The Social Media Club held one of their renowned discussions on trends in social media in Silicon Valley this week (at NBC11’s new facilities). Discussions were held in a “round-table” fashion on topics such as ethics in Internet media, tracking accountability in reports, localization of reporting, the diminishing value of professional journalism, GenY’s and community media, and many others.
I spent most of my time in ethics and youth media, but one of the topics fascinated me – the problem of enticing and overcoming resistance to viewing in-depth media (like news stories and thought-pieces) in a sound-bite Internet-minute world. It’s no mystery that there’s a lot of stuff competing for your attention, from screaming banner ads to link farms loaded with trash. On most portals (especially video portals such as YouTube) the flea market prevails – maybe you’ll find something good, but mostly it’s junk. And as junk rises to the top of the charts, more junk is tendered, crowding out works that actually might be good for you. The Internet, instead of appearing as a rich knowledge base of the world degrades to a monoculture of junk food media. So if you do have something of value, how do you convince a viewer that it is worthwhile to spend the time? And this is where Jane Austen and the telcoms come into play…