I attended some of the Saturday session of “Blogging, Journalism and Credibility: Battleground and Common Ground.”. It brought together a group of well known bloggers and traditional journalists. The event was organized by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at the Harvard Law School, the American Library Association’s Office of Information Technology and the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.
I posted on Jay Rosen’s pre-read on Monday, along with an article that Marc Orchant sent me on the session. This post summarizes the rest of my notes and moves from details to broader themes as topics came up. Dave Weinberger attended and blogged real time. He provides detailed notes on his observation of the Saturday session I attended. He also covers the Friday session which I was unable to attend.
Dave Winer mentioned that a number of cities are setting up free Wi-Fi for their central downtown area. Spokane Washington has already done it and Seattle is proposing it. He mentioned this in the context of podcast radio but it will also be a major aid to all aspects of internet access. I am already increasingly able to find wi-fi as many of you are. In Boston, the major sections of Newberry Street have free wi-fi. I am writing this on the train from Boston to New York and there is wi-fi connectivity on the train, along with a power outlet for your computer.
Jimmy Wales, co-founder of the wikipedia, described the new wikipedia news. It has been set up as a service with the goal of becoming a good general news site like the BBC or CNN. However, Jimmy is open to how it might evolve as either major or niche player. There is an emphasis on quality. Unlike the wikipedia, they more proactively check on the validity of contributions. Unlike, the wikeipedia, they also accept original contributions. Because of the global network of trusted contributors, wikipedia news has scooped the more traditional sites on some stories such as recent protests in Belize where they had someone on the ground who supplied pictures.
Wikipedia news could become a prime site for stories that are not picked up by the main stream press. For example, Faye Anderson mentioned that she had good research de-bunking the myth that low black voter turn out was hurting the Democrats in recent elections. She was part of voter turn out efforts for black Americans. The main stream press would not run the story. Later, the US census bureau confirmed that blacks were the only major group that had increased voter turn out in these elections.
There was some discussion on the wikipedia, itself, the validity of its content, and the challenges it might face as it continues to become more popular. This is topic I have posted on before in Wikipedia and Copyrights and Wikipedia: Fact, Fiction, or Useful Clues? The wikipedia will not publish original research so content validity must have faced some vetting elsewhere. Xiao Qiang of China Digital News, wondered what politics might emerge if the wikipedia gets really big time. For example, the entry on Wal-mart is the number three search result for that topic on Google. So far, no one from Wal-mart has edited its entry. They might claim that they are an interested party and want to have a say in what is said about them in such an important source. The same could apply to Microsoft. The wikipedia has the strength to hold off individual trolls but can they hold off a large organization? Adverse exposure of any attempt for inappropriate influence would be one possible safeguard.
Jimmy said that there are several hundred core contributors and quality is a central organizing principle. So far, everyone is a volunteer but they might have to hire some technical admin staff. They have spent about $250,000 in the last twelve months versus many millions for such sites as the BBC, yet they are starting to compete favorably with the big guys. Their traffic is close to that of the New York Times site.
There was a lot of discussion and disagreement on the responsibility of a blogger for stories that are linked to. Dave Winer said he tries to think of the credibility of the source, the plausibility of the story, whether it is on-topic for his blog, and how much of a scoop it might be. However, he does link to things that he cannot verify and acknowledges this. He feels that his readers can help verify the truth of the story.
Jim Kennedy of the Associated Press disagreed with Dave. They do not just throw stuff out into the public for others to verify. Dave said this was appropriate for a news outlet like AP but not for bloggers. He feels that there are different standards. Jill Abramson, Managing Editor of the New York Times said that they not only verify a story but also offer the subject to comment on it in interest of fairness.
Others mentioned the responsibility to the subject of a story who might be hurt by false statements being circulated on the web. Dave Weinberger took the most radical view as he felt that bloggers were not journalists but simply people having conversations that others could overhear. In his view, a blog is not a news report but a conversation. Others commented that a blog with as much reach as Dave’s is more than a simple conversation and has some responsibility as such.
Jay Rosen offered an intelligent observation. He considers information as material that reduces uncertainty. In this context he disagreed with Dave Weinberger. In Jay’s own blogging he is more conservative on what he reports and tries to reduce uncertainty. Dan Gilmor then said that Jay should then turn off his comments section as they raise a lot of uncertainty.
In Portals and KM, I try to only link to people that I know in some capacity and to stories that appear plausible. However, I cannot possibly verify everything I point to. I do try to follow Jay Rosen’s principle and only link to things which I think will enrich, rather than confuse, conversations. I also provide links so readers can see for themselves the source and make their own judgment on the validity of the story or thought.
In a related topic, several people discussed the need to preserve the integrity of the content you link to and not change or misrepresent it. It has always been easy to change words and now you can change pictures, as well. I always try to represent the content from others without making changes as I reduce it. Then I make it clear, and separate, when I provide commentary on the content from others. This is similar to practice I learned as a researcher. Present the findings or results in one section of your research report. Then provide the interpretation in a separate section so others can form their own conclusions about the results.
There was a lot of discussion over the consequences of the practice of major news outlets hiding their stories after two weeks or less so they can sell their archives. I posted on this issue on Monday. Jay Rosen pointed to a guest article on his blog on The Importance of Being Permanent by Simon Waldmen, Director of the Guardian’s web site.
The AP ran a story on the two day session starting with a comment on the Friday session, Memo to media establishment: Ignore blogs at your peril, by Frank Bajak. It starts with, “The managing editor of The New York Times threw down the gauntlet as she stared across a big O-shaped table at the prophets of blogging…” This was apparently the dramatic high point on that day. It goes on to say that Jill pointed out that it costs the Times a million a year for its Baghdad bureau so you cannot just buy a laptop and become an international journalist. He fails to mention that the next day, Jimmy Wales said the entire wikipedia only spent a quarter of that and it has scooped big media on some stories on its start up experiment, wikipedia news which supports the implied contention in the AP story.
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