Informing the Public in the Internet Age

April 15

The profusion of low-cost media production and distribution has led to the rise of an alternative citizen-led media sector. Is this a passing fad of enthusiastic amateurs or the beginning of a fundamental restructuring of the way media and news are produced and consumed? Will the current trends lead to more information, better information, and better informed people or to an infinite stream of unreliable chatter? Will it lead to a more politically engaged populace or to an increasingly polarized society that picks its sources of information to match its biases and ignorance?

Readings

The whos and wheres of modern journalism

• Persephone Miel and Rob Faris, News and Information as Digital Media Come of Age (read executive summary)

• Persephone Miel and Rob Faris, A Typology of Media Organizations (skim)

• Federal Communications Commission, Information Needs of Communities (read executive summary, skim overview)

• Yochai Benkler, The Wealth of Networks (Chapter 7) (read from 225 ("Our second story focuses…") to 241 (end before "On Power Law Distributions, Network Topology, and Being Heard"); read from 261-66 ("Who Will Play the Watchdog Function?"))

Threats and issues

• Amy Mitchell, The State of News Media 2014

• This American Life, Picture Show (audio, from 0:00 to 5:09)

• RonNell Anderson Jones, Litigation, Legislation, and Democracy in a Post-Newspaper America (Section I only)

• Brendan Nyhan, Biases Abound (about 15 mins., watch all)

• Yochai Benkler, The Dangerous Logic of the Bradley Manning Case

• Jay Rosen, Audience Atomization Overcome: Why the Internet Weakens the Authority of the Press

New technologies and models

• Catherine D'Ignazio, Ali Hashmi, and Ethan Zuckerman, Mapping the (Boston) Globe (play with the website)

• Banyan Project, Introduction and Overview

• Chris Faraone, MuckRock City (Boston Phoenix)

• Adrienne LaFrance, From Cold Calls to Community Building, ProPublica Tries to Make Crowdsourcing More Meaningful (Nieman Journalism Lab)

Optional Readings

• Jonathan Zittrain, 2009 Richard S. Salant Lecture on Freedom of the Press (the lecture starts at 19:45)

• Sara Morrison, The Photo That Cried Wolf

Links

Cracked article http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-ways-to-spot-b.s.-political-story-in-under-10-seconds/

Class Discussion

Please remember to sign your postings by adding four tildes (~~~~) to the end of your contribution. This will automatically add your username and the date/time of your post, like so: Andy 15:12, 7 November 2013 (EST)

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The physical newspaper has been long from my doorstep for quite some time now, as I suspect this is the same for many others as well. According to the article 'Federal Communications Commission, Information Needs of Communities" 13,400 job losses in newspaper newsrooms across the country seems pretty substantial – So, what are we heading towards, the end of type written print physical and virtual as w know it? Or are we becoming willing participants to those who have smartphones and the like regarding instant video information?? I mean we are a video induced entranced society and there seems no way from turning back – so our news someday will only be what we see without any captions at all just the video feed – Yes, I am sounding a little over dramatic, but it seems that is the likely outcome we are heading for… Imagine getting news like the newspapers of old, but with no video feeds, just a picture or two and then a nice written scholarly column – that is unbiased… Hold on I think I’ll just take the video bites and form my own opinion – The fact that newspapers used to be objective and not necessarily so politically driven as they are today (websites included here), really depicts the state of information that we are in now, for better or worse. Dancoron 14:02, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

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I believe that underlying the effects of modern media and why the Internet weakens press and publishers is the digital divide. The digital divide magnifies disparities within countries and between them having an important effect on the distribution and consumption of quality news. New media may have lowered the barriers to entry for information channels but has raised barriers to entry for the digitally underserved or digital illiterate public news consumers. I believe this is a main concern that should not be underestimated when analyzing the media transformations in the Internet Age. Luciagamboaso 12:26, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

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I just came across this video about a different kind of censorship that is happening on Facebook: [1] It's really interesting to consider that censorship is not only happening as a result of laws or terms of use, but now as a way of "forcing" people/companies to pay. Castille 13:12, 9 April 2014 (EDT)

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I'm very thankful for the readings on the implications of the new media revolution on the Fourth Amendment as it's an issue I've never thought about before. Indeed, if the laws are not appropriately updated, these changes could have a massive impact on the freedom of journalism. I wonder whether one way to work around the issue would be to form some form of unions that would encompass many individual amateur reporters, providing them with legal protection, but without limiting the freedoms of the individual participants.--Seifip 13:14, 13 April 2014 (EDT)

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The Information Age and proliferation of media outlets seem to present a double-edged sword situation: while it's wonderful that we have access to a plethora of "news" from around the world and about whatever subjects in which we have a particular interest, there is also very little transparency in terms of the filters through which reporters and stations may be processing and delivering stories. By this I mean that there is no regulation to disclose what the stance of the company or organization might have, and how that stance might color the stories, which are generally presented as factual-- and indeed they may be-- but are oftentimes only offering one of many perspectives on an issue. Of course, maybe the solution is not to bind this freedom of speech with rules but instead to expect viewers to be intelligent enough to carry out their own research if they are so inclined. While this is a valid argument, is it "fair" to expect viewers to have to become reporters themselves? And what about the fact that the "truth" of a situation is virtually impossible to establish in many cases? Ultimately, all of the information available (or not available) is likely to leave the public either misinformed, blissfully ignorant of other points of view, or confused instead of truly informed. Castille 17:27, 13 April 2014 (EDT)

There is a constant sense of urgency and ‘pride in the newsroom’ to be the first to unveil critical information in a developing story. I worked at ABC News in 2011 and everyone there could tell you who broke what information first against their competitors - CNN, NBC, etc, on almost any story they’ve worked on. While I don’t think this industry-race is any different before the internet age, I do think the pressure and urgency has upped the stakes. Now that a pool of captured-this-on-my-iPhone citizen journalists have entered the pool along with individual bloggers - it’s as if staying on top or getting critical information first has been causing numerous reporting blunders and mistakes from the big media companies that would have happened less frequently years ago. Almost every big name media company has learned a lesson the hard way about fact-checking in recent years. Accuracy will outweigh the race to finish in first place; but that is easier said than done within the industry Marissa1989 23:05, 14 April 2014 (EDT)

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I think Brendan Nyhan's talk about biases lends some weight to the idea that new decentralized and less professional media outlets can be problematic. While I'm not as concerned as some people might be about a de-professionalization of media outlets (I'm sure there are many capable reporters, writers, editors, etc. than just those employed at major newspapers and other media outlets), I can understand why writers, editors, etc. in the media can benefit from a level of standard training. Learning best practices in order to avoid some of the issues Nyhan raises regarding readers' biases seems really important! Nyhan says that the technology we have at our disposal makes it easy to buttress our own views and ignore the ones we don't agree with (much like Sunstein's fears about the polarization of the blogosphere), so it's important that journalists don't encourage this behavior and type of thinking by the way they structure headlines and articles. Jkelly 22:38, 13 April 2014 (EDT)

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Jay Rosen's piece "Audience Atomization Overcome" balances some of the arguments made about problems with the changes occurring in traditional media outlets. It serves as a good reminder that, while newspapers and other traditional news media can do a great public service by holding the government and other large institutions accountable to the public, they also (intentionally or not) set the agenda at the inevitable cost of certain issues. He aptly points out that much as journalists like to think they can engage in their work without being political, the very act of choosing to write or not write about a topic is a political statement, or at the very least implies that the topic is worthy of public discourse. Jkelly 22:54, 13 April 2014 (EDT)

I very much enjoyed this article and am glad to see that someone chose to respond. I agree with you, and find that it also serves as a reminder that not only is the public being fed slanted views, but that the news neglects to consider certain topics altogether. One must use his or her discretion at all times, and must do his or her own research if intending to be entirely informed. It is clear that in many cases, opinions are no longer organically developed, nor are they passed down through traditional family values, but rather mass produced and disseminated by the media.Castille 10:21, 20 April 2014 (EDT)

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This is a little off topic, but for anyone who was particularly interested in the article on MuckRock and its FOIA requests, you should check out the work that Ryan Shapiro (a PhD candidate at MIT) is doing.[2] (Full disclosure- Ryan is a friend!) Jkelly 23:08, 13 April 2014 (EDT)

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Litigation, Legislation, and Democracy in a Post-Newspaper America; News and information as digital media come of age as well as other articles asert that that the small communities will may play crucial role and will may substitute the media in future, in other words the newspapers will die. But, I am pretty sure that media will survive, but will tranform into "digital" one, which means that in coming future there will be no paper formated media. TV, radio, official websites will play the same role as they do nowadays. The main power of official media is their professionalism, liability and accoutanability. On the contrary, the role of professional media will tremendously increase when there will be a lot of non-official, non-relaible sources of information. Media will accompany the goverment and legislation as they do now and play its "whatch dog" functions. I could bring the following example: one can know the legislation very well, even better than many lawyers...but, when it comes to court process, they will ask for assistance of lawyer (because he/she is a professional, not the amateur). The same scenario with media..One can read a lot of non-reliable news, but if there is a need for proof, they will go the official website of the professional media. Besides, media is always responsible for the published content, but "media typed communities" cannot held laible for anything, which will undermine their role in the social life of society. Aysel Ibayeva (Aysel 11:36, 15 April 2014 (EDT))

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I can't help but wonder what percentage of web-native media entities are functioning as news aggregation websites rather than representing under-reported items. There are surely gaps in the traditional media, especially on the local level; however many of the sites function as repeaters of a particular political or ideological viewpoint. Eye traffic appears so much easier to attract with the current model that we are neglecting a true opportunity. VACYBER 15:11, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

I am so glad you asked that! I just published a report that looks at the 500 matters that my online journalism referral clinic here at Berkman has helped where, among other things, we looked at this exact question. Turns out the overwhelming majority of the people we helped were original content creators, despite our intake criteria not limiting our work to creators vs. aggregation clients. I'll talk more about it in class today, but you can see the report here. Andy 15:17, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

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Playing with 'Mapping the Globe' was pretty fascinating. The extent to which editors and writers control our knowledge of the news (and framing our conversations) really can be worrisome, depending on the source. This topic is very close to home for me, as a web writer. There's always a small inherent bias in journalism, no matter how hard you attempt to be objective — in a sense, merely the act of choosing to cover one story over another is employing some sort of bias. Twood 15:26, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

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I believe that it is fair to say that the internet has contributed tremendously to the democratization of news and media as a whole. Citizen journalism is now a global trend thanks to the evolution of social media. For instance, in the US, there seems to be a general consensus to encourage citizen reporting even by the prominent news outlets (e.g. CNN and its iReport platform). I do not think that it is a bad thing at all. On the contrary, I believe that it is the beginning of a fundamental restructuring of the way media and news are produced and consumed. Albeit its slightly chaotic nature sometimes, the fact that ordinary citizens have such platforms to objectively voice out their concerns, views, and opinions on different issues is good for democracy. It could also lead to a better informed people in the long run. cheikhmbacke 15:53, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

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One of the critiques from the reading, specifically the statement by Eli Noam, “Money will end up dominating anyway”, might usually be right, but the case of multi billion-dollar company Diebold and their “Election Systems” is an example of how nontraditional media can accomplish things traditional media cannot. They showed themselves able to perform under legal pressure, and even though Wired magazine did not post the exposing emails, the students kept circulating them and kept them widely available to the public the whole time. The news industry is not what it has been in the past; affected by the digital age, it has taken on a new face of non-professional digital media. While newspapers and other traditional news outlets experienced hard losses, cut thousands of employees, and shut down whole departments, philanthropic efforts donate millions of dollars to small digital news stations like New York Public Radio. It seems the current trends in media evolution will lead to a more involved, better informed public with many new and quicker ways for news to travel. Mapping the Globe is very interesting! Usually a site focuses on tracking events in public life, but this website monitors the footprints of the Boston Globe and all the different types of stories they share with their readers. Emmanuelsurillo 15:55, 15 April 2014 (EDT)

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