The floor is opened for questions from the audience.
Emily Mester:
In what ways if any are your organizations trying to incorporate new media to disseminate information?Wilson- Recently rebuilt Concord Monitor using technology fundamentally designed to support social networks and a membership system. That is the easiest part. The hardest part comes in "changing the culture of the newsroom." "Finely honed practices...that has been developed over generations" has to be changed as the media in which it is published evolved. Shift towards "immediate publication." The largest changes are "immediacy" and the connection formed with consumer.
Greenberg- "When we saw the economy tanking, I said the most important thing for us to do--as a news organization--is be as close to possible to the reality people are living in." Created Web site asking consumers (anonymous to the public) how the recession had affected them. These became stories on air and helped develop NHPR's understanding of the economy's effect on New Hampshire residents. The web is essential in accessing the public and understanding the reality of their lives.
Gearheart- TV can be a very one-dimensional experience. Bringing TV online is "a whole new degree of engaging the viewer." It is also "redefining a platform." What was once limited to cable subscribers is now available to anyone who has computer access.
I think that the citizen involvement Greenberg refers to actually reflects a greater, intriguing trend in media -- citizen produced journalism which is published by traditional media sources. The actual content of the radio shows is being created by average citizens, and is then being disseminated by NHPR. Similar arrangements exist at institutions such as CNN, whose "I reporters" have produced much of CNN's coverage, feeding them video clips and pictures of many major news events. If traditional media can harness the power of individual content production which is currently being funneled primarily into blogs, they will gain far more content at no cost to themselves, while diverting some average citizen from creating a blog which could act as that institutions competitor.
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