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Beyond Broadcast

Since 2006, the Beyond Broadcast conference has served as a lively forum for scholars, media-makers, policy experts and programmers interested in the intersection of media and democracy. The initial conference, "Reinventing Public Media in a Participatory Culture," took place on the Harvard campus; the 2007 conference, "From Participatory Culture to Participatory Democracy," took place at MIT, and the 2008 Beyond Broadcast, "Mapping Public Media," was held at American University. Beyond Broadcast has expanded its program to include 2 days of sessions and panels, tailored to meet the needs of innovators and experts in public interest media, and including a focus on international public media projects. The conference is designed to provide a collegial environment, encouraging networking and sharing of best practices before, during and after the conference concludes. The goal is also to discover the latest projects, systems and business models that are contributing to growth in community-based and citizen media that can be applied from the hyper local to the international stage.

http://bb2009.uscannenberg.org/

Beyond Broadcast Conference: Keynote: Reinventing the Gatekeeper

Fri, May 12, 2006

James Boyle of Duke Law School discusses how vibrant participatory communications media depend on a delicate balance between the realm of property and the commons. At every stage, from the intellectual property rights around content production to the technical and regulatory design of the network, vibrant participatory communications media depend on a delicate balance between the realm of property and the commons. If you wanted to upset that balance, to sap the communications revolution of much of its vitality, what should you do?

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Beyond Broadcast Conference: High Order Bit: Second Life

Fri, May 12, 2006

Throughout the Beyond Broadcast conference there have been fleeting glimpses of a replica of the Beyond Broadcast conference: a virtual Ames Courtroom filled with virtual people. This replica conference is taking place in *Second Life*; a world where every character is controlled by a real person. All objects, buildings, trees, cars and light poles are also created by users. John Lester, working for the creators of *Second Life*, Linden Lab, explained the founding principle behind *Second Life*. John says, "We [at Linden] don't want to make content, we want to give people tools to make their dreams and shape their world." Every resident (Linden's term for user,) has a powerful 3d modeling kit and scripting language, which enables them to build their fantasy. Lester further describes *Second Life* as a, "Waking dream environment not completely surreal or mundane, but smack dab in the middle." He illustrates this point with a slide of a concert taking place inside *Second Life*. The musicians are streaming their live (real world) music into a virtual club; the band member's avatars play their instruments to a virtual crowd. John points out that there is something cohesive about a bunch of people hanging out in a club listening to music, but, he says, you realize something is up when a member of the crowd seamlessly hovers into the air. *Second Life* is set apart from most online games and simulations in that residents retain intellectual property rights to all their virtual creations. Some residents release their creations as open source, while others retain their rights and make money off their work. Residents earn L$ (Linden dollars), which can be converted to $US on *Second Life*'s currency exchange. The exchange works just like a real market, where residents post offers to buy and sell money. Residents can even resell their *Second Life* creations back into the real world.

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Beyond Broadcast Conference: Introduction

Fri, May 12, 2006

Jake Shapiro, executive director of Public Radio Exchange (PRX), introduces the [Beyond Broadcast: Reinventing Public Media Conference](http://www.beyondbroadcast.net/). The conference explores the thesis that traditional public media face a unique opportunity to embrace new participatory web-based media models-- podcasting, video blogs, social software, etc.--and create a stronger and more vital public service.

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Beyond Broadcast Conference: What is the Community Dimension of Media?

Fri, May 12, 2006

Ethan Zuckerman leads off with a fast forward history of the Internet from 1969 that demonstrates how a technology not meant for personal communication became a site of incredible, spontaneous creativity. Presenters show off a range of participatory sites that intersect with but go way beyond public broadcasting. One recurrent question is about the role of public media professionals as curators, aggregators and organizers. How much editorial control should public media have over community content? Are these sites community-driven? Three test cases are reviewed: Brendan Greeley, blogger-in-chief at Radio Open Source, "a blog with a radio show", talks about the project as a site of dynamic public participation. His suggestions include: permalinks for talkback; using Technorati; acting like you mean it; not asking for links, but for opinions. Gather.com, the brainchild of Tom Gerace, a public media project where users create and organize content that brings together communities, raises questions that reverberate throughout the conference: How can we bring public media strengths (credibility, trust) into a changing media landscape and maintain that audience? How can we transform a listening audience into a broad source network? Editorial control? How do we monetize traffic? Listenup.org, a space that brings together a network of youth organizations around the world (117 in North America) to share resources and funding to create productions seen on TV (including public media) and elsewhere, demonstrates its ideology that "video production is a team sport". Rhea Moklund describes its roots as a public service campaign for broadcasters, and evolution from PSAs into a "real space for youth media," helped out by its creative use of unused PBS server space. This closed network is curated by the young people who use the site (no addresses, etc), with only hate messages censored.

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Beyond Broadcast Conference: Closing Remarks

Fri, May 12, 2006

Charles Nesson, founder of the Berkman Center, claims that we now live in a time where extant businesses are trying to find their place in a new, more open medium, one that inherently inspires collaboration and the free flow of knowledge. And one that is by design antagonistic to many of the core values of the old business models. Nesson optimistically insists that we find a way to retain our human values and ensure that they always be present in this new technological world.

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Beyond Broadcast Conference: Beta Business Models in the New World

Fri, May 12, 2006

Mark Cooper and other panelists discuss how public media should embrace changes in their operational and financial models in terms of using various levels public participation. They also discuss investor and citizen decision-making methods to fund new public participatory media sites. The following are key points from the speakers. The challenges public media face are not different than those of commercial media. They are both asking the same questions: Should they change their orientation and embrace interactivity? Do they understand understand how technology empowers the consumer? Can they redefine the concept of content? Do they deepen advertising and commerce, reinvent business models, or view the process with an entrepreneurial spirit? Media can no longer be a one-way industry in a two-way world. The old media presented a push approach and treated the audience as mute. The old media will try to make the public "feel" as though we are interactive, which may not be the case. A new way to assess media delivery is that old models are broadcast, cable TV, public TV and the new is "Independent Noncommercial TV" and the "networked individual." At the same time, the Internet, while useful, timely and convenient, lacks public trust. Local television ranks higher. One out of every two Americans is a member of a cooperative, namely credit unions, which are trust institutions. Information could be managed along the same lines in a membership-based, participatory organization to creating and moderating their own credible content. The public could form and pay dues to media membership organizations to create their own local news so that they can decide what is newsworthy. Overall, the old media format is to report, edit, and control responses and have such mottos as "All the news that is fit to print." The media presented at this conference seek to break this top-down approach - from Google to Wikipedia. All of these models have different functions and are open and closed to varying degrees. If you give participants the chance to be a member and use more functions, they will be willing pay dues to have an impact and influence in and beyond their communities.

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Beyond Broadcast