The media is being revolutionized in the digital era, becoming more user friendly and interactive, distributing power and better serving the public interest… or maybe not so much. Maybe the “revolution” is already over and we’re stuck with the same old “fair and balanced” stage show that has long been dominated by talking heads trained in prattling on and run by pinstriped executives who share almost none of our daily concerns.
What kind of news media do we want? What kind do we need? What kind can we make? And how will we pay for it?
Every other year for the past decade, FreePress has hosted the National Conference on Media Reform asking these kind of questions and many more. The Reporters, producers, guerilla video makers, citizen journalists, coders, watchdogs and public-interest dreamers of all stripes that come to the conference are arriving in Denver, where it’s being held over the next three days at the downtown Sheraton hotel.
Discussion Friday will consider the threat of increased media consolidation, where all of our news outlets will share content and production teams and become virtually indistinguishable; internet policy, which will influence choices available to us about what we can surf to online and what we can do at the sites we surf to; grassroots funding for media projects; and ways news narratives can be shaped by journalists to better serve the public.
Conference details, including the full schedule, and a live stream video are posted here. Follow the conference on Twitter at #NCMR13.
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