The Online News Association conference is happening this weekend in San Francisco. As I sit at home in Fresno – just a three-hour drive away – I’m thinking about the role of media here and there, and the different approaches to online news and communication that are possible in the two cities.
While the innovations being discussed at ONA are amazing and important to the future of the journalism profession, I am concerned that communities like mine will struggle to benefit from them in the near future.
Welcome to the information...road. Photo by Flickr user Christian Terboven.
Some recent examples of innovative tech projects aimed at increasing the public’s engagement with news have included The Rapidian, a citizen journalism site in Grand Rapids, Mich., which received Knight Foundation funding and sleekly serves up hyperlocal news. I also downloaded the Fwix citizen journalism iPhone app, which is pretty cool, and have been on the lookout for other developments in citizen journalism and community information access.
However, it seems like the underlying assumption in many of these projects so far has been that if you build it, the participants will come. As long as the project uses the most up-to-date technology, provides near-immediate coverage of events and integrates numerous interactive opportunities, then it is assumed that it will gain community involvement and support (even as everyone acknowledges the financial details remain TBD).
What’s even better? If the project incorporates Facebook Connect, Twitter OAuth and an iPhone app, of course.
But what if you build all that, and no one comes? It all sounds great, but without community access to (and enthusiasm for, and knowledge about) the use of this technology, these projects won’t go very far – and could even inadvertently damage communities by reinforcing class differences in political participation, giving people who already have a strong voice an even bigger microphone.
I’m thinking of the challenges faced in my city: Fresno, Calif. My campus was visited Wednesday by columnist Mike Osegueda of the Fresno Bee, who discussed the paper’s efforts to use social media, including citizen journalism, blogs and so forth. It’s been difficult to build those efforts, he said, partly because of the relatively small proportion of people in this region who regularly use computers and the Internet. Participation is low. It appears that the hard copy of the newspaper (though shrinking) – along with broadcast media – is still a primary way that people here engage with community issues.
Curious about his statements, I looked for some statistical data on Internet use in California’s Central Valley. As a new resident of this area, I didn’t know that there’s actually about a decade of research that documents a significant digital divide between this region of California and the rest of the state.
A June 2009 report (PDF) by the Public Policy Institute of California, a nonpartisan think tank, shows that – remarkably – both Internet use and home broadband access actually declined from 2008 to 2009 in the Central Valley.
The Valley is the only region of California that showed decreases in these areas in the last year. It is also the lowest-ranked region of the state in both categories. The Bay Area leads the state in broadband access, found in 73 percent of those survey respondents’ homes; only 51 percent of those surveyed in the Valley have broadband at home, lagging well behind the national adoption rate of 63 percent. In the Bay Area, 86 percent of survey respondents “ever” use the Internet; only 67 percent in the Valley ever do. Ever. For anything, at any interval.
I’m not trying to disparage the Valley by pointing out these data. In reality, these findings are pretty much consistent with the urban/rural digital divide observed nationwide; much of the Valley is rural. Broadband access is notoriously difficult to come by in rural areas, especially at an affordable price. The decline in Internet use and home broadband access, moreover, could be attributed to the housing crisis and general economic decline, both of which have hit the Valley hard.
I think these data demonstrate, though, that the latest and greatest digital communication technologies simply aren’t going to be the best option for the struggles of every community. It’s easy for those of us in this field – inundated by tweets, aspiring to Google Wave invitations – to start to think: “If only we could get everyone a laptop, wifi and an iPhone, this town would be a better place! They’d tweet news about their neighborhoods! They’d send graffiti reports to City Hall!” I feel sometimes that I run the risk of isolating myself in a happy little bubble of early adopters who just aren’t representative of the public at large.
For many communities, communication solutions other than those at the pinnacle of innovation still need to be identified and implemented. The lack of funding for technological innovations is often a problem, but the lack of a well-equipped audience to participate in them is an even tougher issue. Existing or reconfigured newspapers and broadcast media can’t be left out of the mix entirely, though many of the leaders in communication innovations seem to have already left them for dead and moved on to more technologically sophisticated options. Consider: actual paper may still need to be involved in solutions for these communities – at least in the near future.
When we do build high-tech communication tools in communities, the means of accessing them have to be there – which include low-cost broadband access and mobile technology, education of the public in their use (inside and outside schools), and governance that is open and responsive to citizen participation.* Otherwise, these technologies are likely simply to perpetuate the class distinctions that already characterize public participation in local politics. A recent Pew report describes the demographics of online and offline political activities among Americans; you can probably guess who participates most in local politics.
I love the newest iPhone apps as much as the next tech-savvy soul, and we certainly shouldn’t stop thinking about tools for a future where everyone can carry a smartphone and be skilled in digital technology. But for many communities today, it’s going to take something other than, or in addition to, great tech to enable communication that can resolve local issues.
* Coincidentally, the Knight Foundation released a report today (link to PDF brochure of conclusions/recommendations) that reinforces some of the statements I’m making here. Its emphasis on the need to make digital and media literacy training available to both youth and adults, along with widespread broadband access, is intended to prevent the formation of a “second class” of citizens without this information and the capacity for engagement. I haven’t read the full report yet, but am anxious to see if it offers practical solutions for different types of communities with diverse technology and communication capabilities.
