Nieman Foundation at Harvard
This past weekend, the Nieman Foundation (of which Nieman Lab is a part) celebrated its 75th anniversary. One of the highlights was The 90-Minute Nieman, which brought together a number of Harvard and MIT professors to give brief lectures on their work. The all-star lineup: Jill Lepore, William Julius Wilson, Katie Hinde, Ethan Zuckerman, Sheila Jasanoff, Nicco Mele, and Nancy F. Koehn.
They were all great, but both Zuckerman’s and Mele’s talks will be of particular interest to Lab readers — go check out videos at the Nieman Foundation site.
Zuckerman wrote up his presentation on his blog; he summed up his argument this way: “journalism needs to help people be effective and engaged civic actors, and if it doesn’t, it shouldn’t expect to survive financially or in terms of influence.” Video here.
Too much of today's journalism forces us into a pattern of learned helplessness, Ethan Zuckerman tells #Nieman75
— Geneva Overholser (@genevaoh) September 28, 2013
The idea of "the informed citizen" is a recent invention, "and maybe a farce," @EthanZ says, quoting Michael Schudson #nieman75
— Chris Amico (@eyeseast) September 28, 2013
@EthanZ: This version of citizenship is very consistent with this moment in media, when everyone is creating media. #nieman75
— Laura (Norton) Amico (@LauraNorton) September 28, 2013
New kind of journalism: Telling people how they can actually help, not just in response to disasters, but every day – @ethanz #Nieman75
— Justin Ellis (@JustinNXT) September 28, 2013
Mele took an even broader look at the journalism landscape, diving into the “promise and peril of technology” with an anecdote about 3D printers. Like Zuckerman, Mele focuses on the individual and tries to locate a new nexus of media control. Video here.
"Tech is making individuals powerful beyond comprehension" in comparison to big institutions, governments, corporations @nicco #nieman75
— Ethan Zuckerman (@EthanZ) September 28, 2013
@nicco #Nieman75 "culture of computer scientists was shaped in anti-Vietnam and civil-rights era: push power to the people. "
— Geneva Overholser (@genevaoh) September 28, 2013
@nicco: The End of Big isn't just about how individuals take power. "It's also about how our institutions have failed." #nieman75
— Chris Amico (@eyeseast) September 28, 2013
What Mele seemed to suggest is that, whether or not we’ve noticed, industrial journalism has already failed.
We think of most historical moments through professional media, but not the death of bin Laden, which happened via Twitter: @nicco #nieman75
— Ethan Zuckerman (@EthanZ) September 28, 2013
Check out all the 90-Minute Nieman videos. More videos from the weekend are being Jane Mayer talking about her work and accepting the I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence, and LBJ biographer Robert Caro in conversation with The Washington Post’s Anne Hull.
