new media technologies: online media, blogs, podcasts com 300 kathy e. gill 2 may 2006
TRANSCRIPT
New Media Technologies: Online Media, Blogs, Podcasts
COM 300
Kathy E. Gill2 May 2006
Agenda
Recap: Open Source Online News, Blogs, Podcasts Discussion Leaders & Small Group
Discussion Thursday, Continued discussion +
blogosphere exercise
Recap: GNU Project (1/3)
Start of open source philosophy (1985) “The word `free’ in `free software’ pertains to
freedom, not price” … think free speech, not free beer!
Four principles … Freedom to: Use the program as you wish Adapt the program Distribute copies to help your neighbor Improve the program and share it with the public
to benefit the entire community
Recap: GNU Project (2/3)
Technologists developing social networks to develop new software … by using communication (technology) networks
Subsequently … Linux, Apache, TCP/IP
Recap: Cluetrain (3/3)
Markets are networks composed of people … and people like to talk (communicate)
Companies can impose barriers to this communication (or not)
Reducing barriers means a community of like-minded people has better chance of forming
Online News : Overview
Repurposing electrons from print to new media is a business decision
Few papers have adopted blogs Social system disconnect? Not enough time?
Syndication is an integral part of social system
Online News Social System
1994: San Jose Mercury News goes online
1998: Charlotte Observer uses blog-like format, Hurricane Bonnie
2000: WSJ launches blog-like feature, Best of the Web
Online News RSS Adoption
Apr 2002 New York Times (limited to Userland)
RSS 0.91
Oct 2002 Christian Science Monitor
25, RSS 1.0
Mar 2004 Washington Post 125, RSS 2.0
Apr 2006 Washington Post 150, RSS 2.0
Apr 2006 Seattle Times 47, RSS 2.0
Daily Newspaper Study
18 papers in top 15 urbanized areas of US (covers 65% of US population)
Leader: RSS 2.0 All implemented since late 2003
Only four had no official RSS feed LA Times, Chicago Tribune Miami Herald Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Editorial Decision
Not technological decision > in 3 of 15 markets, papers are co-managed Philadelphia Inquirer (16); Daily News (2) Detroit News (35); Free Press (1) Seattle Times (45); P-I (27)
Why Rapid Adoption?
Syndication in line with culture Business model is evolving
How to reverse loss in readers? How to generate online revenue?
Recognition of growth of blogosphere, driving readers “Pay to read” barriers (WSJ v CSM)
Blogging and Online News
Blog characteristics Effect on mass media and politics Measuring influence within the
blogosphere How have online news sites adopted
RSS technology
Blog Characteristics (1/2)
Reverse chronological journaling (format)
Regular, date-stamped entries (timeliness)
Links to related news articles, documents, blog entries within each entry (attribution)
Blog Characteristics (2/2)
Archived entries (old content accessible)
Links to related blogs (blogrolling) Explain, illustrate again
RSS or XML feed (ease of syndication) Passion (voice)
History 1999: Poynter starts “MediaNews” blog 1999: Dan Gillmor starts blogging at SJMN 2004: Blog universe estimated at 5 million 2004: Pew Internet & American Life:
11% Net users have read blogs 2-7% have created blogs (2.4 - 8.4 million
bloggers)
Effect on Mass Media and Politics
Mass Media Capital and labor-intensive Geographically distinct
Blogging Not capital-intensive Influence rests on the Internet
distributed network that removes the geographic barrier
What is Journalism?
Journalism is “our day book, our collective diary, which records our common life. That which goes unrecorded goes unpreserved … The creation and preservation of collective memory…” is the practice of journalism.
- James W. Carey
Participatory Journalism
Characterized by expanded two-way communication between media and readers.
With blogging, reader becomes author and author (journalist) becomes reader, ending the one-to-many model of communication.
Examples - media Glenn Reynolds, InstaPundit.com
100,000 readers per day (equivalent to medium-sized city daily or cable news show)
Arguably today’s most influential blogger Hundreds of journalist bloggers
Salon, Slate MSNBC, FOX Christian Science Monitor, The New Republic,
Seattle Times, San Jose Mercury News, Washington Monthly, Washington Post …
We are the blogs. Journalism will be assimilated. (2002)
Examples - Politics OhMyNews.com, Korea
Credited with electing president Howard Dean: Blog for America
All candidates followed, with varying success Election of US Rep. Ben Chandler (D-KY)
$2K in ads on Daily Kos and 10 other blogs yielded $80K in contributions from around the nation
Cool/Lame
Measuring Influence
How to measure intellectual influence? Shaping the news hole Tools to help assess credibility
Shaping the News Hole Trent Lott story (2002)
Covered by only one reporter following event
Kept alive by bloggers - liberal and conservative
Microsoft “switch” campaign (2002) LA Times (2004)
Supreme Justices Scalia v Ginsburg Colbert’s monologue Saturday night?
Tools to Assess Credibility
Why should we care what the numbers say? Readers need and want credible sources Do we want to return to the days of
pamphleteers and soapboxes?
Counting for Influence
Academics count citations Counting treats all as equals Countered by weighting Comparisons are within field of study
How do you judge credibility? Is the expert the only credible source? I
would argue that our trust in credentials gives the source the ability to decide what information is credible rather than making the reader accountable for assessing the information. – student, 2005
If we are ever going to impact corporate media control, we need to change the idea that those source are the only credible sources for information. How can we change the notion of credibility to include resources such as blogs? – student, 2005
More Questions to Ponder
Which link is the more representative of influence: blogroll or post?
Are several daily short posts more reflective of influence than less frequent longer (more depth) posts?
How do we deconstruct the blogosphere to provide useful information within genres?
RSS
Rich Site Summary, Really Simple Syndication, RDF Site Summary
XML document that facilitates content syndication This “feed” contains structured data Transformed to information by RSS
reader Ease of syndication, low cost
RSS Development Timeline
March 1999 Netscape RSS 0.90
July 1999 Netscape RSS 0.91
June 2000 Userland RSS 0.91
Late 2002 RSS-Dev Working Group
RSS 1.0
January 2003 Userland RSS 2.0.1
RSS Readers
With RSS 2.0 spec, developers were no longer shooting at moving target
Example: Pluck launched in 2003, turns MSIE into a
reader Privately funded by two firms cNet editor’s choice in July 2004 Public funding of $8.5 million Oct 2004
Recap: Diffusion Rogers: an innovation is “an idea
practice, or object that is perceived as new by an individual or other unit of adoption”
Winston: adoption rate slows with competing, incompatible prototypes and absence of a supervening social necessity
Recap: Rogers’ Diffusion Model A relative advantage over current practice Compatible with current practices and
values Reduces complexity (ease of use) Opportunity to test before committing
(trialability) Ability to observe results before adoption
(observability)
Improved Practice …
Audio file + RSS = Podcast Not just iPod, it’s just that iPod created a
broad audience Incredibly fast adoption
What’s In a Name?
Newspaper (product) is printed (action) on newsprint (technology)
Blog (product) is blogged (action) with blogging software (technology) No clear differentiation Also the case with RSS
Hinders communication
RSS Visibility in Online News Social System
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
2001 2002 2003 2004
Blogs
RSS
Frequency of Appearance of “Blogs” and “RSS Syndication” in Lexis-Nexis News Wire Reports
Other Adoption Hurdles
Incompatible RSS formats > burden on developers
Non-integrated software > potential consumers must find and install new software IT departments : no software
installation Everyday computer users are uneasy
Blogging Social System
Jan 2003: ~ 500,000 blogs March 2005: 8 million - 24 million blogs Pew Internet and American Life Project:
Spring 2002: 3% had created blog March 2003: 11% had read blogs Fall 2004: 8% had created blog End of 2004: 27% of 120 M US adults had read
blogs …. 5% used an RSS reader
RSS Social System
Technorati tracking 2 million blogs, March 2004 7.7 million blogs, March 2005 37.5 million blogs and 2.3 billion links,
April 2006 Syndic8.com tracking
2,500, mid-2001 286,000, January 2005
RSS Readers
Prior practice became cumbersome Development also a function of stable
specification Became easier to find and use
A necessary condition for adoption (Rogers)
Yahoo! News: “We’re trying to make this understandable for normal people.”
Summary Blogging technology is having a profound
impact on Web content Neither politics nor news will be the same Shortcomings of mathematical attempts to
measure influence: Treat all posts equally, which rewards frequency
over depth Fail to segregate and rank within genres
Summary RSS adoption has lagged adoption of
blogging technology Frequent, rapid specification changes hindered
development of easy-to-use RSS readers Growth of blogosphere is the supervening social
necessity RSS, not blogs, adopted by newspapers
Adoption decision appears to be editorial May be business (reader) driven
RSS mainstreamed with Yahoo! News
Resources Gill, KE (2004). How can we measure the
influence of the blogosphere. WWW2004, New York, NY USA. http://faculty.washington.edu/kegill/pub/www2004_blogosphere_gill.pdf
Gill, KE (2005). Blogging, RSS and the information landscape, a look at online news. WWW2006, Chiba Japan. http://faculty.washington.edu/kegill/pub/gill_www2005_rss.pdf