Posts Tagged blogs
Journalism 'sustainable'
By Fernando Mexia - Journalism - 29/10/2009
Fernando Mexia, the pen.
Internet turns 40 and I am invited to the "party" at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), the delivery room of the creature in 1969. The thing had little soiree: no cake, no candles or confetti, or flutes, but was interesting. Apart from the pleasure of talking to a parent network, Leonard Kleinrock, while the man remembered past times next Hulk that issued the first message on the web (a pileup of two meters they called computer art) I lecture to Arianna Huffington, co founder and co editor in chief of the legendary American news website The Huffington Post , and presentations on ecosystem sustainability reporting.
Huffington, with its distinctive Greek accent English, defended the free online news and predicted a dismal failure to the media that ventured to charge for access to premium content portals, such as Rupert Murdoch plans to make their daily News Corporation as the London Times or the New York Post. Read the rest of this entry »
The decline of mass media
By Fernando Mexia - Journalism , featured - 13/04/2009
Fernando Mexia, the pen.
The news paper is not dead and I doubt it is extinguished, at least in the time I play live. What we do is in intensive care stringing the gate of the cemetery is the structure of the news industry. I will not bury the large media groups but, gentlemen, the days of wine and roses these corporations have their days numbered. Internet and the development of mobile communication technologies have paved the way for an information revolution that has set in motion following the economic crisis. Financial problems are shaking ripe apples from a tree media with excess leaves and fruit of decades of good harvests. The sound, which plays now is the pruning.
We enter the era of personal branding in the credibility-first and last name will not hide behind a newspaper-header, the agenda setting will be as flexible as you want the news consumer and the environment will be the person and the person will be the message, altering the quote from McLuhan .
A decade ago was still in journalism school, for those I just bought my first cell phone was starting Internet and Spain experimented with e-mails without knowing quite what to give him the matter. None of the classes I had in college prepared me for the change that is occurring now. No teacher passed me the determining factor would be the information site in the world. No one had blogs or Facebook friends. The output was to get work as a professional in any way in a mass media, even if unpaid, in fact, usually without charge but for profit. Although I spoke the internet (or nothing), they lectured me about Marshall McLuhan and the global village , on the influence of the communication system in the message received by audiences on the various theories of mass media and of course, the famous hypodermic needle . These paradigms have been pending review or a history class, along with the press of Gutenberg .
Today we live in the twilight of the mass media, the fall of the ancien regime of communication due to the rise of the submissive reader-viewer-listener. The hitherto docile recipient has taken the particular Bastille armed informative distribution of views shot from the internet. We are in the midst of a revolution that started with blogging and looking guillotine mass media for social media. Farewell to the hegemonic power information of a few, welcome to the democratization of news and views. Of course, the fall of absolutism is not the end of the aristocracy. As in every revolution, many of the powerful ancient apañarán to stay on top of the news channel, but now have to share its space of privilege with those who can make their way up there thanks to his talent.
Put bluntly , who want to paint something in the future information coming (or already here) better go creating a distinct identity on the Internet, either through a blog, a website, actively participating in social networks, etc. . Not saying anything, but just in case there are some confused not bad to say. The economic crisis has severely beaten waterline of the mass media, the main source of employment for journalists. The layoffs are widespread, as a Spanish flu and it looks like rain is not a passenger. The thing is ugly, very ugly.
The crisis reduced (I speak in future because I sense that the screen will go over) the number of employees and make it through, once you pass the time, much more difficult if it fits into one of those big companies information on terms comfortable. It will impose a freelance journalist, freelancer, as opposed to wage against the media reporter specialized in one field, the labor unrest against corporate security. An obvious instability (more so the existing one) that is also an opportunity.
Autonomy means more independence, freedom means independence, freedom involves time and time combined with the enthusiasm and good ideas lead quality. The quality of information is the fundamental principle of recognition. Recognition is the first step towards the prestige and reputation is worth money. This is personal branding.
This revolution we live and move hard time making them opens the door to a generation of journalism free of ties and well-paid to those who can seize the opportunity. It is true that the market will sustain that system is still forming, but it's wrong to take positions.
A respectable columnist for The Wall Street Journal, Walt Mossberg, recently made an interesting reflection, collected in a known blog on the future of journalism when asked whether it was worth saving newspapers.
"There is the question to be asked (told). The real question we should ask ourselves is whether we can save good journalism. Think about it. Of the hundreds, thousands of newspapers in the country (USA), there are only a few that matter. Good journalism and journalists, on the other hand, deserve the rescue. "
How articulate journalism in the coming years is brewing now, who will lead this 
transformation are surfing the Internet today, some have already put on the table its commitment to the future, such is the case of Spot.us . Presented as a non-profit project, as an NGO of journalism is a start-up originating in San Francisco, California (home of Google, Yahoo!, etc.). directly seeking funding in the community of readers. Projects are proposed in-depth reports on topics that may be of interest to the residents of the San Francisco area. Collect donations of $ 20 per person and hire a journalist to carry out the work. Completed research and developed the story is offered to other media. If sold, the profits are shared among donors, usually reinvest the money in a new report.
Spot.us are just a few months old but it works and plans to expand its model of journalism from other parts of this state and then in the rest of America.
It is certainly a good idea, but assumes that people are willing to pay to have good information. Something possible only where journalism is respected and respectable. I have my doubts, serious doubts that this format would work in other countries, especially in my country, Spain. But Spot.us is at least one reason for hope.
In this video David Cohn, the young promoter of this company information, details (in English) particulars of Spot.us. Introduced as an interview in which he says that "journalism will survive the death of its institutions."
Image: stock.xchng
The fall of the "fourth estate"
By Fernando Mexia - Economics , Journalism , headline - 23/03/2009
The economic crisis has its most visible face unemployment. All sectors are affected by the cut of templates, from finance to the automotive world, from construction to tourism, a list of casualties which is not lacking, of course, journalism. The figures are appalling. In Spain , for example, 16 percent of these professionals looking for work and more than 2,000 reporters have been fired since it was unleashed credit cancer. In the U.S. 30,000 "pens" were left on the street in 2008 and things are not looking good for this year given that staff cuts are on the agenda. The Tribune group (holder of headers as the LA Times, Chicago Tribune and many others), CNN, Conde Nast (magazines like Vanity Fair, Vogue) or Time, to name a few, have become detached from their teams to overcome evil economic drink. The thing is evil everywhere, the press would be less right? But under this "squad" of journalists behind range side effects that go beyond the reduction of the pages of a newspaper: the crisis is undermining the ability of media to fulfill their watchdog role of politicians, is torpedoing the waterline of the "fourth estate".
In the U.S., a country of reference in investigative journalism, the reporters low popularity (high wages) has led several writers begin to worry about health coverage that is made of the management authorities .
James Rainey of the LA Times pointed in that direction in his column of March 20 .
"Newspapers continue, to some extent, with its historic role to lead and shape the political debate 
but they have slashed their workforce, to menundo losing its most experienced reporters (and the higher salary), due to the awful recession and the flight of Internet advertising, "said Rainey, who several political consultants said that the effect the crisis is leaving notes and in the quality of information reporters who manage to authorities.
The first visible result is that parties are using the arrival on the scene of laborers inexperienced information to "sell" propaganda as news content that would previously have paid to see them published on paper.
A little picture that looks like the conditions in which Woodward and Bernstein worked to uncover the scandal Watergate in The Washington Post in 1972. It is questionable whether today any means is able to devote many resources to investigate a similar case This is worrying, as well as sad. "Imagine you drive by the 5 (U.S. interstate highway). There used to be a couple of patrol police to keep people under control. Now they are gone and everyone knows it. This can desenvocar quickly in a situation like 'Mad Max' (classic apocalyptic film about a society which was ruled by the law of the jungle), "said Chris Lehane, a veteran Democratic consultant, who did not hesitate to describe journalists as the law enforcement policy that ensure because the leaders do not get drunk on power.
Undoubtedly, the high fevers that journalism suffers because of the crisis may have other reading and being the beginning of a change-for many inevitably from paper to web. At the forefront of this transition is the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, one of the largest U.S. state newspapers that on March 17 began closing its physical release and concentrated his efforts to inform Internet users.
The network is undoubtedly a world of communication posibiliades, usually a sea of news, which suffers from lack of credibility in many cases. Internet is also a refuge for prestigious firms, which can keep writing about what happens around even after being fired, but without the support of a media group that can protect your work when you have a burning issue at hand. The web is still a disaster where each drawer make war on their own, where the reporter is exposed in the first person to the elements. 
It is not the same as The Washington Post published a corruption case or to do a blogger on its Web site certainly is not. Could you open a new 'Watergate' and support research from a blog? In the future perhaps today I doubt it.
The economic dark period has revealed the weakness of the means to comply strictly with their social role, insufficient resources in the traditional press and to charge too much responsibility on the shoulders of the burgeoning blogs.
Conclusions that are on the same page that the latest report from the Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism about the state of journalism in the U.S. in 2008. Interesting study show that the funding problems of the media, the decline of research on the political and the shift to internet, both from the large media groups and, above all, by journalists in their personal capacity.
The love of journalism that "Watergate" will enjoy in a few weeks of "State of Play", a film in which Russell Crowe retrieves the image of street reporter of "old dog" who asks questions uncomfortable and unable to modernize their methods . Crowe is investigating an incident involving a senator who will take you to uncover a story that could not imagine. I recommend it.
The future internet
By Fernando Mexia - Partner , Peregrine world , society , technology - 15/01/2009
Pilgrim World, by John Berga. Follow her blog here
Internet 2020: irregular social consequences
An American research center, the Pew Internet and American Life Project , has issued a report of prospective internet in 2020. The assessments match report on improvements that will result from network access through mobile and improving the current architecture (rather than creating a new one): speech recognition, artificial intelligence, virtual reality.
However, it seems like the same deal or optimism about the social consequences of these technological improvements. Do not create the report in a more forgiving human relations or in a dramatic improvement of life in homes.
Both the majority of respondents as experts in the sample considered a negative outlook: the ability to know one another will not exceed our capacity to hate, differences in social roles or racial claim.
Transparency in the behavior of individuals and organizations improve. People openly share more intimate details of her life every day. Much of what happens in everyday life will be more visible, more transparent and personal data will populate the social networks and databases. The number of mobile phone cameras and surveillance cameras will grow exponentially, will be extremely expensive, sophisticated, and their widespread use. Even the clothes are considered as the interface design.
But we must not say, establish a relationship between this behavior and integrity. Are tied in the survey, almost, who believe that greater transparency will lead to an improvement in the ethical and who do not.
Respondents predict a harsh battle between advocates of network control and copyright and those who imagine systems, methods of copy and defend the fullest freedom of content. Experts and analysts and users are optimistic about the difficulty of the drivers to tame the media.
Finally, the outlook report said the final separation of the divisions between personal time and work time and between physical and virtual reality, typical of the industrial economy. A confusion, analysts say, with significant effects on basic social relations.
In the vital area is expected to increase the digital divide, an increase of violence and abuse potential: in the workplace is stressed, especially, skills to acquire control of employers over workers network.
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By N2H