be soon.
The oldest newspaper in Colorado, The Rocky Mountain News, has closed along with the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
Final Edition from Matthew Roberts on Vimeo.
The lose of newspapers will hurt democracy because people will not be exposed to diverse views instead they will seek out only what they want to see and hear: the idea of the Daily Me, which is Nicholas Negroponte's idea of a virtual daily newspaper customized for an individual's tastes. We find this Daily me by seeking out the opinions and news stories that we agree with online not by consuming the hopefully objective news of the mainstream media.
New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristoff wrote in a recent column, "The decline of traditional news media will accelerate the rise of The Daily Me, and we’ll be irritated less by what we read and find our wisdom confirmed more often. The danger is that this self-selected “news” acts as a narcotic, lulling us into a self-confident stupor through which we will perceive in blacks and whites a world that typically unfolds in grays."
Not to mention the extremely important role that newspapers play as the fourth estate and the watchdogs of the government.
The importance of investigative journalism in the public interest is widely accepted, but not that many people seem to be worried about what will happen when newspapers are no longer around to provide this important public service.
ProPublica, (where I once I applied for an internship) an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest, was created to offset the decline in real investigative journalism across the country.
So will there come a day when the federal government acknowledges the role of newspapers in keeping themselves in check. Perhaps.
Maryland Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin proposed legistlation that would allow struggling local papers to declare themselves non-profits so that they could stay afloat. My first thought was, "Finally, someone came up with some idea of how to help newspapers because I don't honestly haven't seen them doing much to help themselves."
Yet as a journalists it's difficult to imagine taking a government handout and still being able to be an effective watchdog.
Helena Deards of the Editors Weblog questioned the effect such subsidies would have on the media. "A newspaper may hesitate to contradict or criticise a body upon which it is financially dependent, and that small hesitation could amount to a large flaw in the democratic ideal of an independent media. In the same vein, dependent on how subsidies were distributed, they could have no effect at all upon the editorial line of a publication," she wrote.
Finally, there are those who are willing to stoke the fire burning beneath newspapers until the whole establishment burns down. Jack Shafer wrote in Slate, an online magazine, that it's time to kill the idea that newspapers are essential to democracy.
"The only group that holds a consistently high opinion of newspapers is newspaper people," Jack Shafer wrote.
OK, I'm not going to lie. This is probably true, but I think that's what most frustrating sometimes is that people don't realize what important work we do.
The Daily Me and the lack of investigative journalism will hurt democracy in America, and every American citizen should be concerned about the decline of the newspaper industry.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Obama and the digital native generation
In his 2005 book, Tuned Out: Why Americans Under 40 Don't Follow the News, David Mindich argued that because youths weren't reading the news that civic engagement and democracy as we know it were faltering. However, the campaign and election of Barack Obama engaged the youth of America, which turned out in record numbers to help Obama get elected as president of the United States. Obama and his up-to-date, hip campaign team used their online communication strategy to the fullest to engage the generation of digital natives whose votes were essential to them.
This just shows that young people are getting news, and they are engaged. However, it is in a completely different way than any generation ever before them.
Obama utilized every online tool such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and his own extensive Web site.
In a Pew Research Center poll, more than 75 percent of Internet users used the Internet during the election to get information or participate in the election.
A different, not so surprising Pew Research Center reported showed that 40 percent of Americans use the Internet to get national and international news, which is a 17 percent increase from just more than a year ago. However, in this report, it was the first time that more people cited the Internet over newspapers as their main source of information. Only 35 percent of people surveyed read newspapers, while 70 percent said television was their main news source.
I remember being very small and playing computer games on a gigantic consul. Around the time I was ten, I remember using America Online and getting really excited when I got mail at my first e-mail address, which was Froggie722. I also remember reading international news stories from the Muncie Star Press everyday at the kitchen table after my dad had messed up all the pages of paper when he read it in the morning before me.
As a so-called digital native, it makes sense that my main source of news is the Internet. (I don't really watch television. I hate local news, and I generally only watch national television news broadcasts with my parents who watch them every night.)
As a journalist and a consumer, I'm torn. I never have time to read the whole New York Times, my paper of choice, during the day so I don't want to subscribe because I feel like it's wasteful. I spent at least 20 minutes to an hour online every day reading news, but that's sporadically. I also refuse to buy the Chicago Sun-Times because I think the journalism is shoddy, and I can't support the Chicago Tribune because I'm offended by Sam Zell's interpretation of journalism. Therefore, I would have to answer that I consume most of my news online even though I've always dreamed of working at a daily newspaper.
This just shows that young people are getting news, and they are engaged. However, it is in a completely different way than any generation ever before them.
Obama utilized every online tool such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and his own extensive Web site.
In a Pew Research Center poll, more than 75 percent of Internet users used the Internet during the election to get information or participate in the election.
A different, not so surprising Pew Research Center reported showed that 40 percent of Americans use the Internet to get national and international news, which is a 17 percent increase from just more than a year ago. However, in this report, it was the first time that more people cited the Internet over newspapers as their main source of information. Only 35 percent of people surveyed read newspapers, while 70 percent said television was their main news source.
I remember being very small and playing computer games on a gigantic consul. Around the time I was ten, I remember using America Online and getting really excited when I got mail at my first e-mail address, which was Froggie722. I also remember reading international news stories from the Muncie Star Press everyday at the kitchen table after my dad had messed up all the pages of paper when he read it in the morning before me.
As a so-called digital native, it makes sense that my main source of news is the Internet. (I don't really watch television. I hate local news, and I generally only watch national television news broadcasts with my parents who watch them every night.)
As a journalist and a consumer, I'm torn. I never have time to read the whole New York Times, my paper of choice, during the day so I don't want to subscribe because I feel like it's wasteful. I spent at least 20 minutes to an hour online every day reading news, but that's sporadically. I also refuse to buy the Chicago Sun-Times because I think the journalism is shoddy, and I can't support the Chicago Tribune because I'm offended by Sam Zell's interpretation of journalism. Therefore, I would have to answer that I consume most of my news online even though I've always dreamed of working at a daily newspaper.
Comments on Newspapers' Web Sites Create a Better Public Sphere
When mainstream newspapers provide their content online they give readers an opportunity to easily become active in dialogue about important community and even world issues. In this way, the Internet versions of newspapers function as a public sphere, which is defined in Jurgen Habermas' theory as an area in social life where people can get together and freely discuss and identify societal problems and through that discussion influence political action.
Newspapers, especially local papers, provide an easily accesible forum for discussion that may not have happened had it not been for the ability to provide immediate feedback on something that you have just read online.
In my small hometown of Muncie, Indiana, I've seen extremely active discussion when I read the stories at the Star Press, which I grew up reading everyday in its paper format. Just recently, I saw a very active thread with more than 60 posts. The discussions encompassed a vast range of issues such as the differences between the basketball team from the Southside of town and the rural county school, which had recently won the sectional championship game. The commentors discussed the issues of race, teen pregnancy, socioeconomic status, and the impact of sports on young people's lives.
Many bloggers and columnists for national newspapers and magazines end their posts with a question to stimulate discussion and responses to other comments on their site. The readers' answers to these questions often create a dialogue amongst themselves that the author can revisit and respond to. This creates dialogue and increases traffic to the site, which is beneficial to the newspaper because the more traffic a site receives the more revenue it makes from the advertisments posted on the page. I was also encouraged to end all of my blog posts with a question by my Writing for the Web teacher, Patricia Lamberti.
Though comment sections can sometimes get out of hand with anonymous commentors disregarding respect for others' opinions under the guise of anonymity, they still provide a vital space for discussion among citizens of a community who are reading the paper.
Former Loyola Phoenix editor-in-chief Katie Drews wrote a column in February about the difficulties editors face in drawing the line between progressive discussion and derogatory disgression. She wrote, "The tool allows people to immediately post an emotionally charged remark, along with the protection of anonymity. No filters, no edits and sometimes no thought before the click of the mouse."
The Poynter Institute even offers guidelines (or pointers hehe) on how to handle the comment section. In the world of the Internet, it's important for newspapers to keep their fingers on the pulse of the world and the comment section allows journalists to keep in better touch and communication with their readers.
I love to comment on articles and blogs. I do so much more often when they are written by people that I know. I love being a part of something greater than myself. The public sphere of the Internet allows my thoughts and opinoins to heard among the multitudes of voices that fill the Internet. Most of all as a journalist I love to see my articles commented on whether it is positive or negative. I appreciate the feedback. I often comment back to my readers to better faciliate the public sphere in my own little corner of the World Wide Web.
Newspapers, especially local papers, provide an easily accesible forum for discussion that may not have happened had it not been for the ability to provide immediate feedback on something that you have just read online.
In my small hometown of Muncie, Indiana, I've seen extremely active discussion when I read the stories at the Star Press, which I grew up reading everyday in its paper format. Just recently, I saw a very active thread with more than 60 posts. The discussions encompassed a vast range of issues such as the differences between the basketball team from the Southside of town and the rural county school, which had recently won the sectional championship game. The commentors discussed the issues of race, teen pregnancy, socioeconomic status, and the impact of sports on young people's lives.
Many bloggers and columnists for national newspapers and magazines end their posts with a question to stimulate discussion and responses to other comments on their site. The readers' answers to these questions often create a dialogue amongst themselves that the author can revisit and respond to. This creates dialogue and increases traffic to the site, which is beneficial to the newspaper because the more traffic a site receives the more revenue it makes from the advertisments posted on the page. I was also encouraged to end all of my blog posts with a question by my Writing for the Web teacher, Patricia Lamberti.
Though comment sections can sometimes get out of hand with anonymous commentors disregarding respect for others' opinions under the guise of anonymity, they still provide a vital space for discussion among citizens of a community who are reading the paper.
Former Loyola Phoenix editor-in-chief Katie Drews wrote a column in February about the difficulties editors face in drawing the line between progressive discussion and derogatory disgression. She wrote, "The tool allows people to immediately post an emotionally charged remark, along with the protection of anonymity. No filters, no edits and sometimes no thought before the click of the mouse."
The Poynter Institute even offers guidelines (or pointers hehe) on how to handle the comment section. In the world of the Internet, it's important for newspapers to keep their fingers on the pulse of the world and the comment section allows journalists to keep in better touch and communication with their readers.
I love to comment on articles and blogs. I do so much more often when they are written by people that I know. I love being a part of something greater than myself. The public sphere of the Internet allows my thoughts and opinoins to heard among the multitudes of voices that fill the Internet. Most of all as a journalist I love to see my articles commented on whether it is positive or negative. I appreciate the feedback. I often comment back to my readers to better faciliate the public sphere in my own little corner of the World Wide Web.
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