Archives for September 2002

When bloggers practice journalism

September 25, 2002 by JD Lasica

Journalists & bloggers discuss what’s ahead for the expanding media ecosystem

The following exchange took place Sept. 17, 2002, at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism and appeared a week later in OJR. Note: I’ve left original terms like “webloggers” intact, even though the language now seems outdated.

By J.D. Lasica
Online Journalism Review

When do webloggers practice journalism? What do informed amateurs and niche experts bring to the media ecosystem? Should journalists blog? And should they rely on weblogs as news sources? Should bloggers and those in traditional media engage in a dance of fear and loathing, or do both sides stand to gain from the other? Should blogging be taught in journalism classes?

Those were some of the questions tackled last week at the University of California Graduate School of Journalism. Three journalists — Dan Gillmor, business columnist for the San Jose Mercury News, Scott Rosenberg, managing editor of Salon, and myself — as well as veteran bloggers Rebecca Blood (author of The Weblog Handbook) and Meg Hourihan (co-author of We Blog) exchanged views before 75 journalism students and members of the public.

By coincidence, six days after our panel, the New York Times ran a piece that mirrored some of the topics raised by the panelists, and Providence Journal columnist Sheila Lennon did the same in her weblog. Here are selected excerpts from the panel on weblogs and journalism:

Moderator Paul Grabowicz: We made the mistake of putting the class description up on our Web site. Wired News ran a story about it, and all hell broke loose. One blogger said that the class, if journalists were doing weblogging, would be the Altamont of the blogging world. Why was there that kind of reaction? [Read more…] about When bloggers practice journalism

Interview with Howard Rheingold

September 12, 2002 by JD Lasica

The Internet pioneer looks at the effect of disruptive technologies on society, culture and the entertainment industry

Howard Rheingold — online pioneer, author of the best-sellers Virtual Reality and The Virtual Community — has a new book, Smart Mobs. He spoke with J.D. Lasica by phone on Sept. 12, 2002, in advance of the PopTech conference in Camden, Maine.

Howard Rheingold

You’ve called Smart Mobs your most important book. Why do you say so?

For a couple of reasons. The proximate reason is that I’ve written this at a time when a lot of people have some experience and knowledge of what happened to them and their industry and to the world as a result of the PC and the Internet. Maybe, because this is very early in what I think is the third big wave of technology-enabled change, we can apply some of what we’ve learned to shape rather than be the victims of circumstance.

Histories are important, and books that help people think about the wider issues are important. But books that are written at a time when people might still be able to do something about an issue have more importance. [Read more…] about Interview with Howard Rheingold

Bruce Damer on building the Intercommons

September 4, 2002 by JD Lasica

The author of ‘Avatars’ talks about cyber cocktail parties and the concept of shared virtual worlds

Bruce Damer, a pioneer in the field of virtual worlds and author of “Avatars,” spoke with me by phone in advance of the PopTech conference in Camden, Maine.

Have you been to PopTech before?

This will be our first trip. My life partner, Galen Brandt, will be coming, too. I’ve heard so much about it.

Bruce Damer

What have they asked you to talk about?

I was brought into PopTech by Ray Kurzwell as our organizations (the Contact Consortium and DigitalSpace) have been doing virtual worlds stuff for seven years now. I even wrote a book on the subject. I have to say I’m a little skeptical of the notion that some day AI’s will replace us and we’ll fall in love with them or upload our consciousness. I agree with Jaron Lanier that in fact we are as a species pretty bad at writing code and that in 25 years we will still be buried under the weight of legacy systems. I have a whole barn full of computers on our property here in the Santa Cruz Mountains of Northern California that bears living testament that progress in software is painfully slow. I wrote a lot of code for 15 years giving me a healthy respect for the gap between expectations and reality in technology. In response to last year’s debate among folks like Bill Joy, Jaron, Ray and others, I wrote a piece for Ray’s site that pretty much spells our my views on this. [Read more…] about Bruce Damer on building the Intercommons

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