Redesign the news: an invitation to Seattle
It’s common for everyone these days to bemoan how biased, superficial and misleading news reporting is. And the fall of major newspapers in the wake of the web is oddly seen an achievement. Yes, seeing old things fall can signify change, but it does not guarantee progress.
Are you a developer or designer who cares about news? Who believes quality reporting and information is key to a stable and long-lasting democracy? Do you wish there were better tools for finding, creating and verifying the information we share about the world?
If so, I invite you to sign up for Hacking Seattle News. An event next weekend (10/14-10/16), sponsored by King5 news:
JOIN US! We’re hosting a weekend hackathon with the goal of creating a social-savvy, aggregated news site for Seattle that YOU want to use.
The news industry is ready for a new idea and we’re coming together to build one. In a weekend. Want more social sharing built-in to the news process… or a better way of surfacing content you want to see? Let’s build it.
We’ll be brainstorming, creating, and coding a new news site for Seattle. The winning team will get a cash prize.
All used and created platforms will be open source. Registration is free. Designers and Developers wanted.
I saw a youtube where Steve Jobs was supporting newspapers.
Some history: As you know, the working world has changed since the days of Mad Men. Going off the gold standard, and printing extra money, has led to inflation whereby we now have words like greenmail, hostile takeovers and careerism. It makes sense, thanks to inflation, to acquire a company and cull it’s assets, thus creating money (but not real wealth) on paper.
Newspapers have not been spared. According to the investigative magazine Mother Jones for April 2007, when media conglomerates buy a newspaper they tend to cull various assets including skilled beat reporters. According to Jones, this culling, in favour of electronic media assets, more than computer technology, is what results in the
decline of newspaper quality.
The gold standard for “journalism and ethics” is newspapers, “just the facts Ma’am,” while TV will ever lag behind because of its association with entertainment “dog and pony shows.” Also, the most intellectual people are more print oriented, and get newspaper jobs, just as the guys with microphones are more intellectual than their cameramen. As for the internet and such, although this is supposedly a media-savy age, I am reluctantly coming to conclude that most people are not ladies or gentlemen, and they do not grasp “journalistic ethics.”
I have commented enough; I’ll let someone else explain ethics.
I note that the News Geek category on the Registration page is “sold out”.
is there ANY way for a educated and experienced broadcast journalist to get around that?
Enquiring minds wannna know. :)