Blogs

Hi media education colleagues -

I am posting this fun and educational game on behalf of ACME partner Free Press.

"Whack a Murdoch!"

Check out “Whack-a-Murdoch" information below.

Free Press released this game just as News Corp has unveiled its Fox Business Network. As Murdoch’s latest venture is making headlines, Free Press hopes to frame the issue around consolidation and attract a new population of potential activists.

01-19-2008 -- UPDATE: Watch a 22-minute video interview with Jim Klurfeld and Howard Schneider:

http://newshare.typepad.com/mgpaudio/2008/01/video-the-deman.html

Through my work as a Digital Media Producer for the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, I was fortunate to be able to help produce a podcast (MP3) from today's luncheon series with Drew Clark, Project Manager for the Center for Public Integrity.

Rob sez: Kudos to ACME partners John Stauber, Sheldon Rampton and Diane Farsetta at the Center for Media and Democracy for their cutting-edge work on this issue.

One might argue that most of what passes for "news" on television is "fake" - a small sliver of our daily reality extruded through a variety of epistemological, economic, and political filters like so much shredded wheat.

But the widespread use of VNRS (video news releases) smacks of propaganda of the highest order. Thanks to CMD, this debate, on the heels of FCC fines, seems like a step in the right direction.

The crux of Tom Regan's thesis (article below) is: "The reality in today's world of online journalism is that both old and new views count, and traditional journalists ignore this at their own peril."

He defines "new" news views as youth interests such as stories about the iPhone and "old" views as NY Times stories about the Iraq war. I see it as more than youth vs aged.

Over on my directed study blog this semester, I'm using networked technology (a blog, wiki, del.icio.us, and others tools) to explore and share my research on fair use issues impacting media educators and students in the digital age. I've started with a philosophical inquiry into the meaning of fairness to explore its relationship to today's challenges in sharing access to teaching and learning materials.

In the last couple of years, mainstream media has figured out that its future lies in part with figuring out how to engage youth with civic affairs and . . . the news (however the news evolves). Here's a column from the Waco, Texas, daily -- which is owned by Cox Communications of Atlanta, about what they're doing.
-- bill densmore

http://www.wacotrib.com/opin/content/news/opinion/stories/2007/09/30/093...
http://www.wacotrib.com/services/content/services/aboutus.html

HEADLINE: Ken Sury: From print to small screen
PUBLISHED: Sunday, September 30, 2007

Equipped with a $1.7-million grant from the Knight Foundation and $2 million of institutional support, a bold experiment is underway at Stony Brook University on Long Island: Whan happens when you teach media literacy to students across all college disciplines? For details: http://commcgi.cc.stonybrook.edu/artman/publish/article_1246.shtml

Here's a question. Should the news try to be objective? There is no doubt that Olbermann is a brilliant, articulate, analytic genius whose passion tends to agree with mine, and I love him. But, should we evolve toward a news environment that is totally composed of competing one-sided shows (like Olbermann and O'Reilly)? That seems to be the direction we are heading.

Champlain College professors, Elaine Young and Rob Williams put together a great list - now available on the ACME website - of Web 2.0 Foundational Terms currently used in our rapidly evolving Internet culture. It's a great list for those Media Educators and others who are interested in learning more about today's web lingo!