WASHINGTON - (Business Wire) Slate, the daily online magazine, today launched “The People’s Inaugural Address”, a collaborative, interactive feature that lets users compose, edit and vote for the speech they would want President-Elect Barack Obama to give at his inauguration. Guided by a database of inaugural addresses from past presidents, users will be able to select favorite phrases from previous inaugural speeches and use their own words to create an ideal address.
Powered by cutting-edge technology from MixedInk, “The People’s Inaugural Address” is more than a wiki since it allows anyone to write, remix and rate speeches while synthesizing a variety of opinions to determine the most popular. Slate will feature the top-rated speeches, and visitors can search for other user-generated speeches by author or phrases.
“Combining words from every inaugural address from George Washington to George W. Bush plus ideas and input from the everyday American allows us to create something defined by the country,” said David Plotz, Slate’s Editor. “Slate has always used the Internet to get people to interact in unique ways. We are excited that The People’s Inaugural Address lets anyone participate in speechwriting while commemorating this historic moment.”
Users can create, edit, remix and rate inaugural addresses now through January 16, when Slate will highlight the top-rated speeches and ask users to cast final votes for their favorite ones. On January 19, Slate will publish the top-rated address that is truly of, by, and for the people.
Slate is a daily online magazine that offers fresh angles on stories in the news and innovative entertainment coverage, all with its signature wit and irreverence. Pushing the boundaries of convention, Slate publishes provocative commentary on topics such as politics, culture, business and technology. Slate reaches 6.7 million online adults a month according to Nielsen and is published by The Slate Group, an online publishing subsidiary of The Washington Post Company (NYSE:WPO).
MixedInk is an Internet startup that has developed innovative, online software for democratic, collaborative writing. The platform enables large groups of people to speak with a collective voice by weaving their language, ideas and opinions into a single text. MixedInk’s site was used by a group of online activists in summer 2008 to create a political platform, a piece of which was subsequently included in the official Democratic Party platform. The company will launch its free public service in January 2009.
Much has been written on the subject of the internet-induced transformation currently underway within the news industry. (Those who’ve already had their fill of this topic should feel free to wait for Part 2.)
The basic idea is that the economics of distributing information online are radically different from print, so the business models that evolved within the physical world of newspapers no longer apply. The gradually declining fortunes of today’s newspapers mark the end of the previous era.
In meatspace, it made sense to keep the entire value chain - ad sales, news and editorial content, printing, and distribution – under a single roof. Given the economies of scale and high coordination costs from one end of the chain to the other, companies consolidated into local monopolies and national oligopolies in order to minimize costs and maximize profits.
The internet is changing things. Distribution costs are now much lower due to the ease of online publishing; new communication tools facilitate coordination among the different activities; and buying and selling advertising inventory is much simpler through automated web-based ad networks.
With the reduction in coordination costs, suddenly there’s much less pressure towards vertical integration. The value chain is more efficient when divided between multiple entities, each focusing solely on a single stage of the chain rather than doing everything (newsgathering, printing, distribution, etc.) in-house. Separate companies can develop their core competencies and engage with complementary firms within a competitive marketplace that stimulates innovation at each step in the chain.
So, the consensus among many internet gurus is that the news media is being reorganized. Within the new value chain, distinct companies are performing different functions - selling advertising (e.g. Google Ads, Tacoda), creating content (e.g. AP, NYTimes.com), and aggregating content (e.g. Digg, Google News), and other more narrow ones. They integrate almost seamlessly to deliver a product that was previously provided by a single company. Communications infrastructure firms, like Comcast, are also part of this new chain – they’re today’s delivery boys. But they’re simultaneously a part of many other web-based value chains, and they’re paid by end users, so their fortunes are much less dependent on the news industry.
This is not to suggest that the disaggregation process described so far is complete. Far from it. As more and more consumers get their news online instead of in hard copy, print advertising sales dry up. Online ad revenue, while growing, will probably never make up the difference – a major reason for this is that classified advertising, once a major source of newspaper revenue, has moved elsewhere. (Anyone heard of a site called Craigslist?) Newspapers of all shapes and sizes are being forced to cut back on editorial staff.
So the big question on everyone’s mind as the media ecosystem transforms is: As newsrooms cease to be able to support themselves as vertically integrated newspaper monopolies, how will they continue to do their jobs - if at all? It isn’t only journalists and news companies with a natural self-interest in protecting their livelihoods who ask this, but also foundations, academics, media watchdogs, and others who seek to safeguard a robust fourth estate out of a conviction that the health of our democracy depends on it.
Stay tuned for my thoughts on what’s in store in an upcoming post. The short version: Different types of news will sustain themselves through different business models.
In August 2006, CNN made a big move to bring citizen journalism into the mainstream when it launched iReport on CNN.com. iReport submissions are chosen by editors and checked for accuracy before CNN shows them online or on television. As a result, CNN has showcased only 10% of the nearly 100,000 news-related photos and videos that it has received since 2006. User-generated videos and news have provided some of CNN’s most compelling footage, which were especially noteworthy during California’s wildfires and the shootings at Virginia Tech.
The new CNN site will be fully open, allowing users to post anything (though the site will be monitored for inappropriate content). “The community will decide what the news is,” says Susan Grant, Executive VP of CNN News Services. Modeled after YouTube, iReport.com will allow citizen journalists to upload videos, photos, and audio files, while visitors can search, rate, and share clips.
The trend toward mainstream user-generated news doesn’t end with CNN. ESPN recently launched “ESPNU Campus Connection,” which “combines student reporting with gripping college hoops action,” according to its website. ESPNU is putting students to work as sportscasters responsible for generating coverage, sideline reporting, commentary, and analysis. This gives students a chance for a unique professional experience and offers ESPN exposure and more extensive programming on college campuses.
This is a win-win for publishers and consumers. “For a publisher, you’re engaging consumers, and mixing up your offerings. For consumers, you’re getting a voice and having an impact,” points out Piper Jaffray Web analyst Aaron Kessler.
Here at MixedInk, we’re excited to see these big players recognizing the potential of citizen journalism and supporting it with creative – and sometimes risky – new initiatives!
There’s always been a heavy anti-pundit streak in the online political realm.But lately, the volume of criticism seems to be growing.
The general consensus is that pundits are blowhards. They make statements – often absurd, offensive or false statements – for which they’re rarely held accountable.What is most frustrating is that they are granted unfettered access to millions of ears and eyes, regardless of the validity of their claims (or lack thereof).
This is not a left-vs-right thing; it’s a populist attitude that can be found on both sides of the aisle.Here’s Rightwing Nuthouse, from last August, pointing out what it takes to succeed as a pundit:
The trick in being a good political pundit is not in formulating wildly original analysis or penetrating insights into “what it all means.” Rather, it is much better to say exactly what everyone else is saying except be meaner, or funnier, or more serious, or more dismissive than the next fellow. A good turn of the phrase and an attitude will bring you stardom in punditland.
While their backgrounds and expertise may seem to qualify them to opine on political issues, the talking heads’ obsessive focus on strategy and tactics crowds out all but the most simplistic analyses of the government policies which are at stake.
Even when it comes to the horse race, politics is such a stubbornly unpredictable arena that the pundits seem unable to read the political tea leaves any better than their audiences.Or, at least, no better than those who follow politics closely (of whom there are a sizable number).
This rant from Colin Delaney at e.Politics following the Iowa caucuses calls the pundits out on their mistakes:
Well, who was the big loser in the Iowa caucuses? It wasn’t Mitt Romney or Hillary Clinton, and it certainly wasn’t Ron Paul. The big loser was political punditry.
…What was revealed to be vapid and empty last night was the endless, often cable TV-driven spouting of impression and prediction — when did political talking heads suddenly gain the ability to accurately foretell the future? Most of ‘em sure ain’t that good at it… even a cursory stroll down memory lane turns up plenty more. Remember when Fred Thompson was going to change the race irrevocably? Or when John McCain was doomed and should just pack up and go home? When Obama’s young-voter strategy was a waste of time, ’cause the damn kids never show up to vote anyway?
Political pundits: please stop telling us what you THINK is going to happen, because in the world of online communications, you don’t actually know more than we do. We have access to the same polls, we read the same on-the-ground reporting and scroll through the same blogs and we can see every significant piece of video the same day…
…Pundits, please just shut up and surrender some airtime to actual journalism.
Glenn Greenwald, a once-independent blogger who now writes for Salon, wrote about how wrong the pundits were on the Iowa Caucus results in a recent post, aptly titled “Worthless chatter.” He lists a number of quite damning instances in which pundits not only inaccurately foretold Governor Huckabee’s collapse in the Iowa caucuses, but did so with a degree of certainty which now seems absurd, if not downright manipulative.
Underlying much of the criticism is a belief that pundits are an undemocratic influence on the country’s political narratives, and thus, its political outcomes.Once a certain analysis or prediction becomes conventional wisdom among pundits, regardless of its initial veracity, it can serve as a self-fulfilling prophecy.Aware of this phenomenon, pundits often go so far as to make statements they know to be untrue in order to increase the likelihood that their preferred reality will be come to be.
So why is the pundit criticism getting louder now?
Pundits may be more extreme in their transgressions as they try to entertain for more airtime despite having no more material to work with.It also could be that the critics have more visible platforms than ever before.
But I would argue that on top of this, there’s a growing, organic, anti-pundit sentiment out there in the general public that the critics are beginning to tap into. People now have access to almost all the same information the pundits do - we’re savvier media consumers.We are seeing how frequently the pundits are incorrect, how their analyses are influenced by biases which may not be immediately apparent.And we’re justifiably angry.
Politicians recognize this.Both Republicans and Democrats talk about “the pundits” in voices dripping with disdain, instructing us to ignore their cynicism.Candidates in both parties claim they’re going to prove the pundits wrong, and brag of having exceeded expectations.Pursuing their own self interest, politicians are collectively stirring up a mini-rebellion, challenging the voters to show the supposedly omniscient pundits that this country is still a democracy (which, incidentally, means voting for them).It’s almost as if they’re arguing that proving the pundits wrong is valid enough reason for voters to support their candidacies in and of itself!This type of anti-elitist rhetoric used to be reserved for attacking corporate fat-cats, union leaders, and government officials and bureaucrats.
Bloggers definitely see it, too, and point out how wrong – and grating! – the pundits are.Markos Moulitsas and Jerome Armstrong, two leading bloggers of the left, have long railed against the “DC cocktail party circuit.”But even on DailyKos, a leading left-wing blogging community run by Mr. Moulitsas, there’s been an up-tick in the criticism lately, with specialemphasisonChris Matthews (unaffectionately dubbed “tweety”).
“Can Hillary Cry Her Way Back to the White House?”
That was the headline of a Maureen Dowd column in today’s New York Times.
Hillary Clinton’s win in New Hampshire was shocking. The performance of the national press corps in the days preceding the vote, unfortunately, was not.
Journalists have been replaced by a punditocracy that makes its living (and gets its kicks) by perverting our democratic process. The misogyny that was unleashed by the media’s feeding frenzy on the video of an exhausted Clinton tearing up at a small New Hampshire roundtable of voters was just the tip of the iceberg.
To be clear, we are not endorsing any candidate. This is not about who we choose for president, but rather how we choose our leader…
America is sick of [expletive] this year. From politicians. And especially from pundits.
So what’s the solution?Though their offenses seem greater than ever before at the moment, this situation is not new. And yet the pundits’ stature within the media seems undiminished.
Marc Andreessen, blogger and entrepreneur of Netscape fame, has a proposal:
If the world were a sane and just place, every pundit, commentator, expert, and reporter who predicted the things that didn’t happen and missed the things that did — which is to say, all of them — would resign their jobs tonight.
Since that won’t happen, the only logical response is to put one’s hands over one’s ears and say “Nanananananananananananana” every time one sees them on television from here on out.
While that’s certainly one solution, there’s got to be a better one, a more systemic one.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we could take the narratives that shape our politics out of the hands of a privileged few?
Sure, the blogosphere is a big step in the right direction.Because bloggers are more numerous than pundits, and because there’s room for more websites than there is room for major news outlets, people can choose the bloggers they agree with or like with greater precision than they can choose their pundits.The blogosphere is thus more meritocratic. Also, bloggers tend to be more up-front about their beliefs – they do not disguise their points of view as fact – so any efforts to manipulate the debate are more transparent, by definition.
Yet bloggers are still lone individuals, people with agendas, interested in imposing their own lens on the political discourse.No matter how much that lens align with yours, no single individual can always speak on behalf of an entire community. In stepping into the role of pundit, any single person would end up with too much control over the debate.
If, within the media ecosystem, there were some way for groups to speak with a single voice, we could collectively shout down pundits’ efforts to manipulate the debate.If only there were a way that people could create our narratives from scratch, thereby avoiding the undemocratic influences of those who would digest and interpret our news for us.Hmmmm…
Sparse posting as of late – sorry about that.We’re up to our ears trying to ready the site for release.The good news is we’re on track to do so this winter, as planned.
Last week, I was at the Networked Journalism Summit, a conference organized by Jeff Jarvis and David Cohn, “bringing together the best practices and practitioners in collaborative, pro-am journalism” at CUNY.
In a word, it was…awesome (sorry, I’m an entrepreneur, not a journalist!).It was both encouraging that so many really smart people are experimenting with ways to democratize the media, and a relief that no one has yet been able to find all the answers – meaning that MixedInk can help to provide part of the solution.
The big unanswered questions that seemed to keep coming up were:
1) how the media will be able to make money without sacrificing journalistic quality and integrity (and whether advertising revenue will ever be sufficient); 2) how professional and amateur journalists can coordinate and divide responsibility effectively to produce high-quality, accurate content; and 3) how the public can be motivated to contribute in a way that adds value.
From MixedInk’s perspective, the event was unquestionably a success. In the afternoon, I manned one of several ‘tool’ tables, sandwiched between DayLife and Topix, two other innovative startups in this space.A number of leading media outlets dropped by our table and expressed very strong interest in viewing a demo when it’s ready next month. Several said they would even test our platform with their readers.Though it depends what comes of these initial conversations in the next couple of months, I’d say Jeff Jarvis and David Cohn accomplished their goal of focusing the event on action rather than talk.
Amid the excitement, there was a potentially depressing moment during one of the morning sessions. Jay Rosen, the brilliant NYU journalism professor and founder of newassignment.net, was asked whether there’s any way to avoid using a community leader to tightly moderate and channel contributors’ energy in a productive direction.To my dismay, and likely that of others in the room, he responded, “The dream of a self-perpetuating content production system is an illusion.”He might well have been describing MixedInk, though we would say our content production system is “community led” rather than “self-perpetuating.”
Unfortunately I didn’t have a chance to speak with Jay later in the day, but if I had (and managed to keep my wits about me), I would have said something like this: “With all due respect, we look forward to proving you wrong, Jay.Relying on heavy moderation is not scalable, it’s less democratic and it may even be lessmeritocratic.Given the right structure and application, the community can be trusted to produce quality content.We won’t hold it against you, though, if we’re ever lucky enough that you want to work with us ;-)”(Yes, I would have smiled and winked at the end.)
You can find a lot more detail about the day in the following accounts:
Thanks again to Jeff and David for putting this fantastic event together – and for highlighting MixedInk as an innovative tool in the new media arsenal.
