Draft: 8/8/06 2:54 PM
Digital Journalism
Journalism -
Communication 117/217
Day/Time/Place
117/217 -
Day/Time/Place -
Stanford University, Winter 2007
2007 -
Instructor: Howard Rheingold Email: howardr@stanford.edu
howardr@stanford.edu -
Office: Bldg 120, Rm 342
342 -
Office hoursTK and by appointment -
Over the past two decades, shifts in media technologies, corporate structure and the organization of public life have combined to change the practice of journalism. This course explores these shifts, with an eye to seeing how they affect journalism's role in society. At the same time, the class will introduce you to the techniques of journalism in digital media and offer you conceptual and practical tools with which to join the fray. By the end of the course, you should have a clear sense of the various ways journalists have taken up digital media and a sense of how you might use those media yourself. You should also gain a broad understanding of the ways in which recent social and economic developments have changed both the practices of journalists and the nature of the publics with whom they communicate. You will actively blog, wiki, RSS, tag, and podcast. Each class meeting will involve collaborative work in small teams, class discussions, hands-on work with participatory media, and brief lectures about the coming week's reading. On occasion, we'll have guests. Last year's guests included Craig "Craigslist" Newmark, citizen journalist (and author of one of our texts) Dan Gillmor, Ross Mayfield (founder of wiki company, Socialtext), Zack Rosen (creator of the group blog for the Howard Dean campaign), Creative Commons founder Professor Lawrence Lessig, and others.
Readings (Textbooks):
Dan Gillmor, We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People. Sebastopol, CA: O'Reilly, 2004
Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel. The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect. New York: Crown Publishers, 2001.
Course Reader: Available at the Bookstore.
Academic Computing Resources at Stanford: While this course has a strong analytical character, direct experience with online publishing skills will require a basic familiarity with Stanford's resources for creating and posting materials to the web. These can be found online at http://academiccomputing.stanford.edu/pubs/index.html
Assignments:
Wikipedia:
You will be asked to write an entry in Wikipedia, with extra credit for entries that are directly relevant to the themes of the Digital Journalism course. You will describe your entries and edits in your blog.(see below) no later than January 19 midnight, with links to your changes. http://www.lifehacker.com/software/wikipedia/geek-to-live-how-to-contribute-to-wikipedia-133747.php
Wiki work:
You will build and maintain a personal page on the class wiki; each week prior to the week's class, you will suggest a question for class discussion about the week's readings by posting it on your personal wiki page. You will work in class with others to add value to the class wiki.
Two Critical Papers:
You will be asked to write two brief critical papers on one of several assigned topics, drawing on course readings and our in-class examination of media. Please be aware that these need to be analytical, not journalistic, examples of writing. Papers will need to deal with readings closely and skeptically, weigh opposing points of view, and present a compelling case for your own argument. The position you take will be less important in determining your grade than the sophistication and rigor with which you support it.
Paper 1 Due: Thursday, January 26
Paper 2 Due: Thursday, February 16
Blogging:
You will be asked to start and maintain a weblog in which you make at least one entry on at least three days each week. Your posts can be brief (100-300 words) opinion pieces, reflections, arguments, or micro-analyses of class readings, discussions, relevant current events, or web content. At least one post per week should point to a URL in a public blog, with an explanation of why that content is relevant to digital journalism and the week's readings. You will be expected to post two cogent comments each week to posts made by other class members in their own blogs. The instructor will also post and comment.
Grading:
Wikipedia and wiki work: 10%
Critical Paper 1: 20%
Critical Paper 2: 20%
Blogging and commenting: 25%
Participation in class discussion: 25%
Expectations:
Participation:
You'll need to come to each class with the reading done and sufficiently digested for you to participate actively in discussion. Your grade will depend on whether you do the readings, participate in discussing them, have opinions and thoughts about the readings, and communicate your knowledge of the material to the instructor.
Writing:
Newsroom rules apply: Your work must come in on time and should represent your best work on every level. Assignments that come in late or with errors of fact, grammar or spelling will be penalized. As ever, the Honor Code applies as well.
Course Schedule:
Part 1: The Social and Technological Contexts of Digital Journalism
1: Date
Introductions: Where are we, where are we going?
Key Questions: Who are we and why are we in this class? Where is "news" in the digital environment? How do we characterize the present moment and the immediate future in regard to the practice of journalism?
Lab: Introduction to blogging; introduction to the class wiki; create personal blogs and wiki pages.
2: Date
What was journalism? What was "the public?" What are digital media? What are its publics?
Readings:
• Robert Darnton, "Writing news and telling stories," Daedalus 104 Spring 1975: 175-197. (Reader)
• Pablo Bocszowski, Digitizing the News, Chapter 1. (Reader)
• Bruno Giussani, "A new media tells different stories." First Monday 2.4 (1999). Available online at: http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue2_4/giussani/index.html (Reader)
Web Resources:
• Podcasting, Wikis and Blogs: Learning at the BBC, http://www.datarchive.co.uk/dpx_demo2/dpx.php?cmd=autoplay&type=autofocus&pres=2255&media=real&dpxuser=ambient
Key Questions: How are journalistic routines, industry structures, and technology related to journalism's public role? How are changes in technology, editorial philosophies, roles of producer and consumer of information, changing the nature of news and journalism?
Lab: Blogging and Wiki work, II
Part 2: Mass Journalism in Transition
3: Date
When old journalism met new media
Readings:
• Timothy L. O'Brien, The Newspaper of the Future, New York Times, June 26, 2005 http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/26/business/yourmoney/26kansas.html
• Bob Baker, "It just doesn't MATTER," Newsthinking.com November 9, 2005, http://www.newsthinking.com/story.cfm?SID=226
• Charles Cooper, "All the news that's fit to blog," News.com, November 11, 2005, http://news.com.com/All+the+news+thats+fit+to+blog/2010-1025_3-5946033.html
• Chip Scanlan, "What is 'Narrative" Anyway?" Poynteronline, October 7, 2003: http://www.pointer.org/ (Reader)
• Philip E. Agre, “Find Your Voice: Writing For a Webzine” Available online at: http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/zine.html (AVAILABLE ONLINE ONLY)
• Amazoning The News (Reader) (see site too: http://www.hypergene.net/ideas/amazon./html)
Web Resources:
• The elements of digital storytelling, http://www.inms.umn.edu/elements/ • Center for Digital Storytelling web site: http://www.storycenter.org • see especially: http://www.storycenter.org/canada/storytelling.html • WBEZ Chicago, “This American Life” see http://www.thislife.org/
Key Questions: What kinds of news forms have emerged in the digital environment? How do they shift mass journalism's relationship to its audience? How can you "tell a story" in digital media?
Lab: RSS: setting up an aggregator
Due: Blog entry describing Wikipedia edits
4: Date
The Emergence of Collaborative Citizen Journalism:
Readings:
• Bernard Moon, "Open It Up, New York Times, Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle!" http://www.alwayson-network.com/printpage.php?id=11051_0_11_C
• CommonTimes: A Community Driven Web News Site, http://www.commontimes.org/
• Yu, Yeon-Jung, "OhMyNews Makes Every Citizen a Reporter" http://www.japanmediareview.com/japan/internet/1063672919.php
• Moore, James, "The Second Superpower Rears Its Beautiful Head," http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/jmoore/secondsuperpower.html
• News in 2014 http://www.broom.org/epic/
Web Resources:
• Mediachannel: http://www.mediachannel.org/ • Freedom Forum: http://www.freedomforum.org/ • Jim Romenesko at Poynter: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=45 • Poynter: http://www.poynter.org/ • Editor and Publisher: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/editorandpublisher/ • Jeff Jarvis: http://www.buzzmachine.com • J.D. Lasica, "News That Comes to You," Online Journalism Review, January 23, 2003, http://www.ojr.org/ojr/lasica/1043362624.php • Jon Udell, "Tag Mania Sweeps the Web," Jon Udell, , July 20, 2005, http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/07/20/30OPstrategic_1.html • Timo Hannay, "Tagging and Participative Journalism," You're It – a Blog on Tagging, http://tagsonomy.com/index.php/tagging-and-participative-journalism/
Key Questions: What role do networks of individuals, think tanks and other intermediaries play in shaping the news? What news-shaping forces are emerging from search, tagging, blogging, and other Web-based media?
Lab: Tagging 1: Social bookmarking
5: Date
“Personal” journalism: Pundits, Freelancers and Public Intellectuals:
Readings:
• Dan Gillmor, We The Media, Introduction, Chapters 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 9, 12
• John Rockwell, “Conversing on the arts by clicking a mouse”, New York Times, July 9, 2003 http://www.artsjournal.com/about/nytstory.html (Reader)
• "Journalism without Journalists," http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/060807fa_fact1
Key Questions: What’s the difference between a blogger, a journalist, a pundit and an intellectual? Or is there one anymore?
Lab: Tagging II, photosharing
Part Three: New Publics, New Journalistic Forms:
6: Date
Rethinking "The Public": The Origins and Nature of the Public Sphere
Readings:
• Nancy Fraser. “Rethinking the public sphere: a contribution to the critique of actually existing democracy.” Habermas and the Public Sphere. Ed. Craig Calhoun. Cambridge, MA: M.I.T. Press, 1991. 109-142. (Reader)
• David Zaret, Origins of Democratic Culture: Printing, Petitions, and the Public Sphere in Early-Modern England, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000, Pp 3-17 (Reader)
• Rosen, Jay, "The Action of the Idea," The Idea of Public Journalism, Theodore L. Glasser, ed., New York: Guilford, 1999, pp 21-48
Web resources:
• Habermas, the Public Sphere, and Democracy: A Critical Intervention http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/papers/habermas.htm
Key Questions: What are the relationships among publics, media, and democracy? What might the role of journalism be in a world of multiple publics?
Lab: Podcasting 1: finding, downloading, listening to podcasts
7: Date
The Public Sphere in The Internet Era
Readings:
• Michael Schudson, “Click here for democracy: a history and critique of an information-based model of citizenship.” Democracy and new media. Eds. Henry Jenkins, David Thorburn and Brad Seawell. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003. 49-60.
• Philip E. Agre, “Growing a democratic culture: John Commons on the wiring of civil society.” Democracy and New Media. Eds. Henry Jenkins and David Thorburn. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003. 61-67.
• Pieter Boeder, "Habermas Heritage: the future of the public sphere in the network society," First Monday, volume 10, number 9 ( September 2005): http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_9/boeder/
Web resources:
• MoveOn.Org: http://www.moveon.org/ • Howard Dean’s Campaign Site: http://www.deanforamerica.com/ • City of Palo Alto: http://www.city.palo-alto.ca.us/ • Deliberative Polling: http://cdd.Stanford.edu/polls/docs/summary/
Key Questions: What kinds of “publics” are emerging in and around digital media? What kinds of power struggles erupted when broadcast channels were confronted by the emergence of many-to-many media? What role does online discourse play in the future of democracy – and what role does journalism play in digital debate and deliberation?
Lab: Podcasting II: Recording and publishing podcasts
Due: Critical Paper #2
8: Date
New Communities, New Routines: Early Alternatives:
Readings:
• Nina Eliasoph, “Routines and the making of oppositional news.” Critical Studies in Mass Communication 5.December (1988): 313-334.
• “Indymedia.org: A New Communications Commons” Dorothy Kidd in McCaughey, Martha, and Michael D. Ayers. Cyberactivism: online activism in theory and practice. New York: Routledge, 2003, pp. 47-70.
• “Emerging Alternatives: Edging away from anarchy: Inside the Indymedia Collective,” Gal Beckerman, CJR 2003
Key Questions: How do the politics of community news producers, news routines and new technologies interact? What is the future, if any, for oppositional news?
Web Resources:
• Acción Zapatista: http://studentorgs.utexas.edu/nave/
9: Date
Commons Based Peer Production and Open Source Journalism
• Yochai Benkler, 2006, The Wealth of Networks, How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom, New Haven: Yale University Press, pp 1-34. (Reader)
• Gary Rivlin, “Leader of the Free World” Wired 11.11 (November, 2003) (Reader)
• Thomas Goetz, “Open Source Everywhere” Wired 11.11 (November, 2003) (Reader)
• Open Source Journalism: http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2004/12/28/tptn04_opsc.html
Key Questions: How are the dynamics of open source production processes affecting the ways journalists serve the public? How might social accounting technologies like eBay's or Slashdot's reputation systems shape the gathering, evaluation, dissemination, and analysis of news?
Due: Critical Paper #2
10: Date
The Intersection of Social, Technological, Institutional: Architecture as Politics
Readings:
• David Isenberg, The Rise of the Stupid Network, 1997: http://www.hyperorg.com/misc/stupidnet.html
• Manuel Castells, "Why Networks Matter," Network Logic: Who Governs in an Interconnected World?, Helen McCarthy, Paul Miller, Paul Skidmore, eds, London: Demos, 2004, pp 221-224, http://www.demos.co.uk/networklogic17castells_pdf_media_public.aspx
• Kovac and Rosenstiel, The Elements of Journalism, pp. 9-110
• Elisia L. Cohen “Online journalism as market-driven journalism.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 46.4 (2002).
• Robert McChesney “So much for the magic of technology and the free market: the world wide web and the corporate media system.” The world wide web and contemporary cultural theory. Eds. Andrew Herman and Thomas Swiss. New York and London: Routledge, 2000. 5-36.
Web Resources:
• Architectural Principles of the Internet: ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc1958.txt
Key Questions: How are social processes being written into and performed by computer code? In what ways is the architecture of communication media a political matter? What are the implications of there phenomena for journalists? Given the new organizational, economic and discursive forms associated with network technologies, can journalists still serve a single public? If technology changes almost everything about the institutions and practices of journalism, what will remain unchanged? What should remain unchanged? How do financial pressures shape the potential of online journalism to serve the public? Do new media free us from the problems of media consolidation?