6/4 Circle Discussion

Don't forget: the circle is the oldest form of human communication! The old hunter gatherers didn't sit in rows all facing the same direction. They spread out in a circle so everyone could look everyone else in the eye.

Some key concepts:

• hi-tech, hi-touch journalism: we can put all these tech tools to work, but we also have to be deeply involved as people, giving our journalism a voice people can recognize and engaging with our fellow participants
• Ready Fire Aim!: Just do it! Put your words out there, in rough-draft/you-draft form, let the story evolve collaboratively. This is conversation, not lecture: we don't go to parties with prepared written statements. We build our most important narratives on the fly.
• media literacy: we've got to prepare kids for all this! Evaluating and engaging in participatory community journalism is very different from being a consumer of mass media.
  • [CAH] Now maybe this isn't as big a challenge as we think. We all grow up getting fairly good practice at reading conversations; maybe we just need a little more heads up now to apply our common-sense community interaction filters to this new media. Maybe it's just a matter of unlearning whatever we've learned about mass media literacy.
• community is now often so big that you have to have technology to get the word out.
  • [CAH] If you're placeblogging someplace like Madison, SD, you'd think this wouldn't be a problem. You tell your neighbors over the fence and at the grocery store, they tell their friends, boom! Message disseminated.
  • But even here, media and community are fragmented. People commute to Sioux Falls and Brookings, work night shifts that keep them out of the loop, tune in different TV and radio, read different websites.
  • Even Madison can use a shared, asynchronous portal to serve as a little bit of community glue.