The app would provide walking directions with large blue dots over areas in which ten or more criminal incidents have occurred over the past 12 months. I assume that this must be a very small area, limited to one or two particularly dangerous blocks, because Capitol Hill has had over 2,000 crimes last year, according to SPD crime records—which would mean one of Seattle’s most vibrant neighborhoods earns a big old blue dot.  For some, the implications of this app are irrefutable: avoid the ghetto, avoid “black and hispanic neighborhoods,” avoid low-income areas. For others, this particular feature fits logically within a GPS app that also helps pedestrians avoid impassable roads and dangerous weather conditions—remaining safe is as much avoiding violent crime as it is avoiding busy streets with no sidewalks, for example.

Certainly there are benefits to a map app that keeps tabs on road closures, one-way streets, dead ends, and dangerous pedestrian intersections. Last year I found myself in LA trying to cross a four lane highway without a crosswalk because my phone’s directions app didn’t account for LA’s car-centric culture.

Of course, the app makes no literal mention of the word ghetto, and many have been quick to come to its defense, even African-American writer Maurice Garland, who says, “If you don’t want to end up in those places, I don’t see anything wrong with somebody trying to help you out.” Undoubtedly many of us have received advice from friends to avoid certain places in certain cities based on their own personal experiences.

I find the implications of this app more subtly disturbing—if we never get lost, how will we ever discover? If every move we make is filtered through a phone that counsels us to avoid entire swaths of inhabited city blocks, how will we ever stumble upon those awesome dive bars or bakeries or bookstores that make living in these crowded cities worth it all?

Juanita Wallace (pictured on the left) provides a more compelling argument than just never getting lost—she cites damage to local economies as one of the more concrete arguments against the app. “It’s almost like gerrymandering, she said. ‘It’s stereotyping for sure and without a doubt; I can’t emphasize enough, it’s discriminatory.”

Tourism looks to either win or lose, depending on your opinion, and one Dallas tourist already spoke out against it: “[The neighborhood] may have a high crime problem, but have some great cultural and social things you can do there.”

Microsoft was awarded the patent for the app but it is not available on the market yet. There’s been no word from Microsoft reps on if the app will actually become an official product given the current dust-up.

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CNN moderator John King opened by asking candidate Newt Gingrich to address allegations of infidelity made by his former wife in an interview with ABC News.

Rather than respond to the allegations, Gingrich unleashed an angry tirade on King, and the rest of the “elite media,” to a rousing applause from the audience.

“I think the destructive, vicious, negative nature of much of the news media makes it harder to govern this country, harder to attract decent people to run for public office. And I am appalled that you would begin a presidential debate on a topic like that.” Gingrich said, leaving the CNN anchor stammering to defend himself.

Whether or not it was the right choice of opening question, one thing is clear: in the debate, as in the campaign as a whole, slamming the media is a sure way to win points with voters.

I spent the week on the ground in South Carolina with Com Dept Chair David Domke, MCDM Associate Director Anita Verna Crofts, and four UW students, covering the Republican campaigns in the lead up to the primary election on Saturday, for a blog hosted by the Seattle Times

Over the course of the week I heard numerous references to the ‘elite’ or ‘liberal’ media from all four of the candidates.

Which makes sense. It’s a brilliant tactic, which allows the candidate to paint them selves as an underdog in touch with the common folk, who can’t get the tough truths they’re delivering out to more potential supporters because they’re being censored and attacked by a biased media machine.

But irony of this argument didn’t fully dawn on me until Gingrich’s victory speech on Saturday night, when he again went after the media. In an awkward moment I looked around the packed ballroom and noticed that journalists and TV crews outnumbered his actual supporters about 2 to 1.

Should we take offense? Here we were, spending our Saturday night crowded into a stifling room to broadcast his message around the world. The least he could do was say, “Its okay guys, I’m not talking about you.”

Of course, the seasoned political reporters in the room knew not to take it personally, because they understand the symbiotic relationship that media companies and politicians have.

But back in Charleston on Thursday, at moments it looked a lot more like a debate between the CNN moderator and the four republican candidates, especially when SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act) came up in a question sent in via twitter.

King took the opportunity to disclose that CNN’s parent company, Time Warner was in favor of the law. But it sounded more like he was making an argument for SOPA on their behalf than just pointing out that they had an interest at stake:

“Time Warner, says we need a law like this because some of its products, movies, programming, and the like, are being ripped off online,” he said.

All four of the candidates came out against the Republican-introduced bill to varying degrees, slamming nails into the coffin after the bill was effectively killed  by the massive protest blackout the previous day.

But in between the individual candidates’ responses, King continued to make what sounded like arguments for the bill.

You can see the back and forth for yourself here:

(No, the irony of embedding an unlicensed rip of the CNN broadcast is not lost on me.)

In the next round of questions, about how the candidates might have run their campaigns differently if they had it to do again, Gingrich took another opportunity to tout himself as a media outsider.

“I would skip the opening three months where I hired regular consultants and tried to figure how to be a normal candidate,” he said. “And I would just go straight to being a big ideas, big solutions, Internet- based campaign from day one.”

Its true that, off all the remaining candidates, he appears to have the most web savvy campaign, right down to the Foursquare integrated events map on his user friendly campaign site newt.org.

Despite his dismal national approval ratings, and tainted history, both personal and political, Gingrich seems to have found a sweet spot of playing the outsider and deftly using the mainstream media to deliver his message that he…well…doesn’t have any use for the mainstream media.

It may not be winning him friends at CNN, but it seems to be winning him votes.

For more on the ground coverage and analysis of the 2012 elections, visit www.uwelectioneye.seattletimes.com

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Wikipedia is planning on replacing their standard interface with information about SOPA and PIPA, protest links and phone numbers of U.S. Representatives and Senators.  Other protesting sites will also be providing similar information on their homepages.

SOPA/PIPA reaches deeply into the MCDM curriculum.  We teach the content authoring skills that SOPA supporters are trying to protect.  We teach the ethics and practices of free and unfettered internet access.  MCDMers are at the vanguard in strategizing to content monetization.  Its hard for many of us to take a confident definitive stance on SOPA because the legislation is like a house of mirrors when it comes to what we do here at the MCDM.

In the spirit of innovation and debate, we at the Flip ask you to weigh in on the issues.  Do you support SOPA/PIPA?  Are you vehemently against SOPA/PIPA?  Are you confused by SOPA/PIPA?  We want to here from you.  Let us know what you think about these pressing issues.  Please comment below.

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Listen to his story here.

Is anyone truly surprised by what he found? Should it come as a shock that while hundreds of thousands of Americans are perusing the latest gadgets at this week’s Consumer Electronic Show, children as young as 12 are working full-time in China in conditions so poor their manufacturing plants are surrounded by suicide-thwarting nets?

Have you ever considered how the heck that tiny miracle of a phone in your hand can cost just 300 US bucks? In July of last year, New York-based human rights group China Labor Watch released a report detailing egregious labor violations encountered through plant visits and worker interviews. The members of CLW visited ten different manufacturing plants that supplied Apple, Dell, Sony, Nokia, and Motorola, among others. According to the report, Apple pays about 3.99 British pounds, or about $6.11, to manufacture an iPhone.

Such poor working conditions seem even more criminal when reported alongside the epidemic of suicides and suicide attempts at electronic manufacturing plants. News broke Wednesday about an unconfirmed mass suicide attempt at a Foxconn plant in Wuhan, Hubei that produces Microsoft’s XBox; on January 2nd, 150 workers allegedly took to the roof over a pay dispute and were eventually talked down by the mayor of Wuhan. Microsoft is investigating the incident.

Of course, shortly after the suicides in 2010, technology firms HP, Dell, and Apple claimed to have investigated the working conditions at their respective plants. Some workers received pay raises—they now receive, on average, about $300 a month—and then stories of poor labor conditions faded in and out of media coverage.

But here we are again. Findings by Oekon Research published in December of last year put technology manufacturing dead last in sustainability and fair labor practices, after mining, textiles, chemicals, automobiles, and more. Right now, there is no such thing as “fair trade electronics”—which is how Apple gets away with paying $6.11 to manufacture a $300 iPhone—but I think the tide might be turning. For three years now, the Western world at large has been lackluster in response to these labor violations while technology companies continue to reap enormous profits.

In my household, we have two iPhone4s, two MacBooks, two Shuffles, and an iPad2. We bought them from smiley, enthusiastic Apple retail employees who are paid anywhere between $9-$17 an hour, sometimes with benefits. The bright lights and clean lines of the Apple store can make a person forget where electronics really come from—cramped, cruel places where, for some, death is a better option.

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That was the premise of Advanced Multimedia Storytelling: People and Story, the course I co-taught with Sarah Stuteville this past quarter; that a short film focused on an individual character’s experience is an extremely effective means to communicate a message, whether it’s about a product, a service or a broader trend in society.

The eight students in the class produced some powerful work, and sometimes got more than they bargained for:

Erika Takeuchi set out to produce a lighthearted profile of guide dog trainers, but when she met a trainer named Joseph Skillings, things took a turn for the serious. Joseph suffered severe head trauma a few years ago after trying to help a women being harassed at a bus stop. He took up puppy training as a way to deal with the lasting impacts of his accident.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The resulting story Defining Honor got the attention of King 5 news, which aired the story as part of their evening broadcast on Saturday.

Dominique Barni had a similar experience. Setting out to profile a local cheese monger in a promotional video for a restaurant owned by friends of hers, she soon found out her character suffered from Asperger’s syndrome. The completed video is as much about a person learning to take advantage of their disadvantages as it is about cheese.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The class drew inspiration from some great character-driven documentaries of past decades, from 1972 Academy Award winner Marjoe, to 1994 classic Hoop Dreams, to this year’s Sundance Hit Buck.

The philosophy that focusing on just one person’s experience is often the best way to communicate a broader issue has been central to the international journalism we’ve done at the Common Language Project for the past 6 years. It just seemed instinctive that digging deep into the individual story of a girl struggling to access education in Pakistan or a single refugee who fled violence in Iraq would have more impact than hearing the voices of experts or superlative statistics.

A guest speaker in the class, Joy Portella, Communications Director at Mercy Corps, pointed out that this seemingly innate truth has recently been tested and confirmed by psychologists; in international aid campaigns, people are exponentially more likely to donate if the appeal they hear is about just one person they could be helping, than about two or three or ten thousand.

In “Rainy city girl and a global water problem” Rachel Boyer took this idea one step further. She focused her story about water access in Africa on her co-worker Abby, who traveled with her to Kenya mid-quarter to document the programs run by their employer World Vision.

Click here to view the embedded video.

By contrasting Abby’s daily routine in rainy Seattle with her experience in Africa, Rachel brought the issue home for viewers who might have had trouble relating to problems half a world away.

The class produced five other impressive videos which are embedded below, including Cathy Britt’s web documentary for KCTS 9 about acupuncture as an alternative to prescription pain medication, Gerrit Vyn’s video for the Cornell University newsletter about an alumni researching migratory shorebirds, Lara Underhill’s promotional video for local nonprofit Powerful Voices, Corey Murata’s film for the Shoreline Community College Library and Liz Hunter’s investigation into drug abuse among soldiers that will be used to promote a UW research project.

Sarah and I are looking forward to exploring the interactions between People and Story even further (and hopefully fostering a whole new batch of great projects) when we teach the class again next Fall.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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“But wait, what about the elephant in the room?”

(blank stares)

“You know…monetization.”

(frustrated stares).

Oh, yeah, that.

Indeed, monetization is the question everyone is asking about regarding the future of journalism, and no one really seems to have an answer for yet either. How on earth are we as journalists supposed to earn money for our content when online advertising revenue is dropping and people are so used to getting news content for free?

I feel like the last few lines of this hilarious video sum it up quite nicely:

Click here to view the embedded video.

(To paraphrase: “I want to get a job working for The New York Times.” “Are you a subscriber?” “No, why would I subscribe? I can get it online for free.”)

Here are some avenues of revenue being tested right now in the media world and their measure of success:

#1 The Dreaded Paywall:

I admit, when The New York Times announced this variation of the “digital subscription” model I was skeptical. So…wait, let me see here: I can pay to subscribe to read more than twenty articles a month, or, just get all the articles I want for free through social media links? Fail.

The thing is, so far, it’s working. Here’s why I think it works: internet savvy and cheap people like me can find ways around the payroll- like the twitter feed with links to all the articles (that The NYT tried to take down). But there are enough people who maybe don’t quite know the social media landscape so well, are able and used to paying for quality content and trust the brand (like my mom), who will pay for the content.

And they do.

# 2  The Community-Centered Approach

Here’s a concept: let’s involve the community! Not just online. But, like, in real life. PRI’s This American Life did it successfully. WNYC also managed to bring in added revenue with their new Green Space built in 2009 (read about CEO Lauren Walker’s full strategy for the space here).  Putting on live shows, engaging in discussions, hosting public events, and then outputting the content from these events back into radio, video and the web is a self-sustaining cycle of beauty. It also has the added value of courting new members. Again, public radio seems to be leading the way on this approach, with cozy fundraising ‘listening rooms’ and even a RadioLab Singles night (imagine the combined lifetime pledges of two public radio fans who may have met there!).

# 3 Crowd Sourced Journalism

Two years ago Bay Area-based Spot.us came on the scene: a sort of Kickstarter for funding media and journalism projects. While it hasn’t exactly been a game changer, Spot.us is doing well, mostly by capitalizing on breaking stories and working with independent news organizations. Another variation of this method for a specific news outlet is to produce a feature story then have readers vote- through their pockets- for more in-depth coverage of the issue.

I’m not saying that any or all of these models might be the golden ticket to funding the new age of journalism. But these models do take the focus away from the troublesome advertising quandary- sometimes fraught with ethical dilemmas (like this example), when the editorial copy bleeds into marketing copy in the online link economy.

And in terms of sustainability, I do think that multiple small and diverse streams of revenue are the future. At least until some media-focused wizard genius can figure out an industry-wide solution for monetizing content and getting us all paid fairly.

Is that person you? Please call me; I have some investors I’d like you to meet.

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On October 13^th, the MIT Enterprise Forum Northwest hosted the program, “Pitch, Don’t Spin – How to Create Buzz Around your Start-up” featuring a panel of five seasoned news experts: John Cook, Co-founder, GeekWire, Brier Dudley, Technology Columnist, Seattle Times, Leslie Helm, Editor, Seattle Business Magazine, Mike Davidson, Vice President, Social News, msnbc.com and CEO, Newsvine and Curt Woodward, Senior Editor, Xconomy.

The panel shared personal insights and answered questions from a packed room of Seattle startups about creating buzz and the best way to get your story looked at and published by reporters and influential bloggers. You can watch the full event here recorded by Puget Sound Media.

Click here to view the embedded video.

To save you a few hours of play-pause-play-pause, I have consolidated the wealth of advice into the top 5 buzz strategies for success.

Top 5 Strategies for Creating Buzz around Your Startup:

1. Create Great Content

Leslie Helm suggests creating two press releases, “one for niche trade pub, and another for people who don’t care about that specificity.” Leslie also reminds us to stick to the basics – “market size, competitors, key advantage” in four sentences or less. Unfortunately, many people don’t do that. As a consequence, Curt Woodward stated that “most pitches plain suck.” John Cook prefers to have potential sources “boil down news nuggets a few days in advance” with a few sentences, blog link, or press release so he can triage. Brier Dudley wants us to “talk about it the way you would talk to a friend or family member.” You should also take advantage of all of your digital resources including the about us page, pictures, bios, contact address of the company, etc.  Leslie highly recommends hiring a professional photographer or designer to create good art and make it super easy for reporters to show off you and your story

2.  Build Relationships

Curt challenges you to “make me want to write about it vs. thinking that I have to.” That is how you can have a relationship with people to help down the road. But even with a strong relationship, Curt shared this insightful tip regarding the timing of news releases. If you want to keep it under wraps, you have to use the magic words “Must have hold for release, do you agree?” The reporter doesn’t care about your product release schedule. Once you send the information without first getting confirmation that the reporter agrees, “it is public.”

“Chances are that they already know about your embargoed info,” said John. He also advises startups to “look at archives, number of posts, comments threads, etc.” for a specific reporter. John also prefers electronic communication over calls.

3.  Be Bold

Mike Davidson believes that “courage and the fact that you have nothing to lose is the number one tool you have as a startup.” Brier sounded a little more philosophical with his comment that “your best tool is your mind, being observant and knowing where you want to go.”

4.  Time Your Approach

Leslie reminded the group that timing isn’t always in your favor and that “if you don’t take the opportunities when they come, you may not get another chance later.” Brier added that everyone should “think about timing, gadget and holiday season” and encouraged startups to “stay away from big waves at industry events. Piggy back doesn’t really work.”

Mike commented on the changing face of networking, stating that “one link from anybody isn’t going to do anything, but a cluster makes the difference.” To build that cluster Brier suggests going local because it can “be easier to get picked up by regionals like the Seattle Times.” In fact, Brier shared the little secret that “big stories usually click back to a wire service or local story.” You can test this yourself by looking at the history of video propagation on YouTube views, noting which sources are picked up by their bigger peers.

5.  Tell Your Story

Curt believes that “the best stuff is human. News is what I am not supposed to know, the rest is just releases.” John suggested that you spend more time developing your story. “Everyone has an app,” he said, “but they also have a story.” For the story to work, Curt cautioned startups to “be real [and] be authentic.” He shared the story of when PopCap Games did their pre IPO roadshow. The CEO and Cofounder apparently sat down with reporters, but ended up providing insight about other game companies like Zynga. They could have pushed back and insisted on talking solely about their company, but by being flexible and providing a service to the reporter, they received great press coverage.

Because of those stories, Mike reminded the audience that “people follow people, not companies.” Brier emphasized that thought, indicating that “the most interesting thing about your company is you, more than your stuff. The person behind the company. The “who” is what makes your story interesting.” He stated that reporters “are always looking for the good human interest story. What is special about you?” He said that you should think about your idea or passion for something and talk about how it will change their lives, the community, or make other people’s lives easier.

Case Studies

So how do you bundle all that advice into real world examples?

John Cook related an example of packaging and presenting your story the right way. BigOven CEO Steve Murch took the time to create a story content package and deliver all of the essential reporting elements on a silver platter. Steve provided a link to his website, product images, headshots, a YouTube video and the personal human element from his own life to the story. “It was perfect,” said John. They did the entire interview via email. Read John’s post to see how he used the elements. John did say that he “wishes he would have had a little bit better art, but [it was] otherwise perfect.]

The next case study serves a dual purpose. Mike Davidson’s edgy anecdotal story both showcases how one presidential hopeful used digital media the wrong way and how Mike used the perfect pitch strategy and timing to propel his story to the national stage. At the time, Mike was CEO of startup newsvine.com. From Mike’s blog post we read, “John McCain’s people commandeered my world-renowned MySpace design template and did a few things wrong.”

It really is so easy to provide attribution to your sources, but apparently, the McCain camp not only forgot to provide credit, but they also used an image being served from Mike’s own server. Can you guess where this is going?  As Mike put it, “I figured it was time to play a little prank on Johnny Mac.”  If you are going to do something to a presidential candidate’s website, you might as well go big so Mike contacted Michael Arrington to provide the scoop and perfectly time the lesson in internet etiquette. You can still see a copy of the site change in Michael’s post.

But the story doesn’t stop there.  Mike knew he had “made it” when the story got incorporated into this Daily Show edition at the 2:30 mark.

If you found these tips and case studies helpful, start building your media relationships by taking a moment to send an email or tweet to your favorite reporter from the panel and say “thank you.”

I would love to hear some of your success or failure stories in creating buzz around your startups or other media projects.

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A video of highlights from the conversation with MCDM students and a complete transcript are available on the KCTS 9 website.

According to Sreenivasan, who is a proponent of the growing “slow news” movement, “The value of breaking news is going down faster than you can post it.”

Sreenivasan’s basic message is that there is no point in trying to compete with the wire services on breaking a story. It is more important to be accurate than first. “Do people remember who broke the story first? Hardly. But they will remember if you get it wrong,” Sreenivasan pointed out.

Emphasizing an anyscreen/anytime approach Sreenivasan says: “70 to 85 percent of my job is to move NewsHour to news consumers who don’t come to the six o´clock news show.” Noting that he doesn’t need to reinvent the wheel or create channels, he continues “The challenge is to use the tech tools to distribute the news content to where the audience is already. With Tivo we have gotten used to watching the content at different times than when it airs. Now we are getting used to getting the content where we want it. The challenge is to create a story that is when and where you want it to be and still (be) relevant.”

“iPad, iPhone, TV, online… Share content – so much of the YouTube content that PBS produces is embedded in shared content”, Sreenivasan says.  The NewsHour also increases the value of slow news in the digital world by building widgets and storify versions of the news.

For instance, during the Gulf oil spill in 2010, PBS built a web site widget where users could plug in their guess of how much oil was gushed into the ocean each hour. Later that fall, when full body scans were introduced a various American airports, they built a widget that tracked added wait times at TSA checkpoints for 52 airport. All of this was done with almost no overhead budget.

“I don’t care where you see my content. But I want to get my content to where you are already,” Sreenivasan says.

Sreenivasan argues that one of the most important tasks of journalists working in professional media is to help people cut through the clutter. “Sending a link is lazy. There is value in blog posts that save time, that summarize long reads and help me not (to) have to read it.”

It’s interesting to note that Sreenivasan’s argument is the opposite of the theory Clay Shirky espoused in his landmark 2008 book “Here Comes Everybody.” According to Shirky, with the Internet and social media, everyone is able to publish and market their content at anytime and on any screen. Shirky identifies the old rule of publishing as “filter then publish,” and the new practice is “publish, then filter.”

Sreenivasan believes that people are increasingly unwilling to do the filtering. There is so much news and so many updates, and much of it ends up not being worth the time. A new rule of journalism, Sreenivasan says, is show your work – take the time to verify and confirm the facts, interpret it and make it relevant. Show them how you’ve done the job for them, and added value to the report.

According to Sreenivasan, “We don’t think enough about how we consume the media. We need to be informed about the ingredients,” noting that this is yet another case for slow news and that the “slow news movement” is growing.

Going even further, Sreenivasan says, “There is a large and growing population of smart people who are fed up with what is presented as news today. Commercial networks disenfranchise the audiences the advertisers want to reach.”

Sreenivasan mentions NPR journalist Andy Carvin as the epitome of a crowdsourcing Twitter journalist. Carvin´s Twitter feed is literally a sea of hashtags asking for confirmation of news, independent sources of news, verification of events and so on. For some, this is obviously a worthwhile project, but for Sreenivasan, the constant stream of news items pending verification and interpretation is leading to frustration.

In Sreenivasan’s opinion, Tweets that contain links to useful content rule, while tweets that just lead to chatter make users frustrated. “If I read a blog that isn’t worth anything, I feel like you wasted my time,” Sreenivasan said, noting that wasting time – even if it is only 45 seconds – is almost the biggest no-no of the new media world.

With so many sources, so many channels and so much information out there, people have come to expect that what you lead them to, will be worth their time. That is particularly true for professional journalists, who are there to interpret the news landscape and help people make sense of the information. That is also one of the most valuable assets journalists have over citizen reporters, Sreenivasan argues.

According to Sreenivasan,“You can always make more money, but you can’t earn more time.” The new technology has made almost professional grade tools available to everyone and significantly lowered the barrier of entry for anyone to publish their content. In theory, this makes everyone a reporter, everyone a journalist and everyone a publisher. “But that doesn’t mean that all submitted content adds to the news story,” Sreenivasan says.

“News should be of value to you,” he explains, noting that some networks are already experimenting with letting users submit their stories right from their iPad screens for without pay. But Sreenivasan cautions people to stop and think about their actions for a second. “Facebook and Twitter makes it so easy for us to share and upload, but the cost is that you lose the ownership of that intellectual property once it lives on their servers,” he said.

Harkening back to a sentiment that long defined the news industry, Sreenivasan concludes, “The value of the work we do is the basis for journalism.”

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