The Wave of the Future

Dan Gillmor's book, We The Media, has been illuminating. In Chapter Six he discusses the requiem for editorial intervention in the blogosphere. "I believe in the mission of journalism and fear that serious investigative reporting will diminish, and perhaps nearly dissappear, if big newspapers and other serious outlets wither (pg. 111)." In context, he says that he admires the concept of the blogosphere and that it is the proverbial "dawn" of a new kind of media, namely, New Media, he does however, feel that traditional media is necessary, if only for their (relative)attentiveness to "fairness, accuracy and thoroughness (pg. 134)." "But the vital bottom line would be in improving the news reporting for everyone (pg. 123)."

The reason I said before that Gillmor's book has been illuminating was specifically because of the content of the book. I feel much more knowledgable about what exactly is out there on the web merely thanks to his off-handed citation of sites. I decided to surf through some of the sites he cites and see for myself if they are as ideal as he said.

Gillmor's site, Backfence, is a "many to many" site. In other words, its not like the sites we have for this class where one person authors a blog and others comment, but his site uses technology that allows people to post blogs onto the site itself. Gillmor's site is dedicated to his hometown of Sunnyvale and Silicon Valley. It lists as index titles: Community, Arts & Living, Sports, and Crime Log. What's the point of such a site? To give members of the community a sense of place, belonging and be what Aristotle classed all humans as: zoon politikon. "I'd like to see news organizations encourage 'citizen reporting' by people who want to cover some broadly defined aspect of community life (pg. 122)." There is a clear difference in terms of the tone of the pieces in Gillmor's blog. When Dan posts an entry, it is written like a professional journalist, clear, focused, andwell-written. This is his job as the professional even in these sites! -to be the moderator. "The job of the journalist, more than ever, is to be a filter (pg. 125)." In other words, a journalist in the New Media, according to Gillmor, is not just another blogger, but rather plays a pivotal role in the management of the NM. He is the "filter", viz. the editor. He still is the proffesional source of the news and bloggers would be nowhere without them. In fact, it is the Big Media themseves who make bloggers so successful. A case-in-point is Chris Allbritton. Allbritton appealed to his readership for funds to travel to Iraq to cover the war from the field. Over the course of three months, he got about $500, not bad. However, when his quest was reported by the MSM, his site viewers "went through the roof" and altogether raked in $14,500! New Media still needs Old Media.

Getting back to intonation. I said before that Gillmor's voice is clearly that of a reporter. But a "citizen reporter" is much more amateur, naturally: "I had briefly heard on the radio about Gunn High School receiving an award for being an environmentally friendly 'business or organization' as part of a Palo Alto program." He could have taken out the word "had" and made the reporting seem more objective, for example, by saying, "It was reported by 'so and so station' that...". But, as I said, its only natural, even essential. I would like to expland briefly on intonation.

An essential characteristic of NM is its intonation. Its more like a Town Hall meeting than a formal seminar; people are talking to each other. And even though it is common knowledge that people write differently than they speak (usually for the better), perhaps the advent of the Internet and specifically the non-formal method of IMs and E-Mails where "I" is replaced by "i" and abbreviations are prevalent (eg. nm, gtg, ttyl, asap, IM, etc), make modern "writing" more like talking.

Gillmor relates an incident regarding CNN reporter Kevin Sites. When CNN found out he had a personal blog on Iraq, they forced him to abort it using the excuse, "We do not blog (pg. 116)." But what is it about the blogosphere that so repels Traditional Media? According to Gillmor, its the "innate conservatism of the Big Media business (pg. 114)." So what's so "revolutionary about New Media"? Obviously the answer is its openness, but alongside that is its lack of discipline specifically, I believe in the realm of rhetoric. Articles are credible becuause the people writing them invested the time to make them intelligent sounding. Much of what is out there in the New Media is just noise. That is what repels the Big Media. I can understand that. But what Gillmor is suggesting by his quoting Tim Levell's comparison of the professional journalist as a filter is that the synthesis of professional journalism and New Media will produce true Tocquevillian Media that is accurate, sharp, reliable and... well written.