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What's the responsibility of the media? | 91 comments (91 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)
Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 8)
I've written about the interaction between broadcast media and grassroot media here and here.

Highlight:

Newspapers and other broadcast media have two big advantages over blogs and other grassroots media: Access and organisation.

Broadcast media can get face time with people who are normally inaccessible to Joe Blogger, and they have a background organisation that means they can have people on the ground where things happen.

They also have two major disadvantages: Lack of specific expertise and lack of feedback.

and


  1. What makes a blog interesting is the ease of interaction (and ease of transition) between readers and contributors.

  2. Blogs are an integral part of what may be called "grassroot media" - a media segment that includes SMS chains, video blogs like YouTube, other kinds of social networking sites and, in the widest possible definition, any direct peer-to-peer interaction.

  3. The word "peer" is crucial. While it is not necessary to permit every potential contributor to make full posts, a relatively open comments section is an absolute requirement for a living blog.

  4. Following directly from 3) the relative lack of a top-down structure means that "grassroot media" propagates by word of mouth and maintains its style and focus through peer pressure rather than overt editorial control (various moderation roles excepted).

  5. "Grassroot media" should not under any circumstance be organised by people who hold positions of responsibility in organised parties/news organisations/NGOs/etc.

  6. Pt. 5) does not, however, mean that MPs and other party officials should not be core contributors. In fact they probably should, but they must not have editorial control.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 10:24:00 AM EST
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 2)
If I were an elected politician, the first thing I would do is start a regular, at least weekly, blog telling my constituents what I had been doing on their behalf, and giving them the opportunity to raise issues of concern.  Politics then can become a dialogue and a marketplace of ideas, simulated some of the intimacy that has been lost in our increasingly populous societies.

I don't read any elected politician's blogs, so I don't know to what extent they already do this, and to what extent they allow dialogue.  I suspect there could be quite a problem with spammers/hate mailers.  But if they allow the development of genuine dialogue, then I would consider it an enhancement of our democracy - particularly for MEPs who would otherwise be quite remote from their constituents.

notes from no w here

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot male dotty communists) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 10:35:08 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 6)
In my experience, politicians' blogs are rather like celebrity blogs. Often they have no comments, in which case the blog is just a convenient piece of software to publish press releases.

If they have comments, they usually are moderated. And the politician will rarely descend to the comment thread. So it's one-way communication and a forum for fans/detractors. Often the posts will be ghost-written by the politician´s staff. In the US, Democratic politicians have started to write diaries on DKos.

When political parties attempt community blogging, they do astroturfing and it backfires (as in the recent case of LabourList).

Politicians are starting to use twitter and facebook, but the quality (and quantity) of the debate on facebook is very low.

So, we're not there yet.

The brainless should not be in banking. — Willem Buitler

by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 10:40:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 5)
Astroturfing as in

TH!NK ABOUT IT - european blogging competition 2009 » Blog Archive » Margot Wallström Guest blog post

Is blogging not about having a conversation? Why has there been no response to the many excellent points made above? If the EU thinks that blogging is just another one way street to propagandise the masses they are making a serious mistake. You have to engage with people and address their points - otherwise we are all wasting our time here.


notes from no w here
by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot male dotty communists) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 11:01:51 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 9)
That would be usual for Wallstrom, Piebalgs, etc.

You can see this as evidence of dysfunctional, or perhaps non functional, media. Or you can see it for what it is - which is another example of democratic deficit.

Blogs are noisy people-driven media. Professional media aren't noisy. They're not just Serious™ - which is a good antonym for noisy and tainted by messy emotion - but they're also relentlessly on-message.

In media-speak blogs are many-to-many, the MSM is one-to-many. The one-to-many model, where a single source coherently repeats and promotes opinions, is inherently undemocratic.

The real point of media isn't to get people listening to politicians, lobbyists and experts, it's to get politicians, lobbyists and experts listening to and talking back to people.

On that criterion, all of the MSM get a fail - because the real job of the MSM, as and when debate appears to happen, is to reflect and shape the opinions of policy makers. The strict monopoly on strategy held by these people excludes anyone who isn't already on the inside.

In the context of the meltdown, it's useful to remember that the crash was visible ahead of time to almost everyone who wasn't a media or political leader.

So the best you'll get from the MSM is manufactured scandals like the MP and MEP expenses story - which appear populist, but in fact are perfectly timed to herd the electorate like sheep in a useful direction.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 11:41:45 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (none / 0)
ThatBritGuy:
In the context of the meltdown, it's useful to remember that the crash was visible ahead of time to almost everyone who wasn't a media or political leader.
That is scary - are we letting the blind lead the one-eyed?

The brainless should not be in banking. — Willem Buitler
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed May 27th, 2009 at 06:29:53 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (none / 0)
Is that news to you?

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Wed May 27th, 2009 at 09:55:47 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (none / 1)
In media-speak blogs are many-to-many, the MSM is one-to-many. The one-to-many model, where a single source coherently repeats and promotes opinions, is inherently undemocratic.

This is a crucial distinctions between modes of communication, telephony and its engineering in particular.

Whether or not one wants to characterize a broadcaster "undemocratic" is a trivial matter in consideration of structural barriers which physically prevent "everyman" competing with MSM publishers to broadcast messages to a finite audience.

That is send/receive capacity (a/k/a mbps) assigned by subscriber class (data/voice/video, commercial/personal) by ICT-type (fiber/copper/satellite/radio) of carrier or operator. Isn't it odd, one can always receive twice as much as one can send?

The net-neutrality crew tends to promote the bane of content censorship over property exclusions.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Wed May 27th, 2009 at 10:42:07 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 6)
For an example of Wallström's desire to engage with EU citizens, see the Open Letter we adressed to her and Piebalgs three years ago. It's signed by twelve EU citizens of varying nationalities and countries of residence.

We're still waiting for even an acknowledgement.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 12:10:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 4)
Excellent letter.  And then they agonise over a democratic deficit? Revel in it would be more likely...

notes from no w here
by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot male dotty communists) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 12:17:25 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 2)
See also EU to ban blogs by Starvid on June 26th, 2008.

The brainless should not be in banking. — Willem Buitler
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed May 27th, 2009 at 06:35:08 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (none / 0)
i think they only agonise around election time, too little, too late, they stumble out of their fog and wonder why they people are on a totally different wavelength, patiently waiting for ceeb's 'honest poiticians'.

the parties want more votes for the wrong reasons, ie, to put lipstick on the pig of their voter-apathy numbers.

if they did want to do something very positive for many people, i suspect they wouldn't be allowed anywhere near the levers of power... yet. another generation or two, as others have suggested here.

there are just enough intelligent ones allowed in, to make the others' average rise to....average.

a lot of them are just functionaries for lobbyists.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Jun 1st, 2009 at 07:23:07 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 3)
A politician who attempts to run a blog faces a couple of quite possibly insurmountable structural concerns. First, and most important, is the fact that the politician does not simply represent him- or herself. When Jerome writes about the ongoing Russo-Ukranian gas crisis, he can do so without it being seen as taking stands on behalf of his employer (as long as he takes a couple of elementary precautions). A politician does not have that luxury. Of necessity, then, politicians are restricted to staying "on message," or at the most to deviate from it in ways that are - to use that memorable phrase - "mostly harmless."

The second important concern I'd highlight is the fact that politicians must always expect to have their words used against them. If Markos or Majikthise gets involved in an in-depth discussion, and makes a remark in the context of a twenty post long dialogue, they can be reasonably sure that it will only be read by people who are actually interested in the dialogue in question. A professional politician, on the other hand, must always protect himself against quote mining by his enemies. Again, this tends to turn commentary "mostly harmless," and at any rate reduces the degree to which he or she can follow a train of thought to its conclusion in a public forum.

Finally, politicians are expected to not backtrack in plain view of the public, and so are hesitant to go out on a limb in public and to admit to error or correction in a forum where his new stance is immediately and very visibly comparable with his old stance.

Of these three, only the third point can be changed by improving our democratic culture. It would certainly be an improvement if politicians were less scared of being proven wrong on the facts, more willing to admit that there are things they do not know and more willing to accept corrections from people who do actually know. But the first two points are, as far as I can tell, an integral part of the nature of (representative) politics.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 11:52:20 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 4)
Politicians face these issues every time they speak in public and are skilled at doing so.  Being a member of the Irish Government and responsible for European Affairs didn't stop Roche criticising Klaus in trenchant terms.  

Of course if you are in "public life" you have to be more measured and keep well away from flame wars etc. Even we have to learn such lessons!  Every lawyer has to learn to develop and stick to a brief. Every businessman has to try and present their business/products is the most positive possible light. In politics, your party won't thank you for repeating opposition talking points.  

But ultimately, if you want people to relate to and vote for you, you have to present yourself and your views to them, and if that means taking some crap, then so be it.  I see blogs as a way for plitics to connect better with their electorate, adn if they are afraid/unable ti do so, they probably shouldn't be in politics in the first place!

notes from no w here

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot male dotty communists) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 12:55:21 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 6)
Politicians face these issues every time they speak in public and are skilled at doing so.  Being a member of the Irish Government and responsible for European Affairs didn't stop Roche criticising Klaus in trenchant terms.

That is true as far as it goes, but what makes blogs and other grassroot media different from broadcast media is the possibility of a real dialogue. A courtroom spiel or a sales pitch is a monologue (or, in the case of a courtroom tactic, two or more opposing monologues).

It's not just about keeping away from flame wars, or not divulging confidential information - rules every good blogger should follow. It's about being inflexible, not circumspect.

And an interview situation is much more controlled than a blog dialogue. For one thing, there's only one interviewer - or at most two - so you don't have to repel criticism from more than a couple of directions at once. Second, it is very hard for the interviewer to point out that the person he is interviewing is simply flat out wrong on the facts, or that you are lying to his face - that's against the genre convention that the interviewer has to be "neutral."

Third, the interviewer is on the clock. A blog conversation spans hours or days and it's asynchronous, meaning that each contributor can take as much time as he needs to get his thoughts in order. So it's much harder to parry a point with a glib one-liner that leaves the other guy groping for words. But unlike LTEs, which are similarly asynchronous, the record of the conversation is readily at hand, so you can't simply pour the inconvenient parts down the memory hole.

In short, there are structural reasons that make it much more challenging to get away with giving a sales pitch (or with playing fast and loose with the facts) on a blog (or another grassroot medium) with an even moderately attentive audience than in a newspaper or TV interview, given the same audience.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 02:44:24 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 5)
I think blogs are more important than they seem. There will probably always be a trivial swirl of personal vanity blogs, facebooks, etc.

But once you get people reading and commenting together, there's the potential to influence politicians in the same way that lobbyists do.

The key is voting demographics. Voters are mostly conservative and older, which is why the BNP is running its ridiculous Spitfire+Churchill campaign. They're aiming for the generation which can identify with those, and that won't mean people in their 20s and 30s.

Once that older generation is the one that remembers blogging, a decade or two from now, politics will have to become more interactive. The MSM will have faded and/or fragmented by then, so a simple one-to-many message will no longer be practical.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 04:56:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 3)
I hope you're right, because the medium does have some built in advantages that will be very hard to strip out.

On the other hand... have you taken a look at a YouTube comment thread recently?

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 05:10:48 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 4)
YouTube has no moderation, and no subject focus, so it's a free for all. It also doesn't try to model a user culture.

Most blogs include have a culture of their own, and dissenters can always be taken out and shot. Or banned - whichever is easier.

So scrappy free for alls aren't inevitable. You only need good enough moderation for something worthwhile to emerge.

And blogs have a very live reputation. When Kos bans someone, all of the related communities know about it. So there's a feedback feature there which makes it possible for respectable non-flame-ish blogs to coalesce and start having an effect.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Wed May 27th, 2009 at 06:26:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (4.00 / 3)
I don't disagree with you, but there are ways around the problems you pose.  It isn't necessary for a politician (or a blogger) to respond point for point to all the comments on his post.  Usually a dialogue develops between the bloggers and they answer each others points.  If a flame war develops or the dispute is going around in circles the politician would be best advised to keep out of it in any case.

All that is required is that the politician shows that he has read and taken some account of some of the main points of a conversation in a subsequent post.  In fact it could be argued that the comments space if where the constituents get a chance to have their say and the politician should give them the space to say it in their own way.  You can't win with a bunch of people who are just trying to prove they're smarter than you and looking for a chance to catch you out.

You just go to the next post and articulate what impact the discussion has had on your thinking.  The guys who want you to endorse every line of their spiel are the guys you don't want to be dealing with directly.  You have a very large and diverse constituency to represent and can't allow yourself to be rail-roaded by a few zealots - unless you happen to agree with them!

notes from no w here

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot male dotty communists) on Wed May 27th, 2009 at 05:17:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Verhagen (4.00 / 6)
Dutch minister of Foreign Affairs (and most of the time I find him a prick), started to use Twitter already before he became minister.

He's still tweeting (see here), actually does this in person, responds and jokes with his audience and frequently uses Twitter as a test group to ideas / statements / news events.

The Dutch MEP candidates are now also on Twitter, but this looks like more of a stunt. Verhagen has made consistently use of it.

Granted, Twitter is not a blog and it won't go in depth - but it is interactive with people and it's refreshingly open. I must say, Verhagen gets my credits for this.

by Nomad (Bjinse) on Tue May 26th, 2009 at 06:22:51 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Verhagen (4.00 / 2)
We've already seen:

Twitter as a form of engagement

The BNP using the web to raise nearly £400,000 (successfully, too)

An MEP candidate taking donations by SMS - which is a very, very clever move, because younger people are conditioned to vote and pay for media and content by SMS

There are other new models which new media will make possible. The MSM won't be competing because there's still this 19th century idea of The Writer or The Editor who monopolises your attention with their inherently valuable and entertaining insights and bon mots, set in the shining frame of a magnificent vehicle called a newspaper or TV show.

That idea is dying now. It's being reinvented on blogs, but it's also being fragmented and mutated elsewhere, as people are finding that they're being allowed to talk back.

Not everyone wants to be sold interactive politics as a clearly delineated experience.

But when people are already comfortable with interactive and social media of all kinds, it makes perfect sense to colonise those media with political outposts.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Thu May 28th, 2009 at 09:42:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Repersentative's blogs (4.00 / 2)
The US Congress has set up a system of homepages for congressmen and senators.  If one searches for congressonal e-mail addresses they get references to sites such as  this which will take you to the appropriate homepage.  Homepages feature legislative and administrative accomplishments of the member on behalf of their constituents  and they have a page where one can e-mail the member.  Interestingly, they verify residency in the represented area and only allow e-mail from constituents.  

The only e-mail addresses I can find on the net are to this system.  They appear to have a staffer to handle this system and they pick the most appropriate canned response available, given your message.  They must have other, unpublished e-mail addresses they use with those that really count.  Fax numbers are published for all senators and representatives, so I have used that medium for contacting those who are not my representatives, but naturally have never received a response.

It is a perfect system for the member.  Sort of like "protest areas" at controversial gatherings.  I am surprised if Europe has not implemented such a fine, neutered system.  Makes the representative all up to date at little cost to the member.

If there are better ways to get at these bastards I would like to know.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 12:20:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Repersentative's blogs (none / 1)
I always liked the suggestion that you mail Congress a package with a torch, a pitchfork and a bit of paper with the number(s) of the law(s) that caused you to do so.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 02:13:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Repersentative's blogs (none / 0)
Isn't the right as capable, if not more so, of manipulating this kind of populism as the left?
by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 03:23:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Repersentative's blogs (none / 0)
Absolutely.  Probably better, especially when they can wind up the church people, of whom there is no shortage in the South.  Hence our "conservadems."  Bill Mayer may have made Senator Mark Prior look silly in Mayer's movie, but he really did him no harm.  If anything he got him points for "witnessing."

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 01:37:48 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Repersentative's blogs (none / 0)
Probably.

But then again, if you democratic system is sufficiently FUBAR to merit a revolution, and the only people who can actually muster the warm bodies to make a revolution are the fascists, the theocrats and the happy get-together of people who really think that the 20th century was a bad idea that should just go away... then you are screwed.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 06:51:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Repersentative's blogs (none / 0)
That is not a new paradox: the Gracchi experienced it. Often it's the best fascists who make the best revolutions (that was basically Caesar's point, but the plutocrats did not let him drive it home). Later, when the Franks made their own revolution, it was at the point of fascism itself (Soissons' vase, etc.)

Patrice Ayme Patriceayme.com Patriceayme.wordpress.com http://tyranosopher.blogspot.com/
by Patrice Ayme on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 06:57:00 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Shameless self-promotion (none / 0)
when obams, kerry and kennedies started showing up on dkos, i thought it was 'the breakthrough', having their own blog is great, but to come stick their heads into the tiger pit was even more bold and populist.

unfortunately the dialogue was always poor to nonexistent with the big names, the posts were ok but not epic, and there was no interplay. drive-by, practically.

more minor pols are sometimes more forthcoming.

what a waste...

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Jun 1st, 2009 at 07:02:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]

What's the responsibility of the media? | 91 comments (91 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
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