Inspired by Poynter’s recent Web + 10 seminar, I’ve been wondering how media organizations could use community-based or grassroots journalism to build audience. I’ve been asking myself and others: Whose stories are untold using conventional reporting methods? Whose voices are we leaving out of traditional newspapers and newscasts? Who feels alienated by media coverage of their lives?
So, I wrote a piece raising these questions and looking at how weblogs could be used to bridge some gaps between audience and media. Before publication, we sent the piece to editors and news directors, with some questions, so that we could publish their thoughts along with mine. Click here to read my full piece. Click below to read the responses we received from newsroom leaders.
…Weblogs are not grassroots journalism. Journalism has highly regarded ethical standards. >Read full response
It’s no secret I’m a fan of blogging. I recently added “comments” to my own blog … so far, it’s been more of a conversation. >Read full response
…We should revisit the traditional views of what constitutes … a “correspondent.”
>Read full response
The issue of audience and diversity of voices is at the core of everything we are thinking about and talking about. >Read full response
It certainly makes sense to explore blogs and other ways of involving readers in the newspaper. >Read full response
…Part of the new world of publishing is that everyone gets to have his or her say. >Read full response
Blogs are a wonderful tool to empower those who don’t have as much access to the mainstream press. >Read full response
Hosting blogs for a wide-range of communities is a fascinating idea, but is it worth the effort? >Read full response
Blogging is a more personalized version of the original message threads we started creating back in 1994 when I launched the first Tampa Bay Online service on Prodigy. >Read full response
…Blogs offering genuinely diverse, insightful & interesting points of view would be welcome. Blogs that replicate in print the experience of talk radio would be a waste of good electrons. >Read full response
At this time, we are not using a blog, but recently we instituted ‘forums’ on our Web site. >Read full response
The Internet is full of pontification; opinions and half-truths as plentiful as porn. To open our Web site to them, in my opinion, would be wrong. >Read full response
In one sense, blogs are the antithesis of what newspapers ought to be. The mission of any newspaper worth its salt is to be a cohesive force within the region it covers. >Read full response
I am intrigued by how newspapers can create forums that offer something valuable & not apparent in our current news coverage. > Read full response
Blogs are assumed to be opinionated, whereas news media is assumed to be neutral. >Read full response
