Values Day

June 27, 2008

The Internet Is Destroying Democracy

What You Can Must Do

Chris Herbert

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• Newspapers are in danger of going out of business

• Who will watch the Watchmen?

The Internet Can Save Democracy

• Newspaper journalists are the backbone of the press

• Democracy requires a free and independent pressDemocracy Needs Newspapers

Newspapers Are Dying

• The Chris Herbert 5 Step Action Plan

THIS IS WHAT I’M GOING TO TALK ABOUT

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NEWSPAPERS ARE THE BEDROCK OF DEMOCRACY

The USA was founded on the idea of a free press…

• “Democracy does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority to set brush fires in people’s minds.– Samuel Adams

…and journalists have fought corruption for hundreds of years

• Watergate• Walter Reed

Institutions Do “Stuff”

Newspaper Journalists Tell Us About “Stuff”

“Stuff” Changes

Here’s the Pattern…

• Abuse In the Catholic Church

• Anne Arundel County Fire Chief Dismissed After Bumbling Reporter Stumbles On Corruption Story1

1 Some liberties taken with headline. See Baltimore Sun archives at http://tinyurl.com/4mvan2

Most television reporters read the newspaper over the air, and send a cameraman out for some footage.

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NEWSPAPERS ARE IN TROUBLE: READERSHIP IS DECLINING

Higher readership segments

71

73

81

79

78

72

18-24

25-34

35-44

45-54

55-64

65+

57

60

67

71

72

67

42

44

54

63

69

72

Weekday newspaper readership by age group

1967 1987 1999

Circulation declines are accelerating

And young people are getting news from other sources (if at all)

Source: Journalism.org; Department of Education; Simmons; NAA Facts About Newspapers 2000

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NEWSPAPERS ARE IN TROUBLE: CLASSIFIED REVENUE IS EVAPORATING

Typical Newspaper Company

40%

1%4%

100%

2000

Circulation

Classified

Ads

Display

Ads

Online

Other

20%

35%

25%

20%

100%

40%

10%

2007

5%

30%

0%

40%

10%

20%

100%

2015

“We are just trying to give people a break.” Craig NewmarkCraigslist.orgConsumer Surplus

Newspapers?

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NEWSPAPERS ARE IN TROUBLE: STOCKS ARE DOWN ~75% OVER LAST 5 YEARS

Stock Price History – Last 5 YearsGannett, New York Times, McClatchy, Media General

Source: Google Finance

75%

Most experts agree that the major metropolitan dailies will be the first to go out of business.

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WHO WILL WATCH THE WATCHMEN?

Plug: The Watchmen, by Alan Moore, is an excellent read.

It is the only graphic novel on Time Magazine’s Top 100 English Language novels from 1923 to the present.

And it’s coming soon to a theater near you…

The analogy doesn’t work great. But it does give me a chance to plug one of my favorite books

“The title, therefore, refers to the idea of superheroes, police, the government, or any group of people who assume the responsibility of protecting others from themselves.”

Without journalists, who will check government corruption?

Who will inform the people?

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THE CHRIS HERBERT 5 STEP ACTION PLAN

Stay Informed Pass On The Good Stuff

Take The Power Back Create Original Content

1 2

3 4

Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

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STAY INFORMED

Content Creators

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Feed Readers

Use RSS Feeds to stay up to date on your favorite stuff

• Your own personal customized newspaper

• Aggregates content from all your favorite sources

• Offline access for airplane reading• “Share” feature creates “The Internet,

As Edited by Chris Herbert”

Where do I start?• Sign up for Google Reader• Subscribe to a few feeds. See appendix for a list of recommendations• Google stuff you’re interested in, and just look for the RSS symbol

See http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/index.html for an excellent description of how RSS feeds work.

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PASS ON THE GOOD STUFF

• We may not be able to count on journalists to edit for us for much longer

• The best doesn’t always rise to the top. We need to give it a push

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Google Juice

• Search is king on the Internet• Quote about Google Juice• It is our responsibility to link to and talk about the

best stuff, so it rises to the top

With great power comes great responsibility…

Where do I start?

• Best product reviews on the Internet (way more than just books)

• Restaurants, shopping, nightlife

• Vote content to the top

• Excellent tool for sharing content in your network

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TAKE THE POWER BACK

• Democracy depends on the free flow of information• 2 of my favorite websites, Kayak & Zillow, are providing information to consumers

that is actually useful and actionable.• Others?

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• Best site ever for planning travel • Great site for stalking your coworkers• Handy text message feature provides an

instant estimate of a home’s value (whether or not it’s for sale)

• 1 of many tools we used last year to sell our condo – saved us a $12,000 broker’s fee

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CREATE ORIGINAL CONTENT

Why should I blog?

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Where do I start?

• Responsibility to share ideas• Society is becoming increasingly isolated…most

meaningful interaction is happening online

• Don’t share anything you wouldn’t mind reading about on the front page of the WSJ

What about privacy?

• Easiest platform to learn; not flexible

• Most flexible platform, requires some tinkering

• Astronauts are blogging (@marsphoenix)• You could get a job (@ryankuder)• Egyptian jails probably aren’t fun (@jamesbuck)

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PUT YOUR MONEY WHERE YOUR MOUTH IS

• 90% of Obama’s Feb ’08 fundraising transactions came from donors who gave <$100

5

50%

Feb ‘08

10%

40%$25 - $100

100% = 28 million>$100

< $25

Obama Feb ‘08 Fundraising Transactions1

The Internet is transforming politics

– Fundraising efforts are increasingly fueled by individual donors

– Sites like meetup.com are facilitating grassroots efforts

– It’s never been easier to engage in the debate

4 Years Is A Long Time!

Get involved.

1 http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/20/us/politics/20obama.html?ex=1361250000&en=b49d183460cc591c&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

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Other Stuff I Didn’t Really Address

•Shouldn’t I be worried about privacy?

•Anonymity & Accountability

•How Awesome is Wikipedia?

•Why don’t people use our office blog?

Values Day

June 27, 2008

The Internet Is Destroying Democracy

What You Can Must Do

Chris Herbert

16

A FEW OF MY FAVORITE RSS FEEDS

Newspaper feedshttp://feeds.feedburner.com/EditorAndPublisher-BreakingNewshttp://www.editorsweblog.org/newspaper.xmlhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/NewspaperDeathWatchhttp://www.poynter.org/media/rss/romenesko.xmlhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/BuzzMachine

TVhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/MultichannelBreakingNews

Humorhttp://feeds.theonion.com/theonion/dailyhttp://feeds.theonion.com/theonion/photos http://feeds.feedburner.com/leveragedsellout/lCfwhttp://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/index.rdfhttp://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/feed/http://forksplit.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/defaulthttp://feeds.feedburner.com/TheSecretDiaryOfSteveJobs Other Cool Stuffhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/ZcLOhttp://lifehacker.com/software/top/index.xmlhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/Photojojohttp://feeds.portfolio.com/portfolio/oddnumbershttp://rssfeeds.s3.amazonaws.com/goldboxhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/Footnotedorg

Tech/Internethttp://feeds.feedburner.com/AVchttp://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/rss2.xmlhttp://blog.pmarca.com/index.rdfhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/37signals/beMHhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider

Mediahttp://blogs.wsj.com/informedreader/feed/http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/MediaandAdvertising.xmlhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/cccZ

Personal Financehttp://feeds.feedburner.com/thesimpledollar

Economicshttp://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/atom.xml http://robertghansen.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Stamfordhttp://managermom.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/defaulthttp://feeds.feedburner.com/AlwaysHomeAndUncoolhttp://blogstamford.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/defaulthttp://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/atom.xmlhttp://danmalloy.wordpress.com/feedhttp://www.mrstamford.com/feedhttp://feeds.feedburner.com/StamfordTalk

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A FEW STARTER FEEDS FOR TWITTER

@nytimes: Breaking news from The New York Times' homepage. Also specialized streams for world and national headlines, business news, sports, arts, science, etc.

@techmeme: Top headlines from Techmeme, the pulse of tech news, analysis, and, um, other stuff. There's also the Techmeme Firehose if you don't want to miss anything.

@amazon: The unofficial Amazon book finder bot. Follow @amazon and send it a direct message with a book's title or ISBN. It will message you back the price on Amazon -- a good way to see if a book is cheaper at Amazon or your local book store.

@theonion: The fake news -- often more interesting and less depressing than the real news! Also includes links to their audio and (excellent) video reports.

@new_music: New music for music snobs, maintained by NYT technologist Michael Young. A feed of Pitchfork and Metacritic reviews "over 7ish."

@lotd: The lyric of the day -- a feed of song lyrics -- started up by Twitter investor (and avid Tweeter) Fred Wilson.

@shakeshack: Madison Square Park's Shake Shack is known for its burgers, shakes -- and its line. "Got a report on Shake Shack line length? Looking share a table with other hungry Shackburger-loving Twits? Send an update to @shakeshack."

@alleyhour: Like @shakeshack, but for Silicon Alley-types looking for after-work drinking buddies. "Organize impromptu drinks in NYC."

@alleyfeed: Self promotion! The latest headlines from Silicon Alley Insider, automatically fed via Twitter. Also follow @alleyinsider for more select updates and information.

Source: Silicon Alley Insider

http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/5/ten_news_information_twitter_feeds_you_should_follow