Final post
Phil Rogers recently visited my Broadcast class to talk about his career in journalism. The first thing he wrote on the whiteboard was, “Change your major.” From that point on, we spent the two hours discussing where the future of journalism will head.
I immediately thought of my guerilla media class – where we have learned just how journalism can take many forms, challenge direction and enact progress.
Rogers explained just how unprepared the newspaper industry was when it came to new forms of media. Papers had to accept the Internet, the bastard child to the news business. The Internet was a second thought to the print version of news, but today, has become the main venue for news. Instead of just writing a story for print and throwing it online, newspapers have begun to accept that online is the focus. Unfortunately, this came after Craigslist. Because Craigslist, the news industry has to find a new way to gain revenue. How can newspapers make money from the Internet?
Newspapers can profit through many forms and challenge direction through new models. For example, an iTunes model can help profit by selling news. But would people pay for their news? Well, maybe so. Just as a person would pay for an organic apple, would they pay for a higher quality of information? Then again, would you pay for anything on the Internet?
From our class and Mark Manion and Abby Goodrum’s Terrorism or Civil Disobedience: Toward a Hacktivist Ethic, we discussed how the Internet began as a freedom, forget the system, mentality. Micro-charging, or charging for articles or news outlets, just as you would a 99 cent track on iTunes, is a nice solution, but that is not how the Internet began. The Internet began as an open source, from students who wanted free, unadulterated information. Could charging work for something that originated for the sole purpose of being free? Probably, not. Unless Internet patrons change their information mentality.
I’d like to think I could be wrong. That maybe micro-charging is the perfect model. The best way to see this will be in the upcoming months with Facebook. The social networking site hopes to charge its users for using the site, but according to the many Facebookers I know (almost everyone), charging sounds terrible, but it’s also second-nature to log on.
As the economy looks sadder than a dog with a tail between its legs, media does have a chance to rebuild. The media are only beginning. The media are only learning their options and rebuilding. I’m not changing my major. If anything, I know how to adapt. Adaptation requires some alternative acceptance and flirtation with a computer.
Some more fandom from fandom.
I can’t get enough of it. I know I’m not alone. Admit it, you like it, too. Right?
I LOVE HARRY POTTER! (wheew, I said it now). Every once in a while there are a few people who come along and really represent the fans well. One of the latest to come is We Are Wizards, a film about being the ultimate fan in the highest form of flattery: imitation. We’ve watched this trailer in our classroom, but here is anyway – it’s doing very well and scoring big nods around the U.S., according to their Myspace.
From this spectacular trailer, there is a man with a peculiar voice and a penchant for the word dubiously: Brad Neely.
My dear friend, Billy Kalb of TTTTotally Dudes recommended Neely to me. Neely is a prime example of ultimate fandom. He takes a name like Hermione (which many people struggle to pronounce anyway) and calls her Harmony – because it’s ironic and, well, silly. The narrator includes fires shocking sports analysis through the renaming of Quidditch as Cribbige. He calls Snape, Snake, and also addresses Snape as a she. He creates a new classification for Potterdom
As a fan, he’s cultivating more forms of fandom by crafting slam-poetry, spitting story lines and narrations that most people couldn’t conjure up on lined-paper. What I found, while watching this as Pandora, played, was The Way the Wind Blows by A Hawk and a Hacksaw, was the perfect background music because it sounds dubious and quizzical – but that’s a side note.
Wizard People, Dear Reader, is a form of alternative media, too. Groups that typically link or tag this are friendly toward alternative, non-pantsuit-wearing media, which makes me believe for something to be fandom, it must grip tightly to the indie/alt. media crowd. Hell, they might even be inspired to make their own spin-offs of other films they greatly admire.
Imitation is, after all, the highest form of flattery.
“You should.” “So I did.”
That’s a phrase that most citizen journalists start with, and one Mark Briggs captures in Journalism 2.0 How to Survive and Thrive: A digital literacy guide for the information age
For a citizen journalist, it all starts one way: journalists do not cover special, community interests and citizens take their community into their own hands as a result. Bloggers to zinesters employ their own stake in their community to present just what people with interests like theirs want to know.
In from Pamphlet to blog, a series of independent, citizen journalists (who may or may not like the term at all) state just how divorced they feel mainstream media is. They discuss objectivity, one of the cornerstones of media, is never upheld.
As a student journalist I have been taught to be objective (or suffer a terrible death! – I kid), which is a wonderful quality and a critical component to truth-telling. Sometimes though, it is hard to distinguish bias from fact. Most people have opinions and it makes sense that people, who have access to so much technology, would be interested in exploring their surroundings and trying to make sense of stories they do not understand. Not everything is reported. For example, if I am a high school student and I begin to notice how milk from the cafeteria is warm once I place it on my tray, then maybe I want to blog or post something on my Myspace page about it. Maybe as a renter I begin to notice that many buildings in my neighborhood are becoming condos or facing renovations that will make them higher-end renters, condo buyers. I begin to report this through my neighborhood blog and this sparks civic action from other people in my neighborhood. Maybe we address the issue with the alderman, mayor or housing group to enact change.
The key component of these type of citizen action is that no one else seems to notice these things. Journalists cannot be everywhere and they definitely do not know everything. Citizen journalists (or whatever term or identity they claim) are good at reporting what they report because they are experts and interested in learning more about their causes. One of the best examples of these are in Rogers Park with The Broken Heart of Rogers Park and Chicago News Bench. We see citizens who record and unveil community events and offer a forum for the community, especially when it comes to crime.
Sardine-jammed culture
blog.wired.com
I admit, if I had to see this image on my walk to the bus every morning, I would hate it. However, I would also pause to think about it, too. This is exactly what culture jamming is. It is supposed to smack you in the face and beg you to wake up to the corporate mindset, or at least ask you to second guess its truth. This form of art differs from writing an article about how corporations are overtaking the planet, although that has been written about before. Culture jamming requests a second look at just how silly corporations can be in a consumer-driven society.
Naomi Klein describes the message behind culture jammers as “pointedly political” compared to the mad men ad men of the past described in her book, No Logo. The root of culture jamming is not completely clear. Did it come from frustration toward society? Was it a creative stab at what was already in the clutter? Today, with new media theorists who question corporations and their strategies, ad-busting has become an increasingly popular art form. The rise of ad-busting produces a new outlook on what it means for a message to cross your eyes and mind in the middle of the day, while you walk down the street passing the same sign – only this time you begin to question.
mizbala.com
In Jonah Peretti’s “My Nike media adventure” the author requests just what Nike, a very large (OK, large is an understatement – massive!) offers – free speech on a shoe. Although, his message was denied when Peretti asked for “sweatshop” to read on his custom Nikes. This attempt to ridicule the very root of what the corporation stands for, to him, is an attempt at culture jamming. Ridicule is the number one message behind many culture jammers. Jammers ask: Why do people like this so much when it means ____________ ?
The collective
Our ancestors in caves show that humans have always been around each other in a collective group. Today, collectives have grown larger, invigorated by technology.
I first understood collective action theory as a child, learning about Martin Luther King, Jr and the Civil Rights Movement. In this movement, the public’s human rights were at stake. A group organized, was motivated by a leader, MLK, and coordinated many marches, sit-ins, and went to jail for their cause. There were many free riders, or people who benefited without necessarily participating or taking direct action – but that’s just part of human behavior. In Reconceptualizing Collective Action in the Contemporary Media Environment by Bruce Bimber, Andrew J. Flanigan and Cynthia Stohl, the authors suggest how technology can reframe the climate for collective action.
Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement came at a time when technology was beginning. Today, we see how powerful technology is to propell thousands to a march at the WTO in Seattle or even millions to vote for one man in 2008. Through lap tops, listserv e-mails, Web sites and text messaging the way to gather a group and stand up for a public cause changed. The Civil Rights Movement, WTO protests and the grassroots election of President Barack Obama all have one characteristic in common: the shared goal to produce public goods (or to garuntee the good welfare of many) instead of an individual-centered cause.
With new media, the role of the public is altered, according to Rheingold. Each person can broadcast their own information to a greater public. With a cell phone, one person can spread information to many. Rheingold gives the example of Critical Mass in San Francisco that began spinning thousands of bicycle wheels in 1992 to a violent political demonstration in Toronto in 2000 that was captured by journalist-researchers who webcast their digital video. What is the motivation behind organizing through technology? Rheingold says it’s not very difficult, and, humans are programmed to cooperate for each other’s benefits. That’s what makes us a collective society.
On college campuses I’ve witness the collective and through my own friends at Berkeley. A few weeks ago, students protested the killing of Oscar Grant III. Grant was killed by a Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer and prompted an independent movement for BART police to stop carrying guns and further investigate the death of Grant. Grant’s death became so public through the Internet when a series of images and digital video became available on the Internet. This has spurred collective action from students and community members. Through Facebook, text messaging, e-mails, Web sites, Youtube.com and news wires the group formed a collective network to oppose the killing of Oscar Grant III and police brutality in the Bay area.
DIY
DO-IT-YOURSELF. It’s imperative. It’s in caps so that also makes it angry, angsty – although, this term doesn’t need angst – its history determined an entire subculture of outrage. DIY originated from the “produce it if you want it and don’t feel bad about it” punk movement.This is an attitude that defied disco and collided with the sweater-wearing, feather-haired West Coast. This was not the only location where punk arrived. The Brits had quite a role in the punk movement as well.
If Americans were unsatisfied, and British were too, how did the punk movement become an international movement? What about the 1980s was unique? Blame it on disco, Reagan.
First, the American punk movement and the British punk movement differed by origin. Dylan Clark explores this in The Death and Life of Punk, The Last Subculture. Clark describes how the American punk movement arrived because middle-class kids were bored with the mainstream. The British punk movement, however, was an outcry from working class and a rebellion against a bad economy and rising unemployment. Both movements did apply one major philosophy: Change it if you don’t like it, do it yourself, forget about authority because authority is wrong. In fact, do away with authority entirely.
Today’s DIY is dramatically different from punk. Punk may be the origin, or the catalyst, but it’s not the same today. There is a new form of artistic expression, although, it’s really not so new. This expression looks more like a grandmother’s creation – only with a scary skull. Imagine your grandmother punching tough punk-loving kids with knitting needles. Okay, that’s a little far-fetched. But the similarity between the two is dissatisfaction.
Dissatisfaction with politic and product drives DIY.
Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, music and craft have driven the punk and indie/crafty subcultures. If it’s not out there, the DIY mentality kicks in. Particularly for craft, it’s why not just make it. If one has the tools to make something (i.e. a pattern, a crochet skill learned by Grandma Nini, or vintage beads) – why not make something yourself?
ALT
Most large media advances were made before my earthly start – but my Lord, I remember Compuserve. My parents were convinced that Compuserve was it. Dial up was the future, the way. My mother, sister and I squinted in front of a elephant screen for hours waiting for pages to load with photos. We wanted to print The Spice Girls.
LA Times
It cracked me up to read Dan Gillmor’s From Tom Paine to Blogs and Beyond, because he remembers the astute Compuserve, among other media megastars. Gilmor addresses just how much has changed since the advent of mail service to todays open sources. While he maintains the U.S. mail system is what helped fuel America’s hunger for news, I’m not sure that’s the truth. The mail system did more than just send copies of newspapers; it allowed for an exchange of wealth beyond printed texts through many other businesses. Newspapers did, indeed, profit greatly from the birth of the U.S. mail system, but that was not the main and only reason for profit.
Clearly, profit was the result and the reason for expansion. A question we’ve discussed in class, and I presume we may encounter often, is what makes something alternative and what makes something explode. I mean, really take off and become popular. So popular that everyone knows about it and maybe you or me, “the discoverers of all things undiscovered and cool,” are left without any credit.
I felt like I discovered High Places, a bi-coastal band with a penchant for pepper-shaking noises, but now I see their tour dates have grown in the past six months – that scares me. Yeah, I should get over it. I don’t want to though. I thought I was entering a new world of melodies. But I ask, am I doing a diservice by not mentioning how fantastic High Places is to everyone I meet? Should I link post a video? Fine.
Right now I know, as long as Rolling Stone steers clear of High Places then I’m happy. Pitchfork may have dipped her toes, but MTV better stay far away, please.
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