ziona's Blog

This week, I looked at an article by Susan Carrie Sivek on PBS MediaShift discussing the concerns of magazines and their future.

With the challenged many magazine industries are facing, many are looking to cook up creative ways to keep their audience alive. A report was generated with some ideas to keep the magazine industry going. Some of the most innovative ideas came from areas like New York, London and parts of Europe, likely due to the fact that they have been most hard hit by their shortcomings. Some of these ideas revolve around integrating social media as well as user-generated content, but this doesn’t imply that there isn’t a role for journalists out there:

Sivek does address the Internet’s virtual annihilation of the printed newspaper, yet she doesn’t deny the quality that comes with the printed press. In this article, newspapers are equated to high-end fashion items, whereas web-generated content is sort of like fashion’s prêt-à-porter collection. By keeping content generic and cheaply made, it appeals to the masses. This, however, is not a trait shared with a printed magazine.

Perhaps all the magazine industry needed all along was a little scare in order to generate fresh ideas. They were getting a little to comfortable until reality sunk in that they may be doomed if nothing is done. In my opinion, the digital age is opportunistic, not a setback – it’s just a matter of how you decide to make use of it.

In a world where newspapers generated revenue once upon a time, Richard Pérez-Peña has made it painfully clear that 2009 was a financial disaster for the printing press.

Let’s consider one of the primary areas of losses : advertising. Revenues dropped by almost 30 per cent in losses compared with the previous year. Sure, the newspaper industry has been doomed for quite a while, but when analyzing this statistic, one must realize that the printed newspaper isn’t the only suffering industry out there. Consider the online ad industry, where income has also dropped significantly in 2009. The news industry along with every other field where income was once generated have all been experiencing major losses (with the exception of the off-premise alcohol industry). They all have one thing in common – the recession.

No one has been immune to the economic catastrophe in the year 2009, and quite frankly, the industries which were already suffering prior to the recession were the most at risk. If less and less advertisers were willing to invest in newspaper ads prior to the recession, why would they be motivated to do so when they’re earning even less than before?

All this document does is emphasize the pitiful state of the newspaper in 2009, but then again, I’d argue that almost every other industry was equally pitiful that year.

http://digitalhistory.concordia.ca/cj/soundslides/z_eyob

When I read Journalism.org’s latest news consumer analysis, I felt a little warm and fuzzy on the inside. This gives me new hope that perhaps American society is no longer choosing to live in a bubble, nor is it nearly as self-absorbed as I may have once thought.

And while I see a light at the end of the tunnel, there is still a long way to go. While 78% of Americans claim to get their news from local TV stations, 61% get some of their news online. People turn to the Internet for news because it has developed into an interactive tool.

To a great extent, people’s experience of news, especially on the internet, is becoming a shared social experience as people swap links in emails, post news stories on their social networking site feeds, highlight news stories in their Tweets, and haggle over the meaning of events in discussion threads. For instance, more than 8 in 10 online news consumers get or share links in emails.

On the flip-side, people who expose themselves to online news have a tendency to limit themselves to two to five websites.  Even so, when tallied up with their other forms of news consumption, the end result is that people are exposing themselves to a variety of news sources and broadening their knowledge on issues that aren’t thoroughly covered by one exclusive news outlet.

In addition to this, according to this study, Americans have a tendency to seek out news that isn’t local via the Internet.

The most popular online news subjects are the weather (followed by 81% of internet news users), national events (73%), health and medicine (66%), business and the economy (64%), international events (62%), and science and technology (60%).

Going back to my initial stereotyping of Americans being self-absorbed, I am glad to have been proven wrong by this study because at least I know now that the digital age is motivating a new generation, and perhaps even an older generation to culture themselves by accessing material published from anywhere in the world.

This has a great deal to social media and technological advances in the digital world, because access to materials has never been easier.

• Portable: 33% of cell phone owners now access news on their cell phones.

• Personalized: 28% of internet users have customized their home page to include news from sources and on topics that particularly interest them.

• Participatory: 37% of internet users have contributed to the creation of news, commented about it, or disseminated it via postings on social media sites like Facebook or Twitter.

The upside is that technological progression is no longer exclusively reserved for us digital baby boomers, but no matter what anyone tells me, I will always find it awkward if one of my parents had a Facebook account.  I guess there’s such a thing as too much progress!

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Point St Charles community members looked forward to launching an autonomous social centre in their neighborhood.

Many people danced all along St Patrick street last May.

They were celebrating outside an abandoned building which they’ve occupied for their centre.

But that didn’t last very long.

Police showed up shortly after.

The space was occupied illegally, so they came to evict the squatters.

But people from the Point made sure that the police knew they were not welcomed.

Today, the building once occupied by the Autonomous Social Centre will be demolished for more condo spaces.

I spoke with Anna Kruzynski, a Concordia professor and activist who supports the Autonomous Social Centre.

She was frustrated with the way officials managed her community.

That’s why she got involved with a local anarchist collective called La Pointe Libertaire.

CLIP AK #1: There were certain limits to the kind of organizing that was going on in more institutionalized community organizations, so I was feeling that I wanted to get involved in an organization that was more autonomous, more radical.

Kruzynski also says that historically, people in the Point have always been actively involved in their community.

She also suggests that people in other communities need to get involved if they want to see changes.

CLIP#2 AK: Always work to build a counter power, a countre-pouvoir, you know, strength and force and power in the streets.

Clark Hoyt analyzes the time where a fellow Times reporter Zachery Kouwe was caught plagiarizing.  He iterates that what may seem like harmless news-gathering techniques to a journalist can be dangerous if caution isn’t exceeded. What’s especially frightening is that Kouwe had been plagiarizing for a period of time and got away with it for far too long. Hoyt says:

“Though Kouwe was gone the next day, questions remain: How did his serial plagiarism happen and go undetected for so long? Why were warning signs overlooked? Was there anything at fault in the culture of DealBook, the hyper-competitive news blog on which Kouwe worked? And, now that the investigation is complete, what about a full accounting to readers?”

Whether Kouwe was telling the truth or not is unknown to me, but when interviewed by the New York Observer, he told them that he wasn’t knowingly plagiarizing. Kouwe made a mistake that anyone could have easily made while writing his copy.

Kouwe told Koblin that the plagiarism happened with minor news reported elsewhere that needed to be matched on DealBook. He said he would copy stories from wires, paste them into a file in the editing system, verify the information and then put the material in his own words. At least, he said, that is what he intended to do. When I asked him how he could fail to notice that he was copying someone else’s work, he added further explanation: He said the raw material in the computer files in which he assembled his stories included not only reports from other sources but also context and background from previous articles that he had written himself. When putting it all together, he said, he must have thought the words he copied were his own, earlier ones. “It was just my carelessness in trying to get it up quickly,” he said.”

In the digital age of journalism, it’s far too easy to overlook things with handy tools such as “cut-copy-paste.” But perhaps Kouwe’s rush to remain competitive with his posts leads him to overlook something as crucial as attribution. Computers and simplified website interfaces make it easy to upload news instantaneously, and could also potentially lead to careless behaviour. For example, I frequently come across typeos on major news outlet websites. While many of these typeos are shortly thereafter corrected, why is the article up there in the first place if it’s not ready to be posted? Sure, this may not be nearly as serious as plagiarism, but the same principle applies. Unless the author proofreads his material, he has no reason to act carelessly, especially when technology can enable such behaviours.

While Point St. Charles activists lost their battle to the Seracon developers, they haven’t lost their fight against expansion in their neighborhood.

The Seracon building is also known as 2985 St-Patrick, or simply put, the building which once housed the Autonomous Social Centre in May of 2009. According to La Pointe Libertaire, ASCs are autonomously managed centres that take refuge in abandoned buildings all around the world. Not only do they want to combat gentrification in the neighbourhood, the ASC opposes hierarchical systems of governing and want to establish space that’s accessible to all. In this space, they intend to offer a free cafe/performance hall, an alternative media centre, a free bike repair shop, a collective kitchen and garden as well as popular education.

However, these projects have yet to be realized. Within hours or setting up in the Seracon building, riot police came in to evict the squatters. Although the building was deserted, it looks like landlords have other plans for the space. According to CTV news, it is set to be transformed into condos, even though it’s not a plan neighbours back. Close to 500 people came out to support the ASC and protest the police intervention.

“It’s a neighborhood where there’s a high rate of gentrification. Rents are going up, we’re seeing cultural spaces being closed, and condo’s going up,” one Point St. Charles resident told CTV News.

Nine months later, as predicted, a decision is finalized to destroy the Seracon building. La Pointe Libertaire reported from a local council meeting last February that the property land is valued between $3 and 4 million. Council members said that the space could be transformed into lodging, a commercial area, or a park.

With lack of a public space, one might assume that the ASC risks losing out on an opportunity to develop their projects further. But as the Concordia Journal reports, the Point has a history of resilience and mobilization.

“… The community health clinic, established there in the 1960s, was the model for provincial CLSCs. However, the community resisted the shift to provincial control for their initiative and opted to keep the Point St. Charles Community Clinic autonomous.”

Although they may not have a space, residents of the Point and members of the ASC will likely maintain a spirit for grassroots activism.

Sources:

http://www.lapointelibertaire.org/centresocialautogere

http://montreal.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20090530/mtl_abandoned_building_090530/20090530/?hub=MontrealHome

http://cjournal.concordia.ca/archives/20071122/monitoring_activism_in_the_academy.php

Secondary Sources:

- Concordia Journal, Nov. 22 2007, Vol. 3 No. 6, “Monitoring Activism in the Academy” by Karen Herland http://cjournal.concordia.ca/archives/20071122/monitoring_activism_in_the_academy.php

- Toronto Star, June 12 1992, “Irish lament ‘Summer of Sorrows’ ”

- CTV News, May 30th 2009, Squatters forced out of abandoned building in Point St. Charles, http://montreal.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20090530/mtl_abandoned_building_090530/20090530/?hub=MontrealHome

Primary Sources

- Canadian News Wire, March 11 2009, Public consultation on planning and development of Canadian National shops site in Pointe Saint-Charles