Is mobile, hyper-local, location-based n...

Is mobile, hyper-local, location-based news content the way to save mainstream media in the USA?I think it might be. I have been watching closely over the past few months as newspaper after newspaper has fallen away in the US. It's a very scary and very sad situation that American media finds itself in. Resistance to change over the past few years has positioned many papers in a dire situation where it's a matter of shit or get off the pot. And many are shitting themselves.Boston Globe is a one example that I have been watching withe extreme interest. Boston.com is a great resource that has not been used effectively enough to pull Boston Globe out of financial trouble.The resistance to change coupled with a severe drop in advertising and circulation (with thanks to a recession and online media emerging as a force in the media industry) has left the Boston Globe almost crippled. Many people are set to lose jobs and Boston, the city, is set to lose it's competitive media market. If Boston Globe closes down the city of Boston will be left with a single daily newspaper. This defeats the purpose of mainstream media acting as a democratic watchdog or fourth estate. With one media organisation remaining things are not looking good.Enter hyper-local, location-based news content fed to mobile phones produced by hyper-local citizen media producers who put content up via cellphones on to hyper-local portals.This is what Martin Langeveld of Nieman Journalism Lab had to say on the topic of Boston Globe:

Langeveld's advice is to go (almost) online-only with Boston.com, and to launch or subsidise a network of hyperlocal sites all over the area, and launch a network of local niche verticals focussed on weather, traffic, jobs, entertainment, education and more. He proposes a tiered, variable pricing model for all, with most of the content free, but paid premium access for a "small but highly-engaged group." This income could be supplemented with transactional revenue, through selling theatre tickets, for example, or facilitating restaurant reservations.

This model could also expose the Globe's city-wide reach to a hyper-local market of advertisers (a longer tail than they would previously had access to). This coupled with a free/premium hybrid mode and the paper could be on its way back up.Regarding the print side of things it's a simple mechanic to alleviate some immediate strain: Make the paper a weekly and include the news created over the week from the hyper-local portals and citizens media. Pull city-wide, larger advertisers in to this weekly printed publication to subsidise the cost of the print and drop the price to allow for quantity to be sold and to make the paper appear to be more accessible to the everyday person in the street.There is no quick-fix for papers such as the Boston Globe, that is certain. But it is imperative that these papers start to adapt or simply succumb to a swift death.

Citizen Journalism - My DCI Presentation

I have only seen this now on Zoopy but the Lovely New Medial Lab at Rhodes University managed to record and summerise my presentation at the Digital Citizen Indaba.Thanks to the involved party for doing a great job. Here's the video:

Road trippin' to Grahamstown - DCI and Highway Africa

Tomorrow I'm leaving on a jet-plane and heading to Grahamstown. The reason for this is more than a bit of a nostalgic weekend away to my old University. I am in fact heading to Grahamstown to take part in the Digital Citizen Indaba and Highway Africa.I've wanted to take part in this event for a while now but never seemed to get around to it (or get invited). This year however, I have been invited to speak about the tools that can aid citizen journalists and the available services that one can use.This is an extremely interesting topic for me as I have made a slow and slight transition from mainstream journalism to a more citizen journalism role through my blogs and social media.I'll be posting the presentation online once I'm done with it but I doubt it will make too much sense as I enjoy the sound of my own voice and like to make this the focus of my presentations.Nonetheless the entire weekend (four days) will be great. Matthew Buckland and Vincent Maher will be there and apparently our first stop is the old faithful Rat & Parrot. B-E-A-UTIFUL!

Are podcasts useful?

Yes, I think podcasts are useful in fact, I think podcasting can be an extremely useful mechanism for relaying a message, point, story or event.I found a post on podcasting being dead or alive through one of Eve's blogs. I must say I immediately sprang to blog about it because I recently made use of podcasting as a citizen journalism media.Admittedly I focus much of my thought around social media and web 2.0 on how it affects the mass media on the whole and how the "little person" or Citizen Journalist can benefit from the trends emerging at the moment.

Early Adoption failed me

Podcasting really caught my attention and I tried my hand at it on SA Rocks and the RocksCast. Must like Dave and Mike with their Amplitude, SA RocksCast died.I think that I tried to jump on the bandwagon and appear to be an "early adopter" with my attempt at podcasting. I didn't really grasp the media platform itself nor fully understand how to market or create these podcasts effectively. So it died a quick death.Vincent Maher and I also tried our hand at a podcasting targeting the local sphere. Flamebait was short lived because we were a bit zealous in our approach to the content and it was shot down by editorial staff. Oh well. Needless to say the actual media itself still intrigues me.So are podcasts dead? No, I don't think so. Taly Weiss brings up a good point regarding the technology behind podcasting. If it is there then podcasting itself is not dead. In other words, if we have iPods and media players that are capable of storing and playing back podcasts then the media is not dead. But that isn't really always true. I still have a VHS player, that doesn't mean that VHS isn't dead, it is. And if you think it isn't, trust me it's on the way to the grave.

Podcasting and Citizen Journalism

While on a mission at the Million Man March this year I discovered that one doesn't need to consistently make use of a specific type of media for it to be effective.While making use of various platforms to update people about the event I was asked to do a podcast interview over the phone for The Times. What a great idea. One of their journalists called me and did a short (one or two minute) interview with me about the event.This proved to be a very effective means to get my message across. Yes it was for a big media organisation so that helped ofcourse. But the essence of that instance made sense to me. Why do we have to produce a podcast every week, month, day etc etc. When all that is really needed is an event or story to make a great podcast.Grassroots media or citizen journalists can really produce viable content for their websites over the phone with simple technology. Use a digital dictaphone, if fact, use the recorder on your cell phone, make sure you are succinct in your 3 minutes and publish it as is.Rally your media around events, don't make an event out of your media.

Citizen journalism floods in

The recent spate of flooding in the UK has proven to be a wonderful platform for citizens to feature on major news networks.Watching Sky News this morning (yes, I watched Sky News this morning) I was astounded by the reports coming in on the channel. It seemed as though there were no employed "proffesional" journalists in the field. I'd say most, if not all of the footage from one report came solely from citizens suffering from the floods.This makes sense since much of the country is underwater, which makes it tough for journalists, trucks, camera crews etc etc, to get to the places.

Image courtesay of SKY

Mr Maher might find some point against this, but I feel that this is where CitJ is very relevant and useful. It might even be the logical way to cover this sort of event (can one call floods an "event"). Instead of asking one journalist to try and cover and entire span of tragedy, ask the people living it to send in their footage. It's easy in todays day and age.This streamlines the process, allows citizens to feel important and special because they had their footage played on TV and allows for the news station to appear to be caring about what is happening from the view of the citizens.

Is MyDigitalLife Tripling 10c Payment?

I have been hearing some kind of rumour regarding my post yesterday about MyDigitalLife (MyDL) paying authors. Yesterday I spoke of 10c per page view, now I hear that sometime next week any author will be receiving triple the payment per page view. That means that per click/pageview on any of your posts as an Author at MyDL you will receive 30c instead of 10c.This, as far as I know is still just a rumour. I am trying to get Townboy to speak up and make some kind of commitment either way, but nothing. If this is true that means a tidy little some of money for SA Rocks at MyDL next week.If you aren't an Author or even a member at MyDL yet then I suggest, just in case, you get to their site and have a look around. 30c per pageview in payment is not a bad offer at all, if it's true.

Earn Cash Per Page Impression

MyDigitalLife (MyDL) has recently started a programme that allows verified authors on their website to earn 10c per page impression. This is a brilliant idea.I don't believe that it will be particularly lucrative to begin with, however I think that the concept is an excellent one that will promote the correct approach to citizen journalism and blogging.Townboy is the townplanner at MyDL and says that the payment initiative is meant to incentivise people to become better bloggers and potential citizen journalists who are paid for their stories by MyDL.Not everyone is an author on MyDL and only authors are able to receive the per page impression payment. Most of the members at MyDL are regular bloggers who blog for the enjoyment. Yet, there is a movement towards improved content from specific users who show promise in their writing skills. These users can become authors on MyDL and begin earning some pocket change!The cash that is earned is paid back to authors in sums of R50, I am still figuring out how and when that payment is received. I have begun submitting SA Rocks content to MyDL. So keep a look out and see what you think about the concept. I have also made some suggestions to Townboy about making the process more simple to integrate between someone's original blog and their MyDL blog or contribution area.If you have any thoughts post them here and I will alert Townboy of them.