Rick Stemm and the Boundaries of the Global Village

Rick Stemm had a post up at Dane 101 yesterday called "New Media: How We Took Control". I was going to reply at the site but my response dragged on so I decided to turn it into a post here.

In a Danecast which I have not heard, Rick "argued that new media forces the responsibility of journalism onto the consumer instead of the reporter. Not that journalists should be held any less accountable." What? If reporters are alleviated of any responsibility, what are they to be held accountable for? Personally, I despair if new media even nudges consumers to be journalists. I want professional journalists bringing me my news, not consumers. Consumers generally want to consume, not head the Fourth Estate. Blogging about a concert doesn't make anyone a journalist anymore than looking up symptoms at WebMD makes one a doctor. Posting "pictures of my Ale Asylum brewery tour or a Sunspot show while at the very event" are not examples of practicing journalism. Neither is posting to Facebook. If simply sharing one's experiences counts as journalism to you then I guess you and I are simply at a semantic impasse because, from my perspective, journalism is about much more than that. I find it odd that he says that "Dane101 is at the forefront of this movement [new media]" and that consumers now bear the burden of responsibility alone. Not to discount or insult the contributors of Dane 101 but the site has precious little journalism in it. Most of what there is comes in the form of links to articles by, well, real journalists who work at the old media spots of newspapers and television stations. I've been critical of Dane 101 previously but I mean the above not as a criticism, but merely mean to say that the direction the site has taken is one that does not include a lot of original journalism.

One problem is that I'm not sure what Rick means by "new media". While I'm at it, I'm also not sure what he thinks they have taken over. It sounds like braggadocio to me. It's one thing to say that people at a film festival can post to their blog very quickly, but it's another thing to take the concept of new media and equate it to consumer journalists, which I think Stemm does. How film and music festivals are covered has changed but that doesn't mean that consumer journalists makes the likes of Seymour Hersh obsolete. It doesn't even make them amateur Lester Bangses.

I hope you won't misunderstand me because I am not saying that sharing experiences is worthless. Far from it. I do it all the time here at this very blog. But Stemm's post made a sweeping generalization about all reporting yet he gave examples only relating to the arts, for want of a better way of saying it. He lumps the ability of consumers to share their experiences at a film or music festival in with the long, hard work of an investigative reporter and I think that's unfair.

Another area where it seems Stemm and I disagree, which could very well just be my interpretation of what he wrote and not his intended meaning, is that he seems to blindly favor quantity. The ability to share timely, personal coverage of a festival doesn't mean that that coverage is actually interesting, that the individual writes well, nor has any insights of note.

As for his comment "There is simply no excuse in this day and age to be lacking information or to accept misinformation," that is, to me, just wishful thinking. As long as human beings are behind it, there will be problems and imperfections. The Internet is a medium, it's up to highly imperfect and biased people to do the sifting and winnowing. The Net couldn't care less if the information is bogus or not. The truth of any given matter is probably out on the tubes, but that doesn't mean that it won't take time and effort to get at it and I highly suspect that most consumers aren't willing to invest a whole lot of either to ensure that they arrive at it. Be a purist if you want, but down on the ground, people have responsibilities and interests which don't involve spending hours in front of a computer checking dozens of sources, reading through documents, etc.

Stemm waxes poetic about a "global village" and says "We are always connected". Who is this "we"?

I am reminded of a conversation I had a couple weeks ago. I was on break at work and outside when a gentleman who was around 60 approached me and asked about some construction at Library Mall. I told him what I knew. But he was an inquisitive soul and he kept the conversation going. I forget how, exactly, but the topic turned to computers. He expressed his loathing of them and related to me how he used to work at Memorial Library but quit once everything became computerized. (Whether it was the influx of technology alone which caused him to part ways with his employer, he did not specify.) This comparative youngster was then subjected to a mild-mannered tirade about how computers are a poor substitute for face-to-face interaction and how they can only provide an inauthentic experience. Or something like that.

I proceeded to tell him that I worked in IT and that he'd get no sympathy from me on this matter. He pointed to all the college kids walking around Library Mall to and from class and remarked on how technically savvy they were. I told him that I disagreed. They might be technically literate, perhaps, but not necessarily technically savvy. But, just as any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, posting what you had for lunch on Facebook and doing e-mail might be technical savvy to someone who won't touch a computer with a ten foot pole and instead hates them from afar. Not convinced, my interlocutor then pointed at the students once again and remarked that they are all somehow deficient because of the role technology plays in their lives.

This irritated me and I shot back, "For someone who hates computers, refuses to use them, and knows absolutely nothing about them, you sure are an expert on them and how they affect people." My point was not that he was wrong, although I think he was, but rather that he was in no place to judge. All he had were anecdotes and apocalyptic predictions from luddites like himself as opposed any contact with college kids or to computers. He was forced to concede my point.

The global village is relative. As with the gentleman I wrote about above, most seniors aren't citizens of the Pala island Internet utopia. The 3+ billion people on this planet who subsist on under $2.50/day are probably spending more time trying to find potable water instead of updating their Facebook statuses. About a quarter of all people on this planet don't have electricity. How global is the village to them? Closer to home, Madison's Literacy Network deals with many people right here in town who are either illiterate or need help learning English as a second language. The African immigrant I tutored was not a part of Stemm's Internet world. He was concerned with learning English and couldn't afford a computer and another monthly utility bill. The Internet's reach is global but the so-called global village is actually an exclusive club, albeit a blind one.

Before we go around claiming that the new media has taken control of anything, we must consider those who are left out of it or who choose not to participate in it. Personally, I think the Madison new media landscape is disappointingly homogenous. It could use the Digital Age equivalents of Sol Worth and John Adair to get those who are underrepresented into the mix. Let me try to illustrate the point.

Stemm remarked that Dane 101 is at the forefront of the new media movement and he cites the "timely, personal coverage of the Forward Music Fest" as an illustration of this. OK. I can't complain about such coverage and agree with him that it is a positive development. Indeed, I liked to it at my music blog/podcast. But the new media juggernaut completely ignored the Madison World Music Festival. Where was the coverage? And you know what? I didn't see a goddamn review from it over at The Daily Page either. (That's your cue, Kristian Knutsen, to point out all the coverage that I can't find.) 77 Square ran a preview by Tom Alesia but my searches for actual reviews came up empty. However, Katjusa Cisar's coverage of Forward takes up pages and pages. A search at Google Blogs brings up some photos from someone at WSUM but little else. If ignoring the World Music Festival in favor of O.J. Simpson trial-like coverage of the Forward Music Fest is what Stemm's new media is about, then I'll take a different one, please. I know Dane 101's Jesse Russell doesn't like me but I respect what he does and I don't think his site ignored the World Music Festival simply to push one organized by Dane 101 contributors, former or current. (And to avoid receiving another nasty e-mail in which I am called an asshole, I will also say that I don't think it's racism either.) But I'll take the egalitarian claims that for Dane 101 and new media more seriously when events like the World Music Festival get a bit more attention from Madison's new media than simply appearing in a list of events happening on a given weekend. New media in Madison may be egalitarian and democratic in theory, but in practice it has a long row to hoe if it is to get beyond parochialism.