{"id":355,"date":"2009-06-02T10:11:54","date_gmt":"2009-06-02T10:11:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp\/2009\/06\/maybe_its_time_to_think_bigger\/"},"modified":"2009-06-02T10:11:54","modified_gmt":"2009-06-02T10:11:54","slug":"maybe_its_time_to_think_bigger-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/06\/maybe_its_time_to_think_bigger-2.html","title":{"rendered":"Maybe It's Time To Think Bigger?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"newjournalism.jpg\"<\/span>So journalism has to change. Everyone gets that. But most new models I see are really traditional journalism gussied up in new tools. Or, they reinvent in such a way that throws away some traditional journalistic values. <\/p>\n

Most conceptual re-imagining of journalism is still tied to the events-of-the-hour sort. What happened today. Traditional journalism has been good at this kind of reporting, not just because it was a useful service, but because it was possible. This is a mass media model – content that can be somewhat targeted and personally delivered but not personally customized to any great degree.<\/p>\n

Getting more personalized information is both easier and more difficult. Want to know the value of the house down the street or the crime statistics on your block? There’s the library (the easy part) and now the web. But if you want to know where your specific bus is and when it will arrive, that was more difficult. The most important news while you’re waiting for the bus is probably when it’s going to get to you. But ten minutes from now, while you’re on that bus, the most important news might be the traffic. And after that, the latest people are saying about that new restaurant you were planning to go to for lunch. <\/p>\n

Reporting on larger events of the day is still important. But this individual news, accessible exactly when and how you need it is likely more personally compelling. Most news organizations don’t think of this stuff as journalism. But why not? Are comics journalism? The crossword puzzle? There are lots of things journalism hasn’t been, for one reason or another, and now could be. Here’s one scenario<\/a> imagined at Fast Company:<\/p>\n

Peer into the future and imagine the landscape of information that
\ncould be available to you. When connected to high-speed, wireless
\nInternet, two people looking at the same street could access completely
\ndifferent information. One might call up postings for nearby school
\nevents, while the other might opt to see news about a campaign to fix
\nlocal sidewalks following the last earthquake. Users could add to this
\ncloud of news right from where they stood, or from anywhere else with
\nnetwork coverage. This customized mix of news feeds could include the
\nlocal, international, social, personal–or just plain weird.
\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So journalism has to change. Everyone gets that. But most new models I see are really traditional journalism gussied up in new tools. Or, they reinvent in such a way that throws away some traditional journalistic values. Most conceptual re-imagining of journalism is still tied to the events-of-the-hour sort. What happened today. Traditional journalism has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-355","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4ePZm-5J","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":91,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/04\/creative_destruction_and_the_c.html","url_meta":{"origin":355,"position":0},"title":"Creative Destruction And The Critics","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"April 16, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"A shameless plug for a piece on All Things Considered by Laura Sydell on what's happening with arts journalism as newspapers drop arts coverage. As I say in the piece, IMHO what's happening is not the destruction of arts journalism, but the reinvention of it. Arts journalism has often had\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/04\/creative_destruction_and_the_c.html#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"criticsthumbs.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/criticsthumbs.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":121,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/07\/a_future_for_journalism_about.html","url_meta":{"origin":355,"position":1},"title":"A Future For Journalism About The Arts","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"July 11, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"In the past couple of years, half of all the staff arts journalism jobs in the US have been eliminated. In some cases, newspapers offloading their staff critics have replaced them with freelancers. In some cases, the freelancers have done a better job than the staffers they have replaced. But\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 4 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 4 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/07\/a_future_for_journalism_about.html#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"summitpage.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/summitpage.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":94,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/04\/theatre_celeb_journalism_and_j.html","url_meta":{"origin":355,"position":2},"title":"Theatre, Celeb Journalism, And Journalism","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"April 22, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Two articles over on the ARTicles blog at the National Arts Journalism Program. First, Laura Collins-Hughes has a take on this year's Pulitzer for theatre and why it's important that the finalists are all women:...women playwrights are vastly underrepresented on our stages. Because \"diversity\" isn't just a buzzword. The Pulitzer\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":46,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2008\/02\/a_new_blog_at_najp.html","url_meta":{"origin":355,"position":3},"title":"A New Blog At NAJP","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"February 4, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"In my other life (what other life?) I'm the acting director of the National Arts Journalism Program (NAJP). NAJP started out as a project of the Pew Charitable Trusts in an attempt to help improve the state of arts journalism. I was an NAJP fellow at Columbia University in 1996-97.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "main"","block_context":{"text":"main","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/main"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":130,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/10\/list_of_blogs_carrying_nationa.html","url_meta":{"origin":355,"position":4},"title":"List of Blogs carrying National Arts Journalism Summit Today","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"October 2, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Thanks to those who volunteered to host a webstream of the Arts Journalism Summit at USC today. Streaming begins at 9AM pdt. See you in a few hours. (Looking for more information about the Summit? Go here.\u00a0www.minalhajratwala.com\/bloghttp:\/\/www.bendofbay.org\u00a0http:\/\/www.palmbeachartspaper.com\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.centerscene.blogspot.com\/\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.sfcv.org\/node\/6909http:\/\/www.austin360.com\/blogs\/content\/shared-gen\/blogs\/austin\/seeingthings\/index.html\u00a0http:\/\/www.AnnieStrack.blogspot.comhttp:\/\/www.mamaramabook.com\/blog\/www.judithingolfsson.comhttp:\/\/evansdonnell.blogspot.com\/2009\/10\/watch-national-summit-on-arts.htmlhttp:\/\/arts-america.blogspot.com\/http:\/\/moppenheim.comhttp:\/\/24seven.blogs.heraldtribune.com\/10354\/usc-to-hold-arts-journalism-summit\/http:\/\/houseseats.uniontrib.com \u00a0www.ced.pro.brwideningthei.wordpress.comhttp:\/\/voices.washingtonpost.com\/the-classical-beat \u00a0http:\/\/www.chloeveltman.com\/blog\/index.htmlhttp:\/\/www.joycegehl.blogspot.comhttp:\/\/blogs.tampabay.com\/art\u00a0www.HelloBeautifulBlog.comwww.imamuseum.org\/bloghttp:\/\/clevelandclassical.wordpress.com\/http:\/\/www.artsengagementexchange.org\/resources\/entry\/national_summit_on_arts_journalism\/http:\/\/www.belfry.bc.ca\/news\/webcast-national-summit-on-arts-journalism\/www.theatrelouisville.orghttp:\/\/movement-museum.blogspot.com\/\u00a0http:\/\/www.newmusicbox.org\/chatter.nmbxhttp:\/\/cseries.typepad.com\/celebrityseries\/http:\/\/dancealamode.wordpress.comhttp:\/\/bosccoartbuzz.blogspot.com","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2009\/10\/list_of_blogs_carrying_nationa.html#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":37,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/2006\/12\/doug_generally_speaking_the_cr.html","url_meta":{"origin":355,"position":5},"title":"Doug: Generally Speaking (The Critic As Specialist)","author":"Douglas McLennan","date":"December 18, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"John: Two huge topics to jump into, both probably worth spending a whole week on by themselves. I'll wait on answering the first till later, since it's such a huge topic. But the second, about specialist critics vs. generalists is easier to take a bite out of. I don't think\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "main"","block_context":{"text":"main","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/category\/main"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/diacritical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}