This morning I read a few posts, about a conference session and a panel at Berkley, that focussed on “Web 2.0”, online journalism, and amateur participation.
While the topics discussed at both meetings seemed to overlap with many of those we discussed at the norgs unconference, I couldn’t help but feel that the folks involved are far behind the discussion that’s been ongoing in Philly.
So much so, I actually felt a bit sad. So wound up they are in false choices and pointing fingers. Jeff Jarvis had a recent, heated thread on the subject.
Read for yourself at down the avenue and Union Square Ventures (who has yet to approve my following comment – update:comment approved, good old spam filtering :)).
I posted the following at both blogs, and fully expect to be ignored or put down, because what we did in Philly was to stop pointing fingers. We stopped preaching to each other. And we listened (read Jeff Jarvis’s take here and here).
For some weird reason, folks on either side of this debate, don’t seem to care for that.
My comment:
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I wish I was at this event.
We had a similar event in Philadelphia last year that was focussed on news journalism and the web. It sounds like it covered related territory. (link).
Fact of the matter is, there is room enough for numerous approaches to filtering/finding news.
Algorithmic – Memeorandum, Google News
By the crowd – Digg, Newsvine.
By a single unpaid editor – A blogger.
By communities of unpaid editors – A genre specific slice of the blogosphere.
By a news organization – A newspaper with staffed editors – Yahoo News, Salon, Slate.
By hybrid community/editor efforts – Slashdot, Indymedia.
There seems to be an effort on the parts of some to create some false conflicts between these approaches. To promote one approach over the other as the *ultimate solution*.
That’s a shame really, because in the dust of that are people becoming less and less informed (check out the latest Pew research) while wealth and fortune flow from one kind of media organization to another.
We can do far better. All of us can. My bet is that will happen when groups of us decide to put down our guns and work together.
Karl
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“Fact of the matter is, there is room enough for numerous approaches to filtering/finding news”
What you’re neglecting – and what’s driving the fights – is not a weird reason, but WHERE’S THE MONEY? (literally)
That is, what model is most wealth-producing for those who favor it.
All else is elaboration.
Read Jeff Jarvis’s take on our unconference:
http://www.buzzmachine.com/2006/03/25/saving-journalism-and-killing-the-press/
The interesting thing is his “this is the day the war ends” meme didn’t take off.
A few folks linked to his post, commented here and there, but the idea didn’t take hold.
And it’s a shame.
It maybe about money, but I think it’s also about human nature – it’s easier to point to others as part of a problem (notice most advocates of some thing use how bad something else is in their reasoning) – instead of looking for interdependencies and overlaps and sweet spots that exist when you open your mind up that one approach isn’t always the singular best approach.
Lord help me, I’m still a Perl guy after doing Java for the untold years.