Appeals court refuses to unmask anonymous donut shop critics

A Maryland Appeals Court has overturned a lower ruling that would have unveiled the identity of three anonymous Internet commenters due to a technicality in the discovery process. Still, the judges offer advice on how trial courts should handle the situation in the future by respecting the First Amendment rights of the posters in question.

Read the story here

News orgs must reassess why they are using social media, says Ben Hammersley

from Journalism.co.uk

Media can either aggregate cheap and plentiful content to draw in a mass audience or opt for high quality content, which pulls in fewer but more valuable people for advertisers, says Hammersley.

Wired, which launches in the UK next month, will opt for the latter. With at least five 8,000-word articles in each monthly issue, the Conde Nast title will bring a new kind of long-form, literary journalism to the UK strongly influenced by the US’ Vanity Fair, Esquire and New Yorker style, he adds.

“Everything in the middle [between aggregation and high quality] will die away and you’re going to see that in every industry, which is why we’re launching a big glossy magazine in the middle of a recession,” he says.

Read the story HERE…

Free Alternative to Facebook

A neat free software alternative to facebook is crabgrass (https://we.riseup.net/crabgrass/about).

It’s a social networking application designed with grassroots organizing in mind. Using crabgrass involves a slightly higher learning curve than using an email account, but it has some nice tools for collaborative decision-making, task lists, etc. It’s still under development, so a lot more tools are in the works. And, of course, it’s free software, so if you want a feature that’s not there yet, you can help create it.

Forget Micropayments — Here’s a Far Better Idea for Monetizing Content

While Time magazine and others claim the answer lies in asking readers to pay in small increments, that model will only hasten newspapers’ death spiral. Instead, consider what may prove to be the solution: a California start-up called Kachingle.

Read the Article… Click Here

Notes from the Grassroots Fundraising Conference

Here are some notes from the grassroots fundraising conference: Money and the Movement, held at the Brecht Forum this past weekend.  These notes were published to the Stubblefield Listserve

No news to anyone, we are in a period of extreme uncertainty for the non-profit world, not only for groups seeking money, but also for individuals, agencies and foundations who give. There is an unsettling free-fall at the city and state level, where agencies seem to be readjusting budgets downward week by week, even minute by minute. At the same time, many foundations are horrified watching their portfolios take a dive by as much as 40%-50%, and they are projecting at least two years of decreases in grant making. This translates into very little support going for new program requests. Individuals who have the means will likely continue supporting their favorite organizations, but with smaller donations. We are already seeing groups on the brink of survival or actually closing down.

This picture is grim. However, the message at the conference was that there is great resilience in grassroots groups, and now is the time to be creative and especially bold in our efforts to support ourselves.

• Fundraising is not about raising money, and we are doomed if that is how we approach it. Fundraising is about BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS. We must keep this in mind as we work on our various fundraising campaigns.
• In keeping with this basic premise, we must solidify ties to our existing supporters, reaching out to them directly and personally, telling them what our organizations are doing and keeping them close to our work.
• Explain your expenses and make them manageable by breaking them down into smaller pieces that can make donors feel they are contributing to a specific, concrete need.
• We have to be more creative about new opportunities we can develop or take advantage of, and be more entrepreneurial in our work. No time to be against bringing in new sources of income, this should include close assessment of internal resources that might be used differently, and being flexible reexamining positions regarding ‘acceptable’ sources of income and revising them in light of current conditions.
• Also we should be thinking of more ways to give, donations other than cash, trade outs and barters, and other types of gifts.
• It is going to get much harder for groups to go it alone. We have to get rid of the arrogance of “exceptionalism”, and be looking for ways we can work together with other groups to share resources, combine or share staff activities, be much more collaborative with others. This entails NOT business as usual, but beginning to work differently and reaching out to allies to work on joint planning.
• Funders in particular will want to see collaborations, shared projects, even mergers, that recognize overlapping missions and goals in similar groups and demonstrate efficiencies in spending and shared programmatic work.
• Finally, in the face of growing poverty and displacement, many funders will be turning their support to shoring up the grassroots base. As funding priorities shift towards helping those with the most need, it will be especially critical  that progressive groups not engaged in direct organizing themselves, show they have ties with and are important to such groups.

NYTimes.com: Five major newspapers to share content

“Five major newspapers in New Jersey and New York announced on Wednesday that they would share articles and photographs, adding to a growing movement in an industry that is seeking new ways to cope with shrinking resources,” reports the New York Times.

The agreement is between The Daily News of New York, The Star-Ledger, The Buffalo News, The Record, and The Times Union of Albany.

Full story at this link…

Berkeley Daily Planet launches ‘Fund for Local Reporting’

Posted by Laura Oliver for Journalism.co.uk.

In a frank article about the paper’s future, the owners of US independent newspaper the Berkeley Daily Planet admit they don’t have a solution for plugging the revenue gap in their ailing ad-supported business model.

Enter the Fund for Local Reporting, which is asking for donations large and small to keep the Planet running.

“As we explained in a recent editorial, paying salaries and benefits just for the reporters and editors who cover local news adds up to at least $250,000 a year. That doesn’t include production, rent, printing, distribution, sales etc,” reads the online payment form.

The O’Malleys, the paper’s owners, are also exploring developing the fund into a tax-exempt, not-for-profit organisation. Indeed, they’ve been toying with lots of ideas – part of a ‘reality check’, the editor says – including voluntary subscriptions and migrating to the web . They might not know what the solution is, and this might be a last roll of the dice, but they’re certainly going for it with all they’ve got.

Source: Journalism.co.uk.

Mo’ Power for Low Power

In 2000, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) began accepting LPFM license applications from community groups around the country. But the broadcast lobby, including the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and National Public Radio (NPR) opposed opening up the airwaves. By the end of 2000, Congress—folding under industry pressure—passed the “Radio Broadcasting Preservation Act” to block urban LPFM stations, based on the radio industry’s claim that adding 100-watt, low-power stations into the FM spectrum would endanger full-power broadcasters’ signals.

Activists hope Congress will allow low-power FM radio stations in urban areas in 2009.

By Jeremy Gantz via Infoshop

CHICAGO —The Chicago Independent Radio Project (CHIRP), an all-volunteer radio group formed in 2007, will begin webcasting this winter—though millions of city residents who live close to the station won’t be able to hear its programming.

That’s because urban Low Power FM (LPFM) radio stations remain illegal.

In 2000, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) began accepting LPFM license applications from community groups around the country. But the broadcast lobby, including the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and National Public Radio (NPR) opposed opening up the airwaves. By the end of 2000, Congress — folding under industry pressure — passed the “Radio Broadcasting Preservation Act” to block urban LPFM stations, based on the radio industry’s claim that adding 100-watt, low-power stations into the FM spectrum would endanger full-power broadcasters’ signals.

However, in 2003 the Mitre Corporation, funded by a $2 million grant from the government, found that LPFM stations do not interfere with the signals of existing full-power stations. In late 2007, the FCC recommended that Congress eliminate the interference regulation that blocked LPFM stations from entering urban airwaves.

“I don’t know what more evidence they need,” says Joe Torres, government relations manager for Free Press, a media reform organization. “There is no legitimate basis for NAB and NPR to claim that LPFM will interfere with broadcast stations.”

Since 2000, more than 800 rural LPFM stations have begun broadcasting. In some cases, they provide listeners with local emergency updates and information unavailable on commercial stations.

But urban groups like CHIRP are gearing up for swift passage next year of legislation that could finally bring independent community radio to a city near you.

New tech start-ups can rise from the economy’s ashes

Facing their worst economic climate since the dot-com bust in the early 2000s, high-tech companies are treating 2009 with dread — but also with a tinge of optimism if they act smartly.

Already, a few established companies with ample cash reserves are bolstering war chests that will help them snap up innovative start-ups. Cisco Systems has $29.5 billion in cash reserves and last week sold $4 billion more in bonds. Despite 5,000 layoffs, Microsoft plans to do some strategic hiring to fill new jobs supporting Internet search. And that well could involve acquisitions to pick up talented workers.

Companies are looking to improve efficiencies with cutting-edge technology. Intel says it will spend $7 billion over the next two years to build advanced manufacturing facilities in the U.S. The plants would produce faster, smaller chips that consume less energy.

“If we want to see a return of American prosperity, we have no other choice than to invest in creating the future, not merely preserving the past,” says Intel CEO Paul Otellini.

For the rest of the story, Click here… – Source: USA Today

Wanted: ’survival strategies’ for dying US newspapers

Source: Raw Story

The fate of US newspapers is in the news as journalists, editors, bloggers, media pundits and concerned citizens debate the future of the troubled industry.

“How to Save Your Newspaper,” is the cover story in Time in which Walter Isaacson, a former managing editor of the magazine, revives a plan to make readers pay for news online through a “micropayments” system.

“Battle Plans for Newspapers” is the headline on a feature in The New York Times in which the editors of the paper invite eight prominent media and Web figures to suggest “survival strategies” for endangered US newspapers.

Among the contributors: Craig Newmark, the founder of craigslist.org and the man some in the newspaper industry accuse of singlehandedly destroying their lucrative classified ad business with his free online service.

Newmark, stressing that “vigorous journalism, particularly investigative journalism, must be preserved,” pointed to “hyperlocal” news websites and “philanthropic” ventures like ProPublica.org as possible future models.

Micropayments, hyperlocal and philanthropic schemes are a few of the ideas being bandied about in the pages of dying US newspapers — which cut more than 20,000 jobs last year — and in scores of blogs on the Web.

In a recent opinion piece in the Times, David Swensen, the chief investment officer at Yale University, and Michael Schmidt, a financial analyst, argued that US newspapers should be turned into “nonprofit, endowed institutions — like colleges and universities.”

Most industry observers tend to agree on what is killing US newspapers.

Print advertising revenue is steadily declining and circulation is falling as readers go online to get news for free. Online advertising revenue has been rising but is not keeping pace with the drop in print advertising revenue.

What they do not agree on is the solution.

Much of the debate has focused on whether readers, accustomed to getting news for free online, will be ready to pay for quality journalism.

The Wall Street Journal is currently the only major US publication which has succesfully managed to make readers pay to gain access to all of the content on its website.

In a recent online question and answer session with readers, New York Times executive editor Bill Keller said his paper may also put some of its content behind a pay barrier, less than two years after a failed experiment with just such a system known as TimesSelect.

“Really good information, often extracted from reluctant sources, truth-tested, organized and explained — that stuff wants to be paid for,” he said.

“So far, it gets paid for mainly by advertisers, but a lively, deadly serious discussion continues within The Times about ways to get consumers to pay for what we make.”

In his Time cover story, Isaacson said “the key to attracting online revenue, I think, is to come up with an iTunes-easy method of micropayment.

“Under a micropayment system, a newspaper might decide to charge a nickel for an article or a dime for that day’s full edition or two dollars for a month’s worth of Web access.”

Getting readers to pay was also the subject of a recently leaked memo from Steve Brill, the founder of Court TV, to the Times in which he suggested a “new business model to save the New York Times and journalism itself.”

“There is simply no example, not one — in print, online, in television — of quality content offered for free ever resulting in a viable business,” he said.

Noting that the Times website averages 20 million unique visitors a month, Brill proposed a 10-cent fee for each article, a 40-cent “day pass,” a one-month fee of 7.50 dollars and a yearly subscription of 55 dollars.

Journalist Steve Outing was among those taking issue with micropayments saying the idea would just “hasten newspapers’ death spiral.”

“This approach hasn’t worked. It won’t work. Is completely counter to the nature of the Internet,” Outing wrote on his blog, steveouting.com.

Putting content behind a pay barrier prevents it from being found and shared by search engines such as Google, he added. “If Google can’t point people to your content, you may as well not be on the Web. And you’re out of business.”

Outing instead pointed to a California start-up venture called Kachingle and a voluntary system under which readers would “agree to pay a monthly fee to support valuable online content from publishers and bloggers you like.”

T.J. Sullivan, a Los Angeles blogger, is calling for drastic measures.

Sullivan is circulating an online petition calling for US newspapers to shut down their websites to non-paying subscribers for a week in July and to publish only in print.

“Now is the time for newspapers to do something proactive; time for them to demonstrate what life would be like without them,” he wrote on the website LA Observed.