10 Questions with Dan Gillmor
Ok with the last two great interview I thought I would follow it up with yet another. Today I have decided to make it a double interview day and this 2nd one is with Dan Gillmor in the hot seat and we are talking about blogging and the effect it is having on mainstream media. This interview provides some great insight into the reason blogging is so disruptive as well as where he sees blogging in 5 years.
How long have you been Blogging?
Since October 1999. Wow, has it really been that long?
You have a unique perspective on journalism and blogging. Why do you think blogging is so disruptive to what is considered ‘mainstream media’?
Two overriding reasons:
Blogs are the Web as a writing tool, not just a reading one. When it’s easy to publish, lots of people will do so. Hence, blogs are among the new media formats that are challenging mass media’s near-monopoly on what goes onto the public agenda, nationally and in communities of geography and interest.
Blogs are also challenging the media institutions in a watchdog sense. Although a few of these watchdogs act more like rabid pit bulls and tend to discredit their own work more than the mass media they loathe so much, the new scrutiny of journalists’ work is having valuable effects. Notably, it’s forcing greater transparency on an industry that has been opaque, and in general that’s overdue.
What has changed since you started blogging?
The numbers, for one thing. When I started it was the province of a few people, mainly technology folks. Now it’s wide and deep into just about any topic you can name. The tools are much better (though still not nearly good enough, in my view) and have made it much easier for non-technical people to bring their voices out to the Web.
Another big change is the public acceptance. Blogging is seen today as a useful and normal part of the media-sphere.
It’s important to remember that blogs are a proxy for the wider phenomenon, which is only now taking hold and has a lot of room to grow: the bottom-up (or, more accurately, edge-in) media in all kinds of forms that include audio, video, screencasts, animations and more.
Where do you see blogging and journalism in 5 years?
Blogs will continue to grow. We’re already seeing professional networks of blogs, and this is a certain growth area. Some, if not many, of these networks will be (are designed to be) acquired by mass media organizations.
Professional journalism will continue on several trends as well. Mass media organizations are adopting blogging and other bottom-up communications tools in a big way, and will keep doing this; it just makes sense.
The economic challenges to the mass media, meanwhile, will only get more difficult to handle. Blogs are less of a journalistic threat to mass media than some people claim. The biggest threat, by far, is the undermining of the business models of major media. Newspapers are losing advertising to online at an amazing rate, to companies that are solely focused on grabbing those revenues with no intention whatever of doing journalism. So-called “free TV” (ad-supported broadcast) is being undermined by the DVR; there’s a button on my remote that makes 30 seconds disappear, and I use it, uh, freely.
What blogs do you read on a daily basis?
Among the ones I check daily:
Steve Gillmor, Doc Searls, Chris Anderson, Slashdot, David Weinberger, Global Voices, Ed Cone, Glenn Reynolds, Dave Winer, JD Lasica, Jeff Jarvis, Jay Rosen, Joi Ito, Mark Tapscott, Mary Hodder, Hossein Derakhshan, Susan Mernit, Susan Crawford, Simon Waldman, Steve Rubel, Tim Porter, New West Network, Robert Scoble. Silicon Valley Watcher, Silicon Valley Beat, Macintouch, Engadget, Gizmodo, Gawker, Talking Points Memo, Atrios, Brad DeLong, Hugh Hewitt and others.
There are many, many others I check frequently.
We also get 5 newspapers every day at home, and subscribe to about a dozen magazines, and I read major media extensively on the Web. (I also read books…) It’s important to remember that this is an ecosystem, and blogs are only part of it.
Community involvement is key to the success of grassroots media how did you help to foster that community?
Well, other people have done a far better job of this than I have. I see all kinds of brilliant community formation on the Net. Look, for example, at what Craig Newmark and his team at craigslist have accomplished, in large part by treating the people using the site as members of a community and not just consumers or even customers.
For my own part, I hope I’m helping to persuade more journalists that journalism is a conversation, not a lecture, as I said in my book. Community doesn’t happen unless people talk with each other, not at each other.
What do you think might be lacking in grassroots media today and how do you think people can change that?
Oh, we’re so early in this phenomenon that I can think of few things that are not lacking.
We need better tools for creating media. Yes, the ones we have are getting easier to use, cheaper and more powerful all the time, but we have some distance to go.
We need much better tools for understanding and tracking conversations across sites. If this is a global conversation, it’s hard to follow at the moment.
We need an entirely new kind of reputation management, to help us find and highlight what we (collectively and individually) consider trustworthy. Then we need to fact-check things so we can verify that we were right (or wrong) to trust it.
We need vastly greater media literacy.
What is the most important aspect of a person’s blog to you?
Voice is essential. I need to hear a human being talking. The willingness — even eagerness — to engage in the conversation is also important. Prompt and fair corrections of mistakes also wins points.
Why is Conversation King in Media 2.0?
Because we learn more when we listen, and the first rule of a conversation is to listen.
What advice would you give someone who is just starting to blog and what would you tell them the pro and cons of blogging are?
I’d say just do it. Most people aren’t natural writers, but everyone has his or her own natural voice. Start expressing it.
It’s also important to remember that this medium is not just about saying whatever is on our minds. The laws of defamation apply online, not just in the physical world, for example. The bottom line: Whatever you say, be honorable.