Blog Wrap Up: Journalism, Culture, and Digital Diplomacy
Posted in The Gnovis Blog
On gnovis
Continuing the ongoing conversation about the journalism crisis, Brad reframes the question asking about the kinds of opportunities the collapse of old media creates for new media. In a comment, he points to Clay Shirky’s post on the topic: “When we shift our attention from ’save newspapers’ to ’save society’, the imperative changes from ‘preserve the current institutions’ to ‘do whatever works.’ And what works today isn’t the same as what used to work.”
Questioning the celebratory mood of Women’s History Month, Trish points to the importance of remembering not only the heroes, but also the victims, whether of domestic violence or of international drug trafficking. Highlighting various memorials – the wooden crosses on Georgetown’s lawn, the movie Senorita Extraviada: Missing Young Women – she asserts that “before women are moved from the margins of history, violence against women must be moved from the margins of the present.”
Around CCT
Students in Prof. Mima Dedaic’s Intercultural Communication class participated in a Multicultural Night performance at a local elementary school, showcasing traditions from their heritages. Tatyana (A Glimpse into the Meaning of True Cultural Diversity) and Akoto (CCT, Culture, and Kids!) both comment on the eagerness with which the youngsters embraced learning about other cultures. Writes Tatyana, “For young children, everything new and different is inherently exciting, but at the same time, equally accepted. And as tonight’s performance showed yet again, they are a living, powerful reminder how little these cultural differences matter in the end.”
Dr. Garcia considers the strategy of unbundeling, specifically the social costs involved in this otherwise extolled process. She emphasizes the “need to reassess what is lost when all sorts of products and services are disassembled, and users are expected to put Humpty Dumpty together again.”
In his discussion of Twitter and trend setting, Jeff Borenstein pits networks against nodes, asking if “trends on Twitter are simply the communities’ willingness to pass it along? Or do superconnectors dictate the conversation?”
In the blogosphere
Georgetown is now on iTunes U where the University is distributing audio and video of recordings of events and lectures to their students. It’s not quite open course, but a step in the right direction.
Google Reader has added the possibility to comment on shared items. Upside – a whole new forum for online conversation. Downside – lack of notification for when comments are posted.
President Obama is vlogging to the world. Check out his address to the people of Iran.