Ways to get interviews October 8, 2007
Posted by rebeccaperez in announcements, crowdsourcing, demographics, participatory journalism, presentation.add a comment
One of my friends suggested doing a search on YouTube under community, then put in your school name, so that you get a list of people who have posted video to that site. You could do the same with MySpace. I am sending out messages to people on YouTube right now, just wanted to let you know about this idea while I was thinking about it. Hope this helps.
While I’m Up October 2, 2007
Posted by Rob Ponte in participatory journalism.add a comment
uploaded by xymon
I came across this Joe Think Blog. He worked on the Neighbors section at the Denver Post. It’s apparently built on phpBB but it has a this participation points thing that I think we might learn a bit from, although I’m not sure if these points actually do anything. Getting them seems to be mostly based on quantity of participation rather than quality.
The neighborhoods section itself seems mostly to be an archive of article comments, which are also displayed on the actual stories themselves.
Anyways people seem to be using it, they can also post blogs and photos as well.
[photo unrelated, replaced original over appropriateness concerns]
Practice Present September 30, 2007
Posted by jonathan686 in participatory journalism.3 comments
As preparation for Toronto, I’ve presented our idea two faculty and advisory groups at MSU each of the last two weeks. Here is some feedback:
1. What is the incentive for people to use Tandem?
I had a hard time answering this. Is it for the vanity of getting published? For the ability to tell unique stories not covered by the mainstream media? What angle should we push?
2. How will we stop this from turning into a forum-board like soap-box for ideologues? How do we encourage good reporting?
This seemed to be the biggest concern amongst those I presented the idea to. Especially those who had managed new sites. I mentioned the credibility index (by the way – what is that? How does it work?) and the ability to set a story’s participation level (from open to invite only). Any other strategies? Moderators?
Ramblings September 16, 2007
Posted by Rob Ponte in participatory journalism.add a comment
[preamble] SO, I just bought this new iPod. First one I’ve owned and after loading something like 3000 songs onto it I fired it up and checked out the Artists category. Geh. So there would be Artists names like arist1/artist2 or artist feat artist2 and such which would only show the single song where it features all those people, and also just the single artist tags which didn’t include the songs where another artist was also featured. Anyways I’m not sure if this has been fixed in modern mp3s, a lot of mine are kind of old or otherwise unscupulous but it got me thinking. All you need to do to better organize this is to break the meta database entry into two variables rather than one. One for the actual people who did the song, another for the group or band or whatever that they call themselves. This way I could go to say thom yorke’s entry and it would show me his solo stuff, the songs he’s been featured in with other groups or artists and also the radiohead catalog since he’s a member of the band.
SO, I think our collab content might function similar to how bands and publications might get together and evolve. A band may not always have the same members all the time, a magazine certainly won’t but the name will still stay the same. So we can have individual members of the portal come together and work in impromptu groups and also have people select their own groups and put out content as a team. Nothing new here, we have a google groups account, facebook group, public group blog, chat rooms, group wiki pages with google docs, and we could do warcraft guilds, second life groups (or whatever) and a million other ways to team up and communicate (and work together) as a group. And we have a group name, with subgroups. SO I guess I’m just saying we need to encourage self-organization and publication as part of the regular process on the portal. And we need a way to browse and sort and search them effectively. I think it should be a sort of central theme.
We mainly though need to focus on getting people together in the first place. I think we may be able to do it through content but we might want to look into other methods.
rob.
Bones September 8, 2007
Posted by Rob Ponte in ideas, participatory journalism.5 comments
Okay so I was thinking about the underlying structure of our idea. The “skeleton” if you will and I think that we should all agree on what that structure is and what it’s based on. So I think that creative commons licensing should play a huge part in the underlying shared and non-commercial basis of the collab portal. I’m sure were all familiar with some of these. They are options that the user can pick and choose and should be integrated into the submission forms. From creativcommons.org :
Attribution. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if they give credit the way you request.
Example: Jane publishes her photograph with an Attribution license, because she wants the world to use her pictures provided they give her credit. Bob finds her photograph online and wants to display it on the front page of his website. Bob puts Jane’s picture on his site, and clearly indicates Jane’s authorship.
Our core licensing suite will also let you mix and match conditions from the list of options below. There are a total of six Creative Commons licenses to choose from our core licensing suite.
Noncommercial. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your work — and derivative works based upon it — but for noncommercial purposes only
Examples: Gus publishes his photograph on his website with a Noncommercial license. Camille prints Gus’ photograph. Camille is not allowed to sell the print photograph without Gus’s permission.
No Derivative Works. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform only verbatim copies of your work, not derivative works based upon it.
Example: Sara licenses a recording of her song with a No Derivative Works license. Joe would like to cut Sara’s track and mix it with his own to produce an entirely new song. Joe cannot do this without Sara’s permission (unless his song amounts to fair use).
Share Alike. You allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the license that governs your work.
Note: A license cannot feature both the Share Alike and No Derivative Works options. The Share Alike requirement applies only to derivative works.
Example: Gus’s online photo is licensed under the Noncommercial and Share Alike terms. Camille is an amateur collage artist, and she takes Gus’s photo and puts it into one of her collages. This Share Alike language requires Camille to make her collage available on a Noncommercial plus Share Alike license. It makes her offer her work back to the world on the same terms Gus gave her.
More examples are available on our examples page. Also note that every license carries with it a full set of other rights in addition to the allowances specifically made here.
I also commented on another thread about what our revenue source will be. I think that most likely it would be the same kind of advertising as whatever news website that uses it is. I do think we should try to provide another option since I think a lot of people won’t want to contribute to a site that takes possession of their work and makes money off of it from advertising. I wouldn’t.
So the next step is (?) we need people to create the mockup or prototype (the tech group?), write the script, define the idea and its limits and then basically we all need to be as critical as possible so that we can end up with the most impervious and solid idea there ever were, right?
backtracking a tad September 8, 2007
Posted by deene in interactivity, participatory journalism.2 comments
So this is a little off track, but still on topic. I posted this in a comment but figured it would make more sense to make it into a formal post.
The ENC of my paper holds this thing once a week called “The Tony Awards” (it’s an attempt at punnery-his first name is Tony) where he talks about what was good in the previous week’s paper. It’s to give a little recognition to staffers etc. . . So anyway, one of our reporters did an indepth on the resurgence of heroin in the Flint area. It was a really excellent story and it stirred a great deal of response from our community, including a fairly well written letter from a girl in her 20’s who has struggled with heroin addiction for years. We edited it for length, but not much else and published it on A1. During the Tony awards our ENC pointed out the reporter’s story as being really good because of the community response. What he said really struck me and I wrote it down. This isn’t a direct quote, but it’s a decent paraphrase.
We used to be all riled up about this thing called citizen journalism. Well, after dealing with it for a short time we, of course, realized that there is no such thing. Journalism is a craft practiced by trained professionals. But writing is not. [Brin’s] story was an example of good, solid journalism, but this letter was an example of reader provided, well written content. And any time we can generate a response that gives us that, then you know it’s been a good day.
I thought it was an interesting view of a topic so many of our contemporaries are struggling with. What do you think?
My understanding of the project before seeing Jeff’s art September 5, 2007
Posted by rebeccaperez in ideas, mashups, participatory journalism.add a comment
this sounds really cool, but until I have something that I can look
> at I may be a bit confused. So this is a potential app that allows
> people to contribute local knowledge wikki style, interface with other
> people like facebook, except they aren’t “friends,” but people you have
> collaborated with, ability to upload all kinds of content to be used by
> the news site or other users, and the ability to communicate with the
> journalists in realtime chat rooms. Did I forget or change anything?
> This is so potentially massive I’m having a hard time envisioning a
> news site being able to run all of these apps. Do the papers have the
> option to take off some of the features? I love all of the features
> and I think this would be a great boon to citizen journalism and
> localism, I’m just concerned about trying to do too much. Let me know
> what you think. Doing too much was a problem with K-State’s project,
> among others, I’m afraid that this has the potential to have the same
> problem. Just a thought.
What are we trying to accomplish here? September 3, 2007
Posted by charlotteanne in ideas, interactivity, participatory journalism.2 comments
I saw some comments this past week that made me think some of you needed a repost of something I wrote long ago and far away (OK, in June) … so here it is verbatim:
Every so often it’s important to ponder our mission and refocus. I promised you I would post this, so here it is, straight from the grant document.
First, here is the big picture from Knight :
The Knight Brothers 21st Century News Challenge Initiative seeks…
• New ways for people to communicate interactively to help people better understand one another in geographic communities, share know-how and generate passion in solving local problems;
• New ways for people to use information, news and journalism in geographic communities to imagine their collective possibilities as communities, and to set and reach common community goals;• New ways to dig for news and act on it in geographic communities, including new ways to collect, prepare and distribute information, news and journalism that reveals hard-to-know facts, identifies common problems, clarifies community issues or points out practical courses of action.
Now, here is what Dr. Dianne promised we would deliver:
“… an effective, efficient and replicable system with the capacity to generate and execute entirely new approaches to and examples of participatory community news.“
“… original and relevant models of news production, format and distribution, and it will make those models available to individual, independent and industry news producers
“… an entirely new form of participatory community journalism, one that is scalable, replicable, affordable and effective. Deliverables may adopt any digital format or approach – from a Web site, to a news application, to an immersive media simulation or platform. But they must be adaptable and relevant, useful to real people and real communities.”
“… Most important, the project will generate new approaches to community news production and delivery, which will be made available to all news producers across the country.”
Think about it. Ponder it. Print it out and put it inside your AP Stylebook under your pillow and grok it.
And first one to send me a link with the real origin of the word “grok” wins. 
(hint: it ain’t Steve Jobs!)
Even MTV. . . August 25, 2007
Posted by deene in hyper-local, interactivity, participatory journalism.add a comment
is getting into the local. This was a job posting someone I used to work with sent out to one of my listserves.
” Citizen journalists! Visionaries! Vloggers! This is your year. Now more than ever, the presidential candidates know that every vote counts, and that local campaign stops can be covered and spread worldwide by anyone with a cell phone. You have power.
As part of our collaboration with the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Knight News Challenge, MTV is looking for one aspiring reporter from every state and Washington, D.C., to be part of our Choose or Lose team. We know that you’re already hitting the streets and doing this work. So now we’re giving you the chance to join a national team of journalists in covering this unprecedented election year from a youth perspective.
Ideal candidates will have their fingers on the pulse of issues that are important to young people in their states and be passionate about politics and the possibilities of new technology. Strong writing and reporting skills are a must. A distinctive voice and an authoritative point of view? Even better.
We’ll load you up with some production gear and bring you to MTV’s headquarters in New York City for orientation. In return, you will be expected to work in a paid, part-time capacity to file video, written or photographic stories weekly throughout the election year. Your pieces will be posted online and spread to mobile devices — and the top stories will be broadcast on MTV, MTV2, MTVU or MTV Trés each week.
Requirements:
· You must be at least 18 years old by December, 2007.
· You must reside in the state you are covering from January to November, 2008.
· You must have the time and ability to travel within your state and file at least one video, written or photographic story per week. “
It seems like they’re taking a leaf out of the Gannett’s MoJo book. I thought this was interesting from a local standpoint. Plus it’d be kind of a cool job. However, I’m again troubled by the potential for these positions to become un-objective. After all, it doesn’t say anything about the good folks at MTV helping the budding journalist to choose what to cover. . . or what not to cover. I know I sound like a broken record, but where do you draw the ethical line?
“Reverse publishing” of online citizen journalism – it’s BRILLIANT. August 22, 2007
Posted by Jeff in competition, hyper-local, participatory journalism.5 comments
Beginning today, some Chicago Tribune readers will receive the new Triblocal print edition. Following the launch of triblocal.com earlier this year, hundreds of citizens registered to post photos, stories and events from their hometowns. This content, along with enhanced coverage from Triblocal editorial staff, is used to develop two weekly print publications serving the West and Southwest suburbs.
PR Newswire via BuzzMachine.
Reader contributions are actually being published in dead-tree newspapers. How does that strike you, journalists?
