OhMyNews
OhMyNews (http://www.english.ohmynews.com) is a great idea. It's an idea whose time has come.
And people obviously welcome it. The site has a floating staff of 47,000 writers/reporters, none of whom are paid for their work. It boasts daily viewership of 1 to 1.5 million.
However, it is flawed. For instance, if you read the article "On Being a Citizen Journalist" (HERE), you would be tempted to think: "Sure, unbiased information is great. I need more information. The world needs more information to change society for the better."
But that's naive.
For instance, the author of the article writes: "My primary allegiance is to the public."
This statement espouses the mass society concept, whereas we now live in the demassified society. In other words, you cannot help a person if you do not know WHO that person is.
It's nice and noble to want to inform "the public", but realistically speaking, you cannot know precisely WHAT information a person needs to make better decisions, unless you FIRST know who that person is!
The ultimate test of the value added of OhMyNews is: "What is the difference in RESULTS between a person who reads OhMyNews, and a person who doesn't?"
If there is no difference in results, then there is no value added.
This is not to say that OhMyNews is not a good idea. I truly believe it is a good idea. But people today need intelligence (as in "CIA intelligence") that they can act on, not mere information.
And people need to have a way of asking reporters or experts for information they need RIGHT NOW.
Yahoo! Answers (www.answers.yahoo.com) is a good example of an interactive site that brings askers and answerers together.
In the long run, OhMyNews might be very effective at bringing about social change, but for this to happen, it needs to develop what the late Peter Drucker calls "information literacy." That is, people need to know what kind of information they need, and ask for it.
Writers, for their part, need to know what information they are responsible for providing, and only focus on delivering THAT information and exercise self-restraint so they won't bombard people with "interesting" and "news-worthy" but ultimately useless, impractical or irrelevant information.
And people obviously welcome it. The site has a floating staff of 47,000 writers/reporters, none of whom are paid for their work. It boasts daily viewership of 1 to 1.5 million.
However, it is flawed. For instance, if you read the article "On Being a Citizen Journalist" (HERE), you would be tempted to think: "Sure, unbiased information is great. I need more information. The world needs more information to change society for the better."
But that's naive.
For instance, the author of the article writes: "My primary allegiance is to the public."
This statement espouses the mass society concept, whereas we now live in the demassified society. In other words, you cannot help a person if you do not know WHO that person is.
It's nice and noble to want to inform "the public", but realistically speaking, you cannot know precisely WHAT information a person needs to make better decisions, unless you FIRST know who that person is!
The ultimate test of the value added of OhMyNews is: "What is the difference in RESULTS between a person who reads OhMyNews, and a person who doesn't?"
If there is no difference in results, then there is no value added.
This is not to say that OhMyNews is not a good idea. I truly believe it is a good idea. But people today need intelligence (as in "CIA intelligence") that they can act on, not mere information.
And people need to have a way of asking reporters or experts for information they need RIGHT NOW.
Yahoo! Answers (www.answers.yahoo.com) is a good example of an interactive site that brings askers and answerers together.
In the long run, OhMyNews might be very effective at bringing about social change, but for this to happen, it needs to develop what the late Peter Drucker calls "information literacy." That is, people need to know what kind of information they need, and ask for it.
Writers, for their part, need to know what information they are responsible for providing, and only focus on delivering THAT information and exercise self-restraint so they won't bombard people with "interesting" and "news-worthy" but ultimately useless, impractical or irrelevant information.
posted by Super Peter at 12:41 PM
<< Home