African Report::LGBTI Communities Come Out of the Closet Online.

“The closet I have come out of — it is similar to the wardrobe my relieved parents stepped out of when I unlocked the wardrobe after the police had left. If you’re black in South Africa, the inhuman laws of apartheid closet you, if you’re gay in South Africa, the homophobic customs of this society closet you. If you are black and gay in South Africa, well, then it really is the same closet, the same wardrobe. Inside is darkness and oppression. Outside is freedom.” — Simon Nkoli

The African LGBTI (lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender, intersex) movement traces itself back to the last days of apartheid in South Africa. At that time, a number of gay and lesbian anti-apartheid activists, including Simon Nkoli, founded the first black-led LGBTI organization in Africa, the Gay and Lesbian Organization of the Witwatersrand (GLOW). GLOW, which was a multi-racial organisation, was very much at the forefront of campaigning for LGBTI rights to be enshrined in the new South African constitution and the decriminalization of homosexuality.

Apartheid ended 14 years ago and what was a local campaign in South Africa has become a vibrant and progressive Pan-African LGBTI rights movement. The internet has made an enormous difference to the African LGBTI community. Over the past five years, the community has established a strong online presence in the form of news and campaign sites, advocacy, email lists as well as Web 2.0 media such as blogs, forums and Facebook groups. Activists are now in a much better position to make their own demands, including confronting discriminatory attitudes in the international LGBTI movement and calling for more accountability from that movement.

Email and Listservs

Over the past four years, a number of email groups have been formed to provide a safe and secure online space for human rights defenders to communicate privately, organise campaigns and give support to each other. Whenever there has been the need for an immediate regional or continental response to a crisis such as the recent arrest of activists in Uganda, the rape and or murder of lesbians in South Africa, or the trial of gay men in Cameroon, activists have relied on these groups and emails for communicating and mobilizing locally and internationally. Because of the need for security and privacy, email groups remain an important safe space for human rights defenders from across the continent.

News and Advocacy

Behind the Mask (BTM) was set up about eight years ago and was the first dedicated news resource for LGBTI issues in Africa. Its strength lies in its continental focus and up-to-date news. However the news reports are culled from other news sources and lack original commentary and opinion which would make the site more dynamic and interesting. There appears to be a lack of imagination on how to develop the project; for example, they could recruit local activists to report on local issues and include commentary and a discussion element on the site.

Nonetheless BTM’s importance is not just as a source of LGBTI news. Its very presence and the news it reports confirms the existence of a large number of LGBTI people on the continent, which challenges the argument by many religious leaders and governments that “homosexuality is unAfrican.” More recently a number of established organizations have created websites such as Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG), Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL) and Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ), and the Zambian site African Veil, to name a few.

Having a web presence is a “coming out” of LGBTI activism in Africa but the sites are very much organizational in content and do not provide any features to draw in readers and encourage comments and discussion. This is changing as more and more organizations and groups join social networks like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.

Social Networks

While email groups act as a secure environment to discuss LGBTI issues, more individuals, groups and organzations are beginning to get comfortable with public media such as Facebook and MySpace for advocacy and campaigns. Forum for the Empowerment of Women, BTM and the transgender group Gender Dynamix each have a Facebook group but with little activity. Recently a group called The Killing of Sistahs was set up by a group of activists on Facebook to highlight the rampant murder and rape of lesbians in South Africa. This is the group’s statement on Facebook:

Hands up, how many of you have heard of Matthew Shephard? Yes, that’s right, he was the American gay student who was tortured and killed for being homosexual. Now let’s take it closer to home. Hands up, who has heard of Madoe Mafubedu? No takers? It seems our community isn’t noticing what’s going on in our own backyard. OK then, she was an openly lesbian, 16-year-old who was repeatedly raped and stabbed until she died.

Killing of Sistahs has by far the largest membership and is the most active of all the groups, possibly because there is a specific focus — violence against lesbians in South Africa, whereas the other groups are organizationally focused rather than issue-led.

On July 20, the SA Sun published a horrendous homophobic article, Call me names, but GAY is not OK (PDF file), in which the author, Jon Qwelane, likened the marriage of same-sex couples with marriage to a goat. Within 24 hours, the LGBTI community had set up a Facebook group, Appalling Homophobia, released press statements via email, set up various websites and blogs, and started a campaign to insist on an investigation by the SA Human Rights Commission and the Press Office.

Like Killing of Sistahs, this group has a specific focus and is campaign-led. In just two weeks the membership has risen to nearly 3,000. The group is actively involved with calling for the removal of the author and appears to have taken on the role of monitoring homophobia in the South African media. Like any campaign, making a Facebook group meaningful requires commitment from both the organizers and members, and Appalling Homophobia has both of these.

Blogs

One of the limits of news sites such as BTM and advocacy/campaign sites like CAL is they don’t provide commentary and personal experience of LGBTI people. Blogs counter this and though the number of blogs by LGBTI persons on the continent are still few and far between, they are growing. Blogs like Gay Ugandan, Naija Homo, Black Looks (my own blog) and My Haven are crucial because they not only shout the words “I exist” to those who continue to deny the lives of African LGBTI persons, they politicize the personal and make the voice and experience more powerful. As Rants and Raves of a Gay Kenyan Man writes on his blog tagline:

In the wider scheme of things, I don’t exist. The Kenyan gay man is a myth and you may never meet one in your lifetime. However, I and many others like me do exist; just not openly. This blog was created to allow access to the psyche of me who represents the thousands of us who are unrepresented. I know it’s anonymous and thus contradicts the essence of what I am aiming to do. But if it does inform, educate and demystify the Kenyan gay man, then the purpose is served.

My own experience of using these sites is mixed. Although BTM acts as a portal of African LGBTI news, I find the lack of opinion and commentary means there is often little depth and therefore one does not always get a full understanding of the issues. The same applies to Facebook groups which simply act as an introduction to an organization or website rather than as a tool for discussion or raising awareness around issues.

If the creators of the site are themselves not seen to be interested in furthering discussion then I as a user will not return. Facebook groups like “Appalling Homophobia” and “Killing of Sistahs,” which have a better focus, will draw in my attention and it is to these two sites that I return regularly. The same goes for the LGBTI blogs which are updated regularly. Because they provide both reportage and commentary as well as making the connection with personal experience, they provide a far more interesting experience for me personally.

The coming out online of the African LGBTI community is still very much in the early stages. In by far the majority of countries on the continent, same-sex relationships remain illegal so there is much work to be done both in decriminalization but also very much in changing attitudes and perceptions. African LGBTI people owe much to Simon Nkoli who rejected the idea that his blackness and gayness were separate. On the contrary, they are both an integral part of the same experience and not in opposition to each other.

Sokari Ekine is an activist with a background in human rights in Africa. She presently works with The Global Women’s Strike and Kabissa: Space for Change in Africa. Sokari blogs at Black Looks, Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine and Niger Delta Solidarity Campaign, and is the African correspondent for MediaShift.

Report from Beijing::China Partially Lifts Great Firewall for Media, but Access Remains Pricey.

BEIJING — Journalists scrambling to make Games-time deadlines might not make it to Badaling or Juyongguan during their trip overseas, but they’re sure to become familiar with China’s other Great Wall: the Great Firewall, that is. On July 31, Olympic officials admitted the International Olympic Committee had not yet secured unfettered Internet access to foreign journalists, leaving everyone to wonder, yet again, what exactly China meant when it accepted the 2008 Olympic Bid with the promise to allow the press to report freely.

Chinese officials maintained that access for foreign journalists was sufficient because information on sports and athletics remain readily available. Just the sensitive material (read: interesting and newsworthy) was off limits. However, after howls of protest from many in the media, the censored web was loosened a bit on August 2. No public announcement, no explanation, just a few more sites stripped from the forbidden list. Still, crisis averted — or was it? Even after the news slowly spread, foreign journalists remained incensed about the lack of action prior to August 2.

When the news of the censored Net access for journalists broke, one of my friends posed a question: were journalists who accepted these restrictions for the opportunity to report on the Games sacrificing their credibility? It’s an interesting question. As late as mid-July, IOC president Jacques Rogge continued to promise Internet access without censorship to journalists planning to report in Beijing. Eleventh hour announcements make impassioned protest difficult with visas long since secured and plane tickets already bought.

Of course, ordinary Chinese citizens — and China boasts more netizens than any other country in the world — are subject to an even stricter censorship regime, with sites such as Wikipedia and YouTube being variously blocked and unblocked over the past few years.

The High Cost of Connecting

But forget access to information on Tibet for just a second — let’s just examine access to the Internet in general for foreign media. Beijing has promised state-of-the-art media facilities to visiting journalists, but the ability to log onto the web will set reporters back approximately $500 and up. A fixed IP and access to the Games-time information system will add even more to the cost.

It’s hardly a problem for large papers able to foot the bill for their team of reporters. But what about everyone else? Twenty-four computers offer free Internet access from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. each day. The newly constructed media village will house about 7,000 journalists and media support staff. This scenario conjures up images reminiscent of last week’s queues for the remaining Olympic tickets. Asking journalists to pay for their own usage isn’t unreasonable, but demanding $500 for a service that costs the average Chinese family about $20 for the same length of time is.

Many enterprising journalists have taken matters into their own hands, turning the Papa John’s with free Wi-Fi across the street into their unofficial center of operations. Other early hold-outs to the overpriced Internet are accepting their fate and coughing up the big bucks for reliable service.

How important is the Internet to today’s journalist? I can tell you I have six browser windows and over 20 tabs open right now in Safari to help me research and collect my thoughts, but no one needs me to do the math for them. The occasional network crash forces me to fly solo from time to time, but it leaves Word documents hideously flagged with things to Google once everything’s back online.

Fortunately, my accommodations include free Internet access. Of course, it’s only been in the last week that Blogger and WordPress have run with much reliability. When I arrived in early July, I needed a VPN client to connect to the blog I was writing for my parents back home. Sometimes I could connect; other times, I couldn’t.

What Did Journalists Expect?

That’s the thing about the Great Firewall — there’s no master list or helpful placeholder page to tell you what’s restricted. There’s just the maddening sensation of waiting forever for a “server is not responding” error message. As for Amnesty International:”http:www.amnesty.org” (and other recently unblocked sites), I can now access them from my non-Media Village connection, too. However, a search for “Falun Gong,” China’s banned spiritual movement, kicked me offline the other night and forced me to restart my computer. Even more maddening is the number of sites you wouldn’t expect to be blocked — for instance, access to my online banking account.

With the situation smooted over somewhat, and most foreign journalists already in Beijing, it’s too late to hand in press accreditation to protest Net censorship. Perhaps, more importantly, journalists should be asking themselves why they expected anything different. After all, the 2001 announcement of the successful Beijing bid — and successive promise of press freedom — came on the same day CBS reported suppression of footage on a banned Chinese religious movement.

In the months leading up to the Games, numerous organizations attempted to brief journalists on the realities of reporting in China, but few seemed to head the warning. Journalists who today want to call China’s successful bid and resultant promises a farce might be correct, but they fail to see the bigger picture.

If the world were watching Paris or Toronto gear up for the Games, they would not be asking China about Internet censorship, let alone human rights. A modern China? Indeed, and all the scrutiny that comes with it. Outcry over Internet censorship yielded real results. With more tools for a free press than they had even a week ago, the pens (and keyboards) of foreign journalists are likely to produce others.

More Reading

Check out these stories about the foreign media’s Net censorship in China during the Olympics:

Asian Yahoos Don’t Give a Google About Free Web: William Pesek at Bloomberg

Behind the scenes: Internet police out in force for the Olympics at CNN.com

China Eases Internet Restrictions for Journalists in the New York Times

China Will Lose the Censorship Game at PC Magazine

High-jumping China’s firewall at Asia Times

How to Read the Great Olympics Internet Censorship Drama at Huffington Post

Reporters without borders make pirate broadcast in Beijing at Times of London

Elle Moxley is a student at the University of Missouri pursuing dual degrees in journalism and sociology. Currently, she is living in Beijing, China, spending two months working for the Olympic News Service at the XXIX Olympic Games.

Email Roundtable::Should Copyright Law Change in the Digital Age?.

This is the final part of my three-part email roundtable discussion looking at the new Code of Best Practices in Fair Use of Online Video created at the behest of the Center for Social Media at American University.

In the first part, the respondents in this email roundtable talked about what the Code means, how they might put it into practice, and some thoughts on the way artists work without thinking about the law. In the second part, the group talked about ways to spread the Code through a special video explaining fair use to video producers.

In this final installment, the discussion turns to legal options, and whether the copyright law should be updated for fair use, possibly creating safe harbors for certain types of work that would be shielded from lawsuits.

Many people complain that the U.S. fair use rules are vague, and that copyright law hasn’t really been updated for the digital age. How do you think the laws should be changed to help protect copyright holders while also respecting video remixes and fair use? Or do you think the laws are fine as is?

Peter Jaszi
law professor at American University and co-chair of the Code of Best Practices committee

Trying to “fix” fair use through legislation would be a high risk undertaking. The codification of the doctrine in 1976 was, generally speaking, a victory for the creators, educators, journalists, artists, and others. Developments in the courts since then (especially the rise of “transformativeness” analysis) have underlined just how big a victory it actually was! For one thing, as it now stands the doctrine is technogically non-specific, which has proved to be a boon in times of rapid change.

By and large, the doctrine works pretty well most of the time for a wide range of different kinds of users — which is one reason that copyright owners haven’t always been enthusiastic about it. If Sec. 107 were “opened up” for amendments there is a real chance (nay, a near certainty) that owners would seize the opportunity to rework the statute to their own advantage — and (believe me) there are many ways this could be accomplished. We would be looking then at a naked political contest that I’m afraid users would lose, as they have in so many other battles in recent years. It may be the case that the “vagueness” (though I’d call it the “flexibility and dynamism”) of fair use can sometimes be a problem. But that’s where efforts like to Code of Best Practices Can come in.

Anthony Falzone
executive director of the Fair Use Project at Stanford University

I think the open-ended nature of the fair use framework is a net positive. While it can reduce predictability in some situations relative to say, a laundry list of very specific exemptions, it’s that open-ended nature that makes fair use a dynamic tool that can respond effectively to changes in technology and culture.

Fair use was only codified once in 1976, and section 107 has only been amended once since then. If it laid down a series of specific exemptions rather than an open-ended standard, it would have hobbled innovation. Who in 1976 would have foreseen Internet search engines, or understood the tremendous societal benefit they create despite the fact they copy massive amounts of copyrighted information every day? If we had needed to create a new statutory exception to accommodate them, it would have taken years, and there is a very good chance big media companies would have stopped that process altogether.

That’s not to say the burdens of the open-ended framework aren’t real. It makes decisions more complicated and costly. The people who feel that most are the masses — the ordinary people who create for the sake of creating and do so non-commercially. For them, the system is complicated and expensive to use and they are not equipped to bear the risk of guessing wrong. The burdens this system imposes on ordinary people who use copyrighted content in genuinely creative and transformative — but non-commercial — ways is tremendous, and seriously out of whack relative to the tiny impact these non-commercial uses have on copyright holders. I think it would make a lot of sense to create safe harbors for certain uses that will relieve non-commercial actors of this burden.

Peter Jaszi
law professor at American University and co-chair of the Code of Best Practices committee

I like the safe harbor idea, too, but I have a few worries. My first concern is the notorious indistinctness of the commmercial/non-commercial distinction. This line is difficult in two ways. One is the difficulty of classifying activities that yield indirect (i.e. reputational) rather than direct (i.e. sales-based) financial benefit. The other is the problematic fact that works created for “non-commercial” purposes often get commercialized (by the maker or others) after the fact. The second (and related) concern is that carving out any set of uses from the overall “fair use” scheme could make things tougher analytically for the uses that aren’t carved out. Given the fact that there are going to be many uses that fall on the “wrong” side of the commercial/non-commercial line, no matter how it’s drawn, I think this merits attention.

JD Lasica
co-founder of Ourmedia media-sharing site, new media expert and videoblogger

I’m surprised that none of the legal scholars here have pointed out that, regardless of how the laws are crafted, fair use is, and always will be, a fuzzy concept. We will never have a set of rules that say, “absolutely, in this case, you’re in the clear under the law,” because of all the variables that fair use entails. That’s the shortcoming of fair use — it’s not an affirmative right. In layman’s terms, it’s a set of case-by-case exceptions to the Copyright Act, which means if charges are brought against you, you have this defense to stand on.

In my book “Darknet,” I suggested that the digital generation will eventually come to embrace the concept of digital rights, some of which will be codified in federal law but much of which will become embedded in the cultural norms that are now taking shape. In due time, Congress should specify users’ digital rights by mapping out an expansive, affirmative set of rights delineating the scope of the public’s right to sample, reuse, build upon, and share the digital works they legally acquire. Such a declaration, with reasonable protections for copyright holders, should include the right to time-shift, space-shift, make personal backup copies, change formats, tinker with stuff you buy, engage in personal editing, and share personal media with others, depending on the circumstances.

But as those who have lobbied Congress for copyright reform know, the current Congress is much more likely to impose tighter, not looser, restrictions. At a time when the Internet is collapsing time frames and enabling people to breathe new life into dormant works, it’s still illegal to resurrect and rework movies from the 1920s.

Instead, I think the solution is in our own hands. Individuals ought to use Creative Commons licenses on their videos, photos and podcasts whenever possible, allowing others to reuse or republish the works under the ground rules that the individual lays out. (Tens of millions of photos on Flickr now carry CC licenses.)

More broadly, we’re turning from a society of consumers to a society of users and producers. Whenever we pick up the tools of digital media creation, we’re participating in a shared experience, and together we’re sorting out the rules of engagement for the digital age. People — especially the young — want to access, rip and remix their culture. There’s no going back to the rules and norms of the analog era.

Owen Gallagher
digital media entrepreneur; founder of TotalRecut, a network of fans and creators of video remixes, recuts, and mash-ups

In an ideal world, the copyright laws would be changed to create an established set of rights for legitimate uses of copyrighted material without permission. However, as JD pointed out, it appears that the current Congress appears to be moving in the opposite direction, promoting tighter controls and restrictions, rather than freer access. How many times have copyright laws been extended in the last 50 years?

I’m a big fan of extra-legal solutions, like Creative Commons. Although not without its own issues, this system provides content creators with a choice that they would not otherwise have, i.e. to give explicit legal permission for others to share and reuse their work. I think that Creative Commons is even more important outside of the United States, as many countries do not have a fair use provision in their copyright law. The closest equivalent, ‘fair dealing,’ does not offer as much freedom as fair use. For example, in Ireland and the UK, fair dealing does not extend to works of parody. Unfortunately, Creative Commons is not yet fully established in every country (Ireland still doesn’t have its own country specific version).

The meaning of copyright law has been skewed in recent decades. Copyrights are meant to create a balance, providing benefit to society at large by giving us more creative works while also providing benefit to the individuals who bring those works to us. Copyright was meant to ‘promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive rights to their respective writings and discoveries.’

In reality, copyright law is now being abused to line the pockets of large companies that own most of the well-known creative works in the world. The balance has been lost and the result is the chilling effect we mentioned before, where essentially, less creative works are being made because people are afraid of being sued. Hopefully, with such important initiatives as Creative Commons and the Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Online Video, harmony will be attained.

*****

What do you think? Should the laws be updated or left as is? How useful do you think the Code will be for video mash-up artists who want to learn more of their legal options? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Top Five Week Two Hundred Three.

1. Olympic TAMi
   NBC’s multi-platform audience on Monday: 103 million
2. Cyber-attack on Georgia media
   News site moves to Blogspot after attack
3. TV losing out
   Mobile, Net use rising; network TV losing to niches
4. iPhone 3G problems
   Slow connections put 3G name in doubt
5. Huffington Post Chicago
   Grand ‘HuffPost local’ experiment begins

How are you experiencing the Olympics -- TV, streaming video, mobile?.

This is my first time using Seesmic to ask a Your Take question on MediaShift. You can answer either via Seesmic videos or via text in the comments below.

NBC announced that its Olympics coverage would be a big laboratory for multi-platform media, giving people thousands of hours of the Games on various TV channels, streaming video online, and on mobile. It’s almost a bombardment of video. So where are you watching so far, and what’s your experience been like? I’ve been relying on DVR-taped viewing on TV, with some online news and Twitter feeds thrown in. What has worked for you, and have you also checked out international feeds online? Share your thoughts in a video or in comments and I’ll highlight the best ones in the next Your Take Roundup.

Digging Deeper::Locative Media Project Aims to Collect Stories of Atlanta.

The technology and journalism fields have long been dominated by men, especially in the upper management of big companies. But the J-Lab and McCormick Foundation want to shine the light on new ideas from women who work at mainstream media outlets but want to start something up on the side.

That’s why they started giving out grants in their New Media Women Entrepreneurs (NMWE) competition, with three winning ideas getting $10,000 in seed money:

> Echo, a locative media project that encourages people to call in their stories about places in Atlanta

> Latina Voices, a website for Latinas to discuss social issues

> Northwest Navy News, a site that will facilitate connections between military families in Washington state

Jan Schaffer, executive director of the J-Lab, told me that women are still struggling in the journalism industry, even though there are less barriers to entry in new media.

“The tools for entry [to new media] are not as much of a barrier,” she told me. “You need airwaves to broadcast, but you can build a website online, and do something on your own in the new media world. If you look at what BlogHer has accomplished in three years, it’s phenomenal. The entry points are less insurmountable.”

Two women who feel like they have no barriers to entry are Karyn Lu and Lila King, two CNN.com staffers in Atlanta, who got funding for the locative media project, Echo. Their plan is to put signs up around Atlanta encouraging people to share their stories about places via cell phone messages — and let people hear each other’s stories via cell phones, the the web or podcasts, turing the voicemails into custom audio walking tours.

“We’ll have the stories and locations where they occured, but we hope to have walking tours on the website that you can download and customize for your iPod and then take them out for a walk,” said Lu. “It would be great for us to partner with local Atlanta organizations that promote walking and biking like the Atlanta Bicycle Campaign. And then we could co-host events with them and get people outside that way.”

While the NMWE site lists all the facts and figures about how women struggle in the journalism industry (e.g. women make up two-thirds of journalism school students, but make up only one-third of the workforce), Lu and King told me they hadn’t felt any limits in their own careers in new media. The following is a video they posted to explain their project:

Introducing the Echo team from J-Lab on Vimeo.

I spoke to Lu, 28, and King, 31, on the phone recently about the motivation behind Echo, their evolving business plan and how audio is an overlooked medium. The following is an edited version of our discussion.

What’s your background and why did you decide to do this project?

Karyn Lu: I have an undergradute degree in English literature from Wellesley College and a master’s degree in digital media from Georgia Tech, which is a great combination for this project. I did do one other public art project for the city of Atlanta in the summer of 2005. It was also a place-based storytelling experiment, and was one of the projects that, when I was talking to Lila, sparked our interest in working together. It was funded by the city of Atlanta for a three-month run in Freedom Park, which is Atlanta’s largest public green space, and it was called StoryScape.

I was working on it with two other friends from graduate school, and we put up signs all over Freedom Park with phone numbers and location IDs, and we asked people in the park to stop and call in and leave us stories about the park and why it was important to them. It was a great experiment. We put those stories into a database so that when people called in they could hear other stories left by neighbors and fellow Atlantans. We had them up on a website, with a small Flash-based interactive map with signs that people could click on and listen to stories that people had left on that sign.

Lila King: One of the things I’m most proud of in my pre-CNN life is that a friend and I built a proto-podcasting streaming radio site before there was podcasting. We were dissatisfied with the radio where we lived, in Atlanta, so we thought ‘this isn’t rocket science, we can do this.’ So we bought some recorders and interviewed our friends and anyone who would talk with us, and started producing radio pieces for the web.

In doing that, it made me develop an appreciation for the power of storytelling simply through sound, with nothing but a person’s voice narrating their own personal story. There’s something about sound, even coming from a computer speaker or the radio, where you can just close your eyes and imagine the person who’s talking is right beside you. It’s not interpreted through a screen. Because I like storytelling through sound, that’s what brought me to Echo.

I’m really excited that this first pass of the project will be exclusively through sound, because it’s a medium that’s overlooked.

Lu: I have to agree with Lila on that. When I was working on StoryScape and listening to the stories on my phone, I wasn’t looking at a tiny screen, I was standing there looking and smelling the air and listening to the stories and their words were almost bringing back ghosts of events that had happened right there.

Tell me about the genesis of the idea for Echo, and what’s your motivation for doing it?

Lu: It came out of a lot of conversations that Lila and I had at work and outside of work. We are kindred spirits in a way, we’re both tinkerers, and we both taught ourselves how to design and code. It’s satisfying for us to make something ourselves, and have creative control of our projects. Every time we talked, we came away inspired, and thought we should work together on something.

You both taught yourselves how to code?

Lu: Yes, not that we’re great at it. It’s the basics, HTML, CSS and basic design. It’s something we’ve done for a number of years.

King: I don’t consider myself to be a supreme software developer, but there’s enormous ease and possibility on the web. You can learn a little bit and do so much with it. That’s so enticing. Over the years, we’ve often talked about what else we might do. It’s so easy to go from having an idea to making it happen on the web, that doesn’t necessarily map to other media.

Lu: We would always share other projects that other people were doing that were great, and say, ‘Isn’t this great? We could totally do this.’ It came out of different conversations like that. I had mentioned my StoryScape project and she mentioned her radio project and the two melded perfectly together in the way mine collected stories in the public and Lila produced audio pieces.

I see that you’re still brainstorming ideas for it. How formed is the idea at this point? How much do you think it will change?

King: I think the core of the idea is that we enable place-based storytelling about Atlanta, and encourage people to walk and get on their bikes and experience the city outside of cars. We have a kernel of an idea of how we imagine it could happen. I feel really strongly that this is going to evolve considerably over time. Part of our development process is setting up brainstorming dinners among our friends who have different backgrounds and expertise. And every time we talk to someone new, they have a new light to shed on how we might direct the project and what we might do specifically. We’re all ears.

Lu: We have a couple main guiding principles that we’re working with, like getting people outside and walking and cycling more. And we’re committed to working on an open source platform like Drupal. And we’re committed to using audio to start with instead of video or text. And we want to present personal and historical stories side by side. But there are so many great ideas out there, and we’re open to all that. When we have the system up and running, the users will probably surprise us by the way they use it.

Tell me more about the entrepreneurial part of the project. What’s the business model behind it?

[Both laugh]

King: We shouldn’t laugh about it, but to be perfectly blunt, we haven’t talked a lot about a business model behind the project. The motivation is more about motivating our community and adding something to the community. We’re truly only at the beginning. If there’s a business model, great, but…

Lu: I think it’s something that will have to evolve.

[In their proposal to NMWE, Lu and King mention partnerships with local institutions such as the Atlanta Bicyle Campaign, the Clean Air Campaign, and universities that could secure them more funding.]

What will you spend the $10,000 grant on? For your time or for development?

Lu: Most of our budget will go to hiring a designer and developer to help us get our site and our mobile storytelling infrastructure up and running. There will be some costs for printing and mounting the signs, and equipment and hardware and things like that.

Are there deadlines for when you have to have something up and running?

King: Yes, there are guidelines with the grant, we’re supposed to have a prototype up and running within 10 months. So we aim to have our beta site up and running by then. That’s the end deadline for this grant.

What’s the reaction of people at CNN to your project?

King: I don’t know if I want to speak on behalf of other people at CNN, but as far as my friends go and aquaintances, every reaction has been positive, and a lot of people said, ‘How can I help?’ And that’s why we decided to have a series of brainstorming dinners with them. My husband kindly agreed to cook dinner for us. [laughs] So we’ll sit around and talk about what we’re doing.

Lu: It’s one of those things where every time we tell someone else about it, they come up with another fantasic idea for us.

I’ve heard a lot about locative media, both from Medill’s projects and from projects on Idea Lab. Do you think that the community is demanding them, or is it the kind of thing that they like when they see it?

Lu: When I did the StoryScape project I was doing it for a class called Experimental Media. So that says something about how new this is. Communities have always had lots of stories tied to spots, and I don’t think people are demanding it. But based on the reaction we’ve had so far and in the interviews we’ve done in the pilot phase, people get very excited about the project when they realize how powerful the stories can be.

King: I think in Atlanta there is definitely a demand for improved infrastructure for walking and biking. This project is our answer to that demand. It’s one of many, I’m sure.

Lu: It’s our goal to pleasantly surprise the people who live in this city, so they stumble on something that will make their lives a little richer…Space is a physical location that exists without any meaning, but when something personally or culturally significant happens there, then it’s transformed into a place. I think place-based storytelling plays into that.

King: I’m really excited to build something based on mobile phones that nearly everyone has, and isn’t based on a screen or a smartphone that has a visual capability. I like the idea that using the phone opens it up to everyone, plus you can look around the place while you listen to it.

Do you feel like women aren’t represented well in new media? In blogging, there was a time where people said that female bloggers weren’t getting enough recognition, and then BlogHer came along. How do you see the industry right now?

King: I think BlogHer is an amazing organization, but I don’t really perceive in my limited world of new media that there is limited opportunity or exposure for women. I’m proud to receive this grant and take a women-led project out into the world. I don’t feel like as a woman I’m limited in any way.

Lu: I completely agree with that.

*****

What do you think? Can locative media projects like Echo help people get out and walk and bike more in urban places? What’s your view on women in new media? Do the have the same opportunities as men? Share your thoughts or experiences in the comments below.

Embedded in Belgium::Walls Tumble Down as Mediafin Integrates Print, Online Newsrooms.

Recently, MediaShift started running reports from “embeds” at various media outlets and educational institutions. This report comes from Roland Legrand, new media director at Mediafin in Belgium.

The company where I work is well-known in Belgium for its print publications. Mediafin is the publisher behind the Dutch language business daily De Tijd and its Francophone counterpart L’Echo. But in recent years, the company’s Internet sites have grown to rival the popularity of its print editions. In July, Mediafin websites reached a new high of an estimated 160,000 unique visitors on one single day, an amount roughly equivalent to the average number of readers per day. But even as online journalism continues to reach more and more readers, journalists themselves continue to balk at putting their work online.

Many are still captivated by the nostalgic charm of the printed page. Others just find that old habits die hard. Mediafin company management has thrown its support behind efforts to bring the newsroom into the modern media age, to encourage print reporters to embrace new media. As head of the Internet and new media editorial staff, I have seen first-hand the changes instituted and have seen what works and what — at least for now — does not.

Mind the Gap

In addition to publishing De Tijd and L’Echo, Mediafin also operates websites for both publications. On a normal working day, the websites draw about 140,000 to 150,000 unique visitors and receive more than 1 million pageviews. Yet despite the growth of online journalism, only 18 out of Mediafin’s 140 journalists work for the electronic media (not including 5 supporting editorial staff members).

De Tijd started experimenting with electronic media in the early 1990s, long before the Internet became available for the general public. In those days, Internet reporting was considered merely a stepping stone, a place for young, inexperienced journalists to start out. The online editorial desks were mainly staffed by junior journalists, who were supposed to learn the tricks of the trade before becoming full-blown journalists doing print reporting.

Today, Internet reporting is still the domain of younger reporters: Those working for wire services and websites are typically in their 20s, while those at the print desks are in their 30s and 40s. But the second-class status of Internet reporters is gradually changing, as the newsroom comes to recognize the importance of new media.

There is still a gap between the print journalists, used to working almost exclusively for the print publications, and their younger colleagues at the electronic desks, who have worked for online as well as for print publications.

Even in the digital age, most journalists remain veritable luddites. Many do not use RSS-feed readers, do not blog, do not use social bookmarks, and have never collaborated using a wiki. They consider tagging to be something best left to supporting staff, have no experience whatsoever using video and audio, and have only the vaguest idea about telepresence techniques such as virtual environments. While the public has been quick to adapt to changing technologies, journalists have lagged behind and now risk losing touch with their readers.

How to Fix the Gap

The Mediafin editorial management team decided to take drastic action. We looked at the technological and physical infrastructure of the newsrooms and found several barriers to the integration of the old and new media departments:

> Physical infrastructure: Our newsroom was divided by brick walls, separating the online desk from the print desks. We are now demolishing the walls, which will hopefully encourage the two sections to interact more! (See the “before” picture of the walls being ripped down above, and the “after” picture below.)

> Technological infrastructure: Currently, we have separate publishing mechanisms for print, Internet, wire, and mobile services. We are looking for a system which integrates all those platforms. For example, an ideal system might automatically prompt a print journalist to write a version of her story for several online publication formats. (If any MediaShift readers have any suggestions, please let me know.)

> We also plan to install a central news management, overlooking online and print publications.

Our journalists were shocked by some of the new policies integrating print and new media — especially the Web First Policy. Print journalists were used to reserving big scoops to first run in the print newspaper; but under the new policy, scoops were to be published immediately on the web. Less controversial was the announcement of courses introducing print journalists to publishing on the web.

Growing Pains: What Works, What Doesn’t

Because we’re still in a learning process, not every experiment has yet been successful. But some innovations have yielded encouraging results.

What works:

> Web First: When publishing scoops on the Net, we contact the major local news wire, making sure that they credit us correctly. Journalists are pleased that their work is being recognized by colleagues and competitors. Recognition by peers is crucial for journalists.

> Living with comments: Journalists get a better idea of their audience when readers are able to comment on the articles. Although our articles get hundreds of reactions each day, we’ve been surprised to find that site users often use the comments feature more to talk amongst themselves than to give feedback to the reporter. But we are learning that one of the most effective ways to manage communities is…by actually joining in the conversation in a polite and friendly way.

> Constituting communities: We started a community of Belgian expats. People of different backgrounds from all over the world post high quality comments here.

> Blogging: Journalists run several blogs now. One blog in particular has been very successful, Bear & Bull (okay, not that original a name!) about financial markets. We have developed a kind of virtual weekly show around the blog, by holding live sessions with special guests and by allowing the community to participate. Other journalists are involved as “correspondents” — for instance, we have a “banking correspondent” who comments on recent financial developments during the live show.

Unfortunately, not everything has gone completely smoothly. There are a few areas where we are still working out the kinks.

What does not (yet) work:

> Social tools (bookmarks, feed readers, sharing sites, professional networks, life-streaming): Our journalists have resisted using new social networking tools, preferring to rely on their old direct contacts. Some have joined Facebook or Linked In, but the professional results are so far disappointing. There are no rational reasons for this choice. I gather that it is simply hard to acquire these new habits. The heavy workload means that experimenting is not self-evident. The newsroom gets the major news wires (Reuters, Bloomberg, etc.), and reporters avoid other sources as information overload. However, electronic networks and virtual environments do serve as an important source of inspiration — something I will discuss in more detail in a future post.

> Acquiring skills: Learning video, audio, HTML/CSS, JavaScript and Flash skills are very difficult because of heavy daily workloads and the fact that specialists already provide everything beyond simple HTML. Even so, I think it would be useful for reporters to acquire a basic knowledge of these media, if only to be able to communicate more effectively with those specialists.

Now the walls have come tumbling down, literally, but there are still walls to break down around learning. Even though it is not easy for all our colleagues to quickly pick up new skills, they are becoming more aware of new possibilities regarding community management and interactivity. I am sure I will have more to tell you about these changes in the coming weeks and months.

Roland Legrand is in charge of Internet and new media at Mediafin, the publisher of leading Belgian business newspapers De Tijd and L’Echo. He studied applied economics and philosophy. After a brief teaching experience, he became a financial journalist working for the Belgian wire service Belga and subsequently for Mediafin. He works in Brussels, and lives in Antwerp with his wife Liesbeth.

Additional editing for this story by Mike Rosen-Molina

Photo of walls being torn down by Frederik Delaplace; photo of unified newsroom by Nima Ferdowsi. You can see a Flickr photostream of the Mediafin construction here.

Embedded at UBC::Teaching the Technical Without Losing Sight of Journalism.

Recently, MediaShift started running reports from “embeds” at various media outlets and educational institutions. This report comes from Alfred Hermida, an assistant professor at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia.

Classic Hollywood movies tend to idealize the job of the reporter, from Cary Grant in “His Girl Friday” to Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman in “All the President’s Men.” All they needed was a pen and a notebook.

Fast-forward to the 21st century and the picture changes dramatically. Not only would they need to have strong research, reporting and writing skills, the journalists would also be expected to file for the website, upload some photos, shoot video and, of course, write for next day’s paper.

The changes happening in journalism have left j-schools scrabbling to adapt to a multimedia, multi-platform news environment. At the recent annual conference in Chicago of the Association of Educators in Journalism and Mass Communication, the topic preyed on the minds of academics wondering how to cope with the technical demands of today’s journalism.

The challenges for journalism schools are two-fold. First, students need to be taught how to use a wide range of technical tools. Second, and more importantly, they have to learn how to produce real journalism using the technology. This is perhaps the hardest part.

Our students are digital natives, living in an always-on, always-connected world. The challenge in the classroom is less about teaching the technology and more about providing an understanding of how new media tools can be harnessed to create quality journalism.

The Big Disconnect

Like so many others, my j-school at the University of British Columbia has grappled with how to add a layer of technical complexity to an already packed curriculum. When I started here two years ago, I ran a course over two terms that sought to introduce students to multimedia journalism. But this approach had its own limitations. The journalism ended up taking second place in the rush to teach a wide range of technical skills. As it ran as its own separate course, there was a lack of connection to the reporting and writing skills taught in other classes.

This past year, we tried a far more integrated, holistic approach, with the technical training taking place side by side with the journalism instruction. This has allowed us to place the use of technical tools in a news context and we have found that teaching journalism and technology side by side makes a big difference.

Students learn how to, for example, record and edit audio, and then this is followed up by an assignment in which they apply these skills as a reporter. This reinforces the technical aspects but also forces students to understand how the technology can enable them to become better journalists.

However, in my experience, you have to keep stressing the connection between journalistic and technical skills. Simply creating a slideshow in Flash is not journalism. It becomes journalism when it tells a story in a powerful and evocative manner achieved through a combination of compelling images and moving audio.

Accessible Tools

Teaching journalism and technical skills side by side presents its own dilemmas. There are only so many weeks in a semester. It can be difficult to strike a balance between covering the basics of research, interviewing and writing; understanding different narrative structures; and getting the specialized skills to work across media.

The good news is that the tools used for multimedia journalism are much more accessible today than they were in the early days of the web. Back then, creating a website involved learning a program like Dreamweaver. As a result, students could spend weeks knee-deep in HTML code. While a basic grasp of HTML is still valuable, students can create websites today in minutes using hosted services such as Wordpress or Blogger. This frees up valuable time in the classroom to focus on issues like information architecture and usability.

We use Wordpress as a content management system in the classroom to power our course site, TheThunderbird.ca, and have found that students pick it up quickly. Tools like this are becoming more intuitive and easier to use. We welcome anything that stops the technology from getting in the way of journalism.

The added benefit of these tools is that they are often free or inexpensive. I will write in detail about the tools I have found useful in a subsequent posting. With so many choices, journalism educators are spoiled with choices. The stumbling block is not the software, but rather having instructors who can teach it. This is hardly surprising as new media didn’t exist when many professors started their careers in academia.

The result is a generational gap in both media use and understanding. Part of the answer is for instructors to go back to school themselves and pick up these new media skills. Some schools rely on bringing in professional journalists as adjuncts to handle the technical training. Others put the emphasis on students, expecting them to acquire convergence skills outside of regular class time.

I believe that the best way for professors to learn new media tools is to use them, even though this can be a time-consuming process. I suspect many academics would rather spend time on research and writing than learning to create slideshows in Flash or exploring the potential uses of Twitter in the classroom. As journalism educators, we have to be part of the media world of our students, rather than observers looking in from the outside.

Alfred Hermida is an online news pioneer and journalism educator. He is an assistant professor at the Graduate School of Journalism, the University of British Columbia, where he leads the integrated journalism program. He was a founding news editor of the BBC News website. He blogs at Reportr.net.

Report from Beijing:: Cell Phone Use, Texting Widespread in China.

BEIJING — As basketball fans geared up for the U.S.-China pairing on August 10, a banner headline in the China Daily predicted more than a billion fans would watch the game. There were watch parties everywhere — at ex-pat bars, local dives, even the hotel room two doors down from me. And in the lobby, even the security guard working the graveyard shift could watch Yao Ming. For several hours, he kept one eye on the door, and one eye on his cell phone, which he watched for scores, play-by-play reports and even video highlights.

With the opening of the first Apple store in China, there’s been a lot of talk about when the retailer will finally negotiate an Asian contract for its iPhone 3G. But really, why all the fuss? The Chinese market is already saturated with hacked iPhones, complete knockoffs and, most importantly, domestic cell phones that can outperform Apple on its best day.

Internet browsing and email access, until recently only available to the elitist BlackBerry crowd, are standard-issue on most Chinese cell phones. Here, it’s not just wealthy businessmen and yuppie college students who feel a constant need to be connected. It’s people like Guo Jing, the security guard at our hotel watching Yao Ming on the very tiny screen of his cell phone. His position only pays about 2,000 RMB a month (around $300), and his phone cost almost as much. Jing is not alone, either. Almost all of the security guards at Renmin have made similar investments.

Phone-Driven Cell Market

With more than 360 million users, China Mobile does provide almost 70 percent of wireless service in mainland China, but like in Europe, the wireless communication market here is phone-driven, not plan-driven. As a tourist, you can walk into any one of a dozen mobile phone shops on the street and purchase a SIM card that works with the cell phone you already have.

In a truly bizarre blending of tradition with technology, how much you’ll pay depends largely on the cell phone number you’re willing to take. While the Westerner might scan the list for the number closest to his birthday, wedding anniversary or garage door code, the Easterner is looking for lucky number eight. Because the number is said to bring good fortune (08/08/08 at 8:08 p.m., anyone?), customers pay a premium for numbers that have a lot of eights.

Of course, the Beijing Organizing Committee-Olympic Games (BOCOG) had SIM cards waiting for us when we got on the ground in China. There are no eights in my new number, but there aren’t any fours, either. (Because the Chinese word for “four” sounds a lot like the Chinese word for “death,” the number is considered unlucky.)

Along with our new SIM cards, BOCOG handed us new Chinese cell phones as well, but they’re not quite TV ready. In fact, I half expected the tiny gadget to dispense candy, not to make calls. It didn’t help that the thing bore an uncanny resemblance to the Nokia S110 (you know, the one with the endless stream of colored face plates) my sister carried in high school. Even in a room of English-speaking Chinese volunteers, every request I got for help setting up voice-mail was met with a blank stare. Finally, someone explained to all of us that voice-mail isn’t popular in China. Our venue supervisors would be in contact with us via text message.

Here it seems a little odd to have your boss text you, especially when texts come at weird times. For instance, the Chinese concept of acceptable text times seems to be very different than that in America. Kevin, our manager, would often send us texts at one or two in the morning trying to change the time we were all supposed to meet the next day. This was fine if we were planning to meet in the afternoon and he wanted to push the time back an hour or two, but it was somewhat less effective when he’d want to meet at, say, 8:30 a.m. instead of 9:30 a.m. Unless you heard your phone go off in the middle of the night, you wouldn’t get the message until 8:30, when you had your alarm set for in the first place.

This, I’ve learned, is by far the norm in China. Every time I step on the subway, I feel like I’m entering a bizarre scene in some electronic catalog (with Nokia providing the largest number of phones by far) where able-thumbed passengers convert the Roman alphabet into Pinyin and into Chinese characters at rapid speed.

It’s not that I haven’t seen my best friend’s fingers work text message magic so quickly before, it’s just that she’s using a rundown flip phone that’s similar to mine. My Dad (businessman) recently bought his first BlackBerry, and my brother (yuppie) has had an iPhone since they hit the shelves last summer, but most of my friends still use a somewhat clunky cameraphone. Email and Internet access? Only if they convinced their parents to spring for an upgraded plan.

More Cell Phones Than Laptops

On the University of Missouri’s campus in Columbia where I go to school, you’re more likely to see students checking their email on their laptops than their phones. But here at Renmin, where there’s a campus-wide wireless network, only about one-third of students have laptops, so it’s the opposite.

Likewise, when I’m checking headlines online at the New York Times, my Chinese counterpart is probably skimming an SMS message with the same information from Chinese news sources. China Mobile users can pay a small fee to receive headlines on their phones, and during the Olympics, a separate dissemination service keeps subscribers up-to-date on Games news. The ads in the subway have me curious, but I’m not quite sure I’m ready for news on the tiny screen of my cell phone. After all, I held out for an entire month before getting a cell phone charm, an absolute Chinese must-have.

Plenty of students in my group have swapped their usual SIM cards for their Chinese SIM card because they couldn’t stand the stripped down model BOCOG provided. Journalists constantly complain about the lack of features and familiarity with the phones they’ve acquired during their brief stay.

I can’t blame them: I’ve spent plenty of time in the last year glancing woefully from my inexpensive Samsung to friends’ powerful iPhones. I’ve told myself a dozen times that as a journalism student, I too could benefit from 24/7 access to email, but at the same time, I know I’m sitting in front of my computer anyway nine times out of ten. I’ve always resisted the urge to upgrade, and in China, the tradition continues. Maybe I just haven’t had long enough to adjust to the 2 a.m. text messages from my work supervisor with instructions on where to go and what to do when I wake up.

Elle Moxley is a student at the University of Missouri pursuing dual degrees in journalism and sociology. Currently, she is living in Beijing, China, spending two months working for the Olympic News Service at the XXIX Olympic Games.

Photo of Chinese texters by Kimberli via Flickr.

3-Ring Political Circus::Will the Big Tent in Denver Help Bloggers Break Through?.

Mark Glaser is on vacation this week, but we are happy to have blogger/journalist Simon Owens filling in as guest blogger. Here is his report on the upcoming Democratic Convention.

As the 2008 Democratic Convention quickly approaches, thousands of journalists will begin swarming into Denver for what is sure to be an around-the-clock media event. Reporters will interview throngs of convention goers to examine every facet of the political landscape and the implications it has for the upcoming election.

Among these mainstream media bees will be a wave of new media journalists appearing out of the Wild West of the Internet to lay at least partial claim to the stories that will be emerging from the convention. A number of these bloggers will be working at a location outside the building in a facility appropriately called the Big Tent Denver. Whether these new media reporters will be able to produce compelling convention coverage without constant access to its participants remains to be seen.

Inside the Pepsi Center itself, there will be approximately 50 bloggers — one from each state — who applied for and received press passes to attend the event. Though only a few blogger passes were offered at the 2004 convention, the rise of new media since then has made a blogger presence a necessity now. Conferences organized by bloggers are now attended by well-known figures and politicians, and several major news stories have been uncovered by citizen journalists armed simply with Blogspot and Wordpress accounts.

So this year there wasn’t even a question as to whether bloggers would be admitted into the Democratic National Convention; it was just a matter of how many. Still, several bloggers expressed disappointment when the DNC only handed out 50 blogger passes. It was in the midst of this disappointment that the announcement for the Big Tent was made.

Huge Demand for Tent Access

Hosted by Daily Kos, Progress Now, and the Alliance for Sustainable Colorado, the Big Tent will be a 9,000-square foot, two-story erected structure a few blocks away from the Pepsi Center where the convention will be held. It will be specifically geared toward new media — bloggers, podcasters, vloggers— and its sponsors include both Google and Digg.

Aaron Nelson, project director for the Alliance for Sustainable Colorado, told me that the discussion for organizing the tent began about seven or eight months ago.

“We recognize that more and more people are turning to new media and as a result new media has become a powerful driving force,” he said. “We’re providing access to resources and platforms to discuss politics and sustainability. We made it a non-partisan event and bloggers that have access to our tent represent this. For example we have people from Daily Kos and we also have bloggers from the Heritage Foundation — completely different sides of the spectrum.”

The organization received over 3,000 applications for those who wanted to attend the Big Tent, but because of spacing restrictions and fire codes, only a fraction of those were accepted. Though the final count is a “moving target,” as he put it, there will likely be around 300 bloggers and other new media journalists who will participate.

I asked Nelson what benefit the bloggers would have at the tent, given that they wouldn’t get access to the building where the convention is actually being held. The bloggers, for instance, wouldn’t be able to walk among the convention-goers and use that atmosphere to provide context to their reporting. Why wouldn’t a blogger just stay home and watch the event on his television?

“Well, we’re going to try a couple things,” he said. “First, we’re trying to develop partnerships and momentum to lure convention participants over to our tent. Being half a block outside the security line, we think it’ll be simpler than maybe otherwise. The other incentive is that we simply provide a gathering place with access to resources, including food and WiFi. These are the kinds of resources that the new media hasn’t experienced at any other major national event.”

Who Gets In and Who Doesn’t

Though the organizers are still pulling together much of the programming and offerings that will be available, he said the tent will likely beam out live streaming video — what he called the “Virtual Big Tent” — so that Internet viewers who are not able to attend can watch the events inside the facility unfold.

I asked him to explain the breakdown of the tent and how those who aren’t credentialed Big Tent bloggers will be able to move about the facility. Would convention-goers be allowed to wander in?

“There’s a small part of the space sponsored by Google that is accessible by people,” Nelson responded. “But the majority of the tent will be for credentialed bloggers only. The second floor of the tent will be the media lounge and nobody but the credentialed people will be allowed up there. The ground floor will have a bit more multi-use, so it will have a little more accessibility. But nonetheless there will only be a limited number of spots for those who don’t have reservations.”

Valerie Reynolds, like many of the bloggers I interviewed for this article, first found out about the Big Tent through a press release published on Daily Kos. As a lesbian progressive blogger living in Tennessee, she said that she was driven to online media because she didn’t feel represented by the news outlets in her red state.

Reynolds, 52, runs a horse farm 45 minutes northwest of Nashville and she writes for Avalon Farm Blog, a site that focuses on a number of issues ranging from LGBT rights to blues music. With her background in radio, she also operates a podcast that functions as a spin-off from her blog.

“Basically I just wanted to be there at this historic event,” she said of the convention. “I wanted to be part of it, both as a podcaster and also to shoot video. I’ve got the gear, I know how to use it, and I’m pretty good at interviewing. I thought why not just place myself in the middle of it and see what stories develop.”

I asked Reynolds how the Big Tent would fit into the larger realm of media coverage at the convention, and whether it would serve as an effective alternative to more mainstream news outlets.

“I think the more voices that are in the conversation, the richer the dialog is going to be,” she responded. “The big thing with bloggers is there is no gatekeeper, you’re not hearing the message of the day, you’re hearing it as it happens. Depending on the level of expertise and the talent, it’s like having an eyewitness for you. What I love about the Big Tent is that they were so open to diversity.”

Bringing Regional Issues to the Fore

Both Matt Reichbach and Tracy Viselli will be viewing the Big Tent through a regional lens — he for his blog focusing on New Mexico politics and she for her site centered around downtown development in Reno, Nevada.

“I really want to focus on some of our local or state stories,” Viselli told me. “For instance, not only is Nevada a swing state, my county is considered the swing county in the state. Also, we have the possibility of electing our first all-female congressional delegation, which is really exciting.”

She explained that her “over-arching narrative” at the Big Tent will be written from the point of view of a female progressive blogger from a swing state, a fact that she believes gives her a unique perspective.

For his part, Reichbach said he’d try to focus on New Mexico and Western issues, hopefully getting one-on-one interviews with key legislators from his area.

“I’m sure there’s going to be plenty of opportunities to focus on the west since it’s in Colorado,” he said. “Democratic candidates from New Mexico are going to be over there and I’m going to try to talk to them. Actually something we’ve been doing on our blog a lot lately is podcasts through Blog Talk Radio. It’s basically just an online radio show that people can listen to live and can call into.”

Skepticism About the Big Tent

Despite the enthusiasm of many of the Big Tent participants I spoke to, there has been a fair amount of skepticism as well. In the comments section of an Alternet article about the tent, one person wrote that “any learned, critical thinking, reasoned human being would realize that this is a charade to sugar up and pacify the progressive community.”

“‘Walking distance’ from the convention?” another person wrote. “The first commenter is right: this is a joke. It’s called a ‘consolation prize.’”

I spoke to Sarah Granger, a blogger who has directed Internet strategy for a few campaigns and writes regularly for several sites. She is one of the few bloggers who will have access to both the convention itself and the Big Tent; she’ll be attending with several other writers from MOMocrats, and the group will be sharing a single blogger pass to the Pepsi Center, switching back and forth between it and the tent. I asked her whether the Big Tent would be a viable alternative to the news outlets that will have more around-the-clock access to the convention-goers.

“It’s going to be different,” she said. “It’s going to be a different group of people that are there. There won’t be as much bumping into the Congressmen in the hallway, it’ll be more of networking with other bloggers. That does have a lot of value too, it’s just going to be different, I think.”

I pressed further, asking, “Do you think it’ll be less value at all, because the bloggers are not going to be on the ground in the convention?”

“I think that having worked for a number of candidates and elected officials, I think they have their own sort of agendas, and mostly they’ll want to network with each other while they’re there,” Granger responded. “But I would not be surprised if some of them reserved some time to come talk to the media. I just don’t honestly believe that everyone is going to come out to the Big Tent. I don’t think they will. Also, a lot of people don’t understand the power of the blogosphere, so they may or may not be that tapped into it quite yet.”

In a July 14 Huffington Post piece, Granger complained about the lack of communications from the DNCC when it comes to what access credentialed bloggers will have, including what kind of Internet will be offered and how the final night at Invesco Field will affect them.

In our interview, she said that one advantage to the Big Tent is that the organizers have been much better at talking to the bloggers and giving them the logistics of what to expect.

“They have been very good about explaining their whole process of applying,” Granger said. “And they’ve been very good about getting back to us. Like we had one person in our group who applied under a different blog name, and due to a family emergency she won’t be able to be there. We wanted to see if we could still use the pass for the group, and they’re working with us to figure out a way to do that. They’ve been very responsive and very helpful, I think.”

What do you think? Will the Big Tent be a good way to get bloggers more access to the Democratic Convention, or is it just a consolation prize? Should the DNC have credentialed more bloggers? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Simon Owens is a 24-year-old newspaper journalist living in Virginia. He writes the Bloggasm blog, launched in late 2005 and focusing on the intersection of new and old media. It often includes in-depth feature articles on a variety of media subjects.

Embedded in China::How a Protester Pulled Off the Clandestine Radio Broadcast in Beijing.

This is a special report for MediaShift from the person who set up a clandestine FM radio broadcast in Beijing to protest censorship. The correspondent is associated with Reporters Without Borders, but is writing under the pseudonym “Mina Martin” for fear of retribution from the Chinese government. You can hear the 20-minute broadcast in English, French and Mandarin at this site.

Beijing, 8.08 a.m. on August 8

The voices of Chinese human rights activists can be heard on the radio. A former journalist describes the censorship she experienced, and a human rights activist explains the increasing crackdown on Chinese dissidents that has occurred these past few months. A former political prisoner complains about the appalling conditions in which he was held.

Have the Chinese authorities gone wild and suddenly opened the airwaves? Is this happening in another century when China has opened up to the world and embraced freedom of expression?

Not quite. This is August 8, 2008 at 8.08 a.m., exactly 12 hours before the start of the Olympics Games’ opening ceremony. This radio station is not like the others broadcasting in China this morning. It’s Radio Without Borders, a free radio broadcast launched by Reporters Without Borders, the international press freedom organization, the first clandestine radio broadcast in modern China.

I was a key player in that broadcast, and this is my story.

Broken Promises for Freedom of Speech

I woke up that morning at 5 a.m., after only a few hours of sleep. I should have been tired and jetlagged, having been in Beijing for a few days, exploring the city to find the best places where my colleagues and I could broadcast a pre-recorded radio program to mark the opening of the Games. It would be a symbolic gesture of defiance, protesting the lack of free speech in China and the broken promises of the Olympics organizers.

In 2001, when Beijing was chosen as the Host City for the 2008 Summer Games, the authorities promised an improvement in the human rights status and “complete freedom of the press.” In the months leading to the Games, censorship increased. Chinese editors were forbidden to address sensitive Games-related issues by the Propaganda Department. Dissidents such as Hu Jia, asking for more human rights before the Games and talking to foreign media about the issues, were sent to jail. We call them the Olympic prisoners.

The new rules adopted in 2007 for foreign reporters gave them more flexibility, but numerous incidents and violations were still recorded. And when the Games started, foreign journalists were angered when they were denied access to an uncensored version of the Internet, a violation of the promises made by the International Olympic Committee. Some reporters were even roughed up when they covered the few activist demonstrations or saw their candid sources end up in jail.

We were promised access to free information. It was not delivered. We decided to provide it ourselves. To do this, Reporters Without Borders was going to take over an FM frequency, air some independent information, and give a voice to those who are being denied access to the Chinese media — China’s dissidents. After all, the Chinese authorities are used to jamming international radio stations. This is fair enough.

Finding a Broadcast Spot

When I land in Beijing in early August for a “vacation,” the sky is very foggy but the people look genuinely excited about the Games. Mascots and Beijing 2008 flags have taken over the city. It looks like a gigantic sports club. At the airport, I stress while my luggage goes through security. I am transporting some of the radio’s materials. But the luggage gets through, and they let me in.

The police presence is noticeable but not overwhelming. But it is impossible to estimate the number of plain-clothes policemen and informants. While walking in Tiananmen Square, I was photographed more times than I took pictures. Definitely not a good place to set up a radio broadcast. It would not last more than a few seconds.

Booths with “Olympic volunteers” ready to help you find your way, answer your questions about the Games or help you out with translation requests can be found at every corner.

Impossible to broadcast near the Olympic Village or the Media Center, the access is blocked yards before. I need to find a place from where I can stand less than 100 meters away. The Beijing International Media Center is accessible. I have found it. This will be the place where I can operate the broadcast. My colleagues will be stationed outside of other venues including the international news agencies Reuters and AFP. We want as many reporters to hear the radio so they can relay the news.

Foreign reporters and other contacts are being warned by Reporters Without Borders HQ in Paris to listen to the frequency 104.4. It was available at the different locations we chose and I thought it would still be free on Aug 8. Plus, the number 4 is considered an unlucky number by the Chinese people because its homonym is the word “death.”

Hiking Sticks as Antennas

On D-Day, we bike to our different destinations. The metro was out of the question; every bag has to go through an x-ray machine. I leave early, in case some streets would be closed, but everything is fine and I settled in at a park a few blocks away, trying to kill time and watching Chinese people practicing tai chi. Despite the tension, I am very focused, eager to get going with our mission. I give up the idea of putting the material together in the park. I am the only Westerner around and I feel as though I am being watched.

At 7:50 a.m., it’s time to go. I take my bag and walk toward the BIMC. It’s early. I can see fewer policemen than I did last night. I sit on a wall on the other side of the road, trying to act casually, as a tourist. The antennas are hidden within hiking sticks. I take them out of my backpack and screw them together with an additional piece supposed to link the antennas and to allow the signal to be transmitted. I put a huge Beijing 2008 flag on top of the hiking sticks and it looks as though I am holding a flagpole.

In my other bag, I have a transmitter, already set on the 104.4 FM frequency. I plug the transmitter’s cable to the sticks. I push the Play button on the MP3 player, and check on my portable radio to see if I can hear anything. I can’t. I check the setup again, everything looks fine but I still can’t hear anything. Panic. What do I do? Then Jef Julliard, the deputy director of Reporters Without Borders in Paris, calls me to confirm the radio can be heard from the media center. Now I just have to wait and see…

Giving Interviews Under Disguise

Some reporters who were tipped off about our broadcast come to interview me with TV or radio equipment. I put on my hat and huge sunglasses. It’s a fashion crime but I need to protect my identity. In case I am not arrested right away, I don’t want to be found at the hotel. A couple of minutes later, cars of policemen are arriving, apparently looking for something. The reporters become nervous but continue interviewing me.

Some policemen pass behind us to try to listen to what we were saying, looking suspicious. I change my tone to “I am so happy to be here, I love sports, Beijing is so nice, blah blah blah.” As soon as the policemen leave the area, I switch right back to “repression has been increasing these past months.”

I will learn later that some policemen are checking the media center with airwaves interception material, trying to locate where the signal is coming from. I spend another 45 minutes answering the journalists’ questions and then it is time to go.

I get rid of my material in the trash can behind me, starting with the MP3 player and the hiking sticks. I walk toward my bike, then leave the area trying to look relaxed but still unable to believe we were able to do the broadcast and we are all still free. I call my colleagues in Beijing with another SIM card and they confirm that they are fine and safe.

I do a few more interviews over the phone and then get rid of my last Chinese cell phone so as not to be found. Our HQ are left to explain to the world what has happened. In the plane on my way back, I think of a Chinese journalist who warned that these would be the no-fun Olympics. I was more afraid of the “no-news Games.” But with Radio Without Borders, we were able to show that the news monopoly is breakable. We made our voice heard, peacefully. It was a way of saying censorship just wouldn’t work. One way or another, the free flow of information cannot be stopped.

Embedded in Bowling Green::Newspapers Can Do Online Video on a Modest Budget.

Recently, MediaShift started running reports from “embeds” at various media outlets and educational institutions. This report comes from Mark Van Patten, general manager for the online efforts at the Bowling Green (Ky.) Daily News.

I was as excited as anybody to be able to post video on our website. Our newspaper readers were turning more and more to their computer screen to read our news and it seemed logical that they would appreciate and enjoy seeing video enhancements for the print edition.

My excitement soon turned to frustration as I started to run into hurdles. While I saw an opportunity to expand our “share of mind,” our photojournalists saw it as an expansion of their work load. There also was immediate disagreement over hardware and software needs.

Now, the hardware and software issues have been resolved, but we still haven’t come to a mutual understanding or agreement on who should do what and when. Consequently, local video on our website is not fresh. As general manager, I have no oversight of the newsroom, only the online newspaper.

Getting the Right Equipment

I think photographers are often too involved with looking the part rather than getting results. It is especially true when it comes to photographers shooting video. When we made the commitment to video, our chief photographer purchased a prosumer videocamera, i.e. a camera that was between top-of-the-line professional and an amateur — or consumer — camera. It was an unnecessary expense, but it looked good.

Our online director Chris Houchens offers this great example when he speaks to newspaper groups on how to do video:

What photographers say they need

This is what your photographers say they want. A prosumer camcorder that looks so different from the regular consumer camcorder that the shooter will obviously be doing “serious” work.

What photographers really need

This is what photographers need. Since the end result is going to be web video — not broadcast — the difference in quality isn’t discernible by the average viewer.

Excellent video and sound can be captured without spending more than $700 total on equipment including camera, tripod and microphone. However, the photographer won’t look like the photographer from the TV station. Despite the size of your community, people know what TV photographers should look like.

Overcoming the look of being a photographer shooting video is not a small hurdle and should be addressed early on.

Gary Moyers, webmaster for Shurz Communications newspapers in Kentucky, told the Kentucky Press Association recently:

When we started, we got the big $8,000 Sony camera…it came with all the bells and whistles, but the equipment doesn’t have to be that costly…at (Jessamine Journal in Nicholasville, Ky. (6,200 circulation weekly), they have a $300 JVC camera that works fine and they post their videos through YouTube.

Getting the Right Software

Probably the most often overlooked aspect of newspapers putting video online is the software needed to make better video. Video is better when it is edited. If a newspaper is shooting and uploading raw unedited video it often will have the YouTube look, i.e. amateur. But with simple software, often free, video can easily be edited and you can even add a voiceover after the fact to give it a more professional look.

At the Daily News, we started with Visual Communicator Pro. We paid about $200 for the software a couple years ago. Since we purchased it, the company has been acquired by Adobe and the software now sells for $400 with numerous additional features. The version we have is useful for web productions. Houchens used it for a couple years to produce our daily online tease for the print edition.

This is a Daily News Now webcast that was produced by Chris Houchens using Visual Communicator Pro. The webcast is no longer produced because of a decline in viewer interest.

What photographers say they need

Newspaper photographers think they need a full blown professional editing bay (like the one pictured here), when in fact a smaller, less costly alternative is available and perfectly acceptable for web video. (Photo by DF Shapinsky for PINGNews.com/Shapinsky MultiMedia via Flickr.)

What photographers really need

The Daily News uses Visual Communicator Pro with no special lighting, as you can see in this photo. The green backdrop is a vinyl sheet that is included with the software package. However, we have replaced the coat rack with a more permanent string suspension arrangement from the ceiling.

For editing raw video, Houchens uses the software that came with the video card, Pinnacle. He classifies it as a mid-grade editing program. Daily News photographers prefer to use Final Cut Pro Express from Apple.

This is a video story produced using Pinnacle software included with the computer video card.

This is a video story produced by Chris Houchens using Final Cut Express.

Who Shoots Video

At the Daily News we have two video sections on our main page. One area is reserved for photojournalists’ work, called Multimedia and includes slide-shows and video; the other is for all the other video and is labeled Web Video.

If we get one video story a week from the newsroom, it’s been a good week. Our web video is shot by myself and Houchens. We also run hot and cold on getting new video online. Since we both have other duties, we just don’t force ourselves to get out and shoot. In our newsroom, there is very little discussion of the online newspaper and how it can be used to enhance the print edition. Houchens does not sit in on newsroom planning meetings.

This indicates to me that the online newspaper is still viewed as something less than journalistically worthy of consideration. It is still an afterthought in the newsroom.

Mark Van Patten isn’t as smart as he thinks he is. He has compensated by surrounding himself with smart people. As a result, he in his 38th year of working at small newspapers, starting on the street as an ad sales rep and working his way up to publisher. Currently, Van Patten is general manager of the Daily News in Bowling Green, Kentucky. He blogs, Twitters, Flickrs, Diggs, Stumbles, Tumblrs, and Woopras his way through the web and is Linked-in. He blogs at MarkVanPatten.com for business and GoingLikeSixty.com for fun.

Digging Deeper::The Best 2008 Political Convention Coverage Online.

In 2004, the major political conventions gave a few dozen bloggers press credentials, a historic moment for the new media outsiders. And this year, the political conventions have tried to be even more open to bloggers, video reporters, podcasters and new media. The Democratic convention credentialed 120 bloggers, and the GOP has credentialed 200 bloggers, according to Forbes.

And the Democratic convention taking place in Denver this week also includes the Big Tent, a hangout for new media types outside the convention sponsored by Google and Digg. There have been panel discussions, appearances by political dignitaries and free beer, smoothies and massages there. (Simon Owens looked at the Big Tent in-depth for MediaShift last week.)

But perhaps the more interesting trend at the conventions this year is that it’s more difficult to tell the independent bloggers from the mainstream media bloggers. As traditional media embraces a multi-platform approach, including their audience in citizen media reports, the distinction between who deserves a media credential and who doesn’t has blurred like never before.

One example: Social-news site Digg and CNN’s citizen media-generated iReport are co-producing Digg Dialogg, where Digg’ers and other concerned citizens can ask questions to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The questions are then rated “thumbs up” or “thumbs down,” with the most popular being asked to Pelosi in a special Q&A with Digg CEO Jay Adelson. (No. 1 question so far: “Please describe what Net Neutrality is and your position on the issue.”)

Insiders or Outsiders?

Perhaps the more interesting question is whether indie bloggers and new media folks are now becoming a part of the mainstream at the same time the mainstream is reaching out and using the tactics of the independents. When the staid C-SPAN network is lauded by TechCrunch for using live-streaming Qik cams at the political conventions, you can feel change in the air for the media.

For example, independent bloggers in the Big Tent have already succeeded in getting big names to participate in panels and interviews — from Arianna Huffington to Dan Rather and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). At what point does blog coverage become indistinguishable from coverage by mainstream media?

“It does make you wonder. This blog culture that grew up outside of the traditional media, are we starting to step up to the stage and be with them as equals?” Daily Kos blogger Georgia Logothetis told the National Journal.

Actually, some of the hardest-hitting work so far at the Democratic convention has come from bloggers outside the traditional media. Sunlight Foundation set up a special Party Time blog to track which corporate sponsors were holding pricey shindigs for which lobbyists and politicians. In a similar vein, Salon’s Glenn Greenwald reported on a lavish AT&T party for Blue Dog Democrats that barred members of the press, including bloggers.

While citizen-generated media has an increased presence at the conventions these days, that populist ethos has yet to alter the fundamental nature of the conventions itself. Even with a few hundred independent bloggers in the mix, there are 15,000 total press in attendance at the conventions from around the world.

The political parties themselves could do a lot more to include their audiences outside the convention hall. TechPresident blogger Micah Sifry, who decided to stay home to watch the event on TV and online this year, said the conventions could do better:

This week, something like 20 million people will tune in each night to watch the conventions, but I’d be surprised if either the Democrats or the Republicans try to create any kind of interactive community out of that audience. Yes, they did a YouTube contest to find a representative “average person” to give them a free pass to attend, and yes, they’re using tools like blogs and Flickr to keep us informed on how the conventions are taking shape. But in terms of making the actual events more engaging, they’re probably spending more time worrying about the timing of the balloon drop.

Following the Conventions Online

So where do you start when looking for convention coverage online? With so many news outlets, bloggers, live video streams and Twitterers, what’s standing out? The following is a guide to some of the better sites covering the conventions. With so many voices in the mix, the best way to start is with aggregators that can give you a snapshot of what’s happening in various online platforms and communities.

Aggregators

> Perspctv
Nice startup site compares polls, with live feeds from blogs, Twitter and news sites

> Google Convention Page
Aggregates news, photos, videos and blogs for both conventions

> Yahoo Full Coverage: Democratic Convention
> Yahoo Full Coverage — Republican Convention
The usual news, photos, video, blogs, related sites — deeper than Google’s effort

> Politweets
Twitter entries that contain tidbits on McCain or Obama

> #dnc tag search on Twitter
> #rnc tag search on Twitter
Follow Twitter entries that include tags for conventions

TV Network Video

> C-SPAN’s Democratic Convention Hub and Republican Convention Hub
Nice online channel for videos from conventions, along with live streams on Qik

> CNN Political Video
Typical playlist of convention videos, with citizen media videos on iReport

> ABCNews Video
Good player with politics section, including classic convention moments

> NewsHour Insider Forum
Interviews at the convention with questions from the audience

Independent Blogs

> TechPresident
Focus on technology and politics, with bloggers from left and right

> Wonkette
Still a funny sendup of politics, now unmoored from Gawker Media

> Huffington Post
Doing a convention swarm of coverage, including Off the Bus citizen reports

> Heritage Foundation’s The Foundry
Conservative think-tank dissects Dem confab schwag, Big Tent panels

> Pajamas Media Elections 2008
Aggregation of conservative blogs, including lots of convention video

> Glenn Greenwald’s Unclaimed Territory
Biting reporting and commentary with depth from the Dem confab

Major Media Blogs

> ABC News’ The Note
Latest post on Bill Clinton/Obama has more than 12,500 comments

> Reuters’ Tales from the Trail
Includes video reports from 40 delegates given small cameras from Reuters

> New York Times’ The Caucus
Group effort by Times political correspondents to cover every angle of confabs

> Washington Post’s This Just In
Running list of latest blog posts from the convention by Post staffers, including from opinion writers’ PostPartisan

> LA Times’ Top of the Ticket
Nice roundup and analysis of items, along with multimedia and speech transcripts

> National Review Online’s The Corner
Not major media, but a major voice in conservative group blogging

Political Sites

> Politico
Newbie comes out strong with wall-to-wall coverage and poll tracker

> CQ Politics
Congressional Quarterly’s free site includes blog posts from former Wonkette, Ana Marie Cox

> Real Clear Politics
More of an aggregator than original news site; has heavy emphasis on polls

Video Sites

> YouTube’s You Choose 08
Includes official video from convention as well as videos from candidates on issues

> Big Tent’s YouTube channel
Archived video from Big Tent events during the DNC

> C-SPAN on Qik
Extra coverage with small videocameras mainly outside conventions halls

> TheUptake.org
More live video feeds from citizen reporters on the scene via Qik

Twitter Feeds

> dncjournalists
> rncjournalists
Poynter’s Steve Myers is aggregating journalist feeds into one mega-feed

> HuffPost
Aggregation of Huffington Post folks who are Twittering conference

> RobertBluey
Heritage Foundation media guy who will be more active at RNC

> GOPconvention
Twittering from Minnesota’s public affairs news service

> bigtentdenver
Aggregation of Big Tent denizens’ feeds

> TwitterPacks’ List of Twitters
Lists Twitter feeds for people at both confabs

Special Features

> Denver Post’s Map of DNC Events
Annotated map includes filters for editor’s picks, official and unofficial events

> Rocky Mountain News’ Unconventional Wisdom
Special report with advice to Obama from 10 people, including Ralph Nader and Jerry Brown

> Wall Street Journal’s The Parties’ Parties
Breaks down which corporations are giving how much to sponsor conventions

> New York Times’ View of the Convention
A 360-degree panoramic photo shot that rotates while you hear audio of Hillary’s intro; with “full screen” mode you are there

> USA Today’s Electoral Vote Tracker
Lets you play out various state-by-state scenarios and see historical election results

Articles on New Media Coverage

> Bloggers at Democratic convention plant their stake at Christian Science Monitor

> Following political conventions the Web 2.0 way at ComputerWorld

> How To Follow The Democratic National Convention LIVE On The Web at Silicon Alley Insider

> New Media Stream Into an Old Tradition at the New York Times

> Social media mobs the national conventions at LATimes’ Web Scout

*****

Which sites have you used to follow the conventions online? Which ones have done innovative work? Share your favorites in the comments below and I’ll update the list, with credit to you.

Photos of Google smoothie and Big Tent action by Ashley Dinges via Flickr.

Embedded at the DNC::Bloggers Make Progress Covering Convention at DNC.

DENVER — Even for members of the traditional media here in Denver, access to floor seating at the convention has been scarce, and talk time with politicians and celebrities at the Democratic National Convention is a game of persistence and luck. Some days you see all the newsmakers, other days you’re stuck on the outside with the gawkers, watching Anderson Cooper do your job.

But for the bloggers who followed all the DNC rules and took advantage of never-before-seen opportunities to cover the convention in Denver, access has been unprecedented, and relationships between the party and the bloggers who cover it are improving.

“We’re definitely being treated as press by the people that matter,” Pam Pohly of EverydayCitizen.com told me. “The DNC has been fabulous.”

Pohly added that the party even explained some journalism-lingo terms to her when they were unclear in memos to the press.

“They’ll write back and explain,” she said. “They’ve said they’re honored to have us.”

Floor Access Still Tricky

That said, like anything new, accessibility has not come without its challenges. State delegations control the floor access for the journalists that cover their local regions. So when a state isn’t on board with helping out new media, the party can do little to enforce the rules. Pohly said her Internet connection and charging station weren’t accessible at her embed with the Kansas delegation and that she had trouble getting information about delegate events outside the Pepsi Center.

“I’m a party person turned new media, not the other way around; that’s why it was shocking to me,” she said.

It takes about three tries to find the right place to go at the Pepsi Center to find the bloggers in their main filing space. It’s not well marked, and many have complained about having trouble knowing where to go. Few of the security officials I spoke with had any clue where there “bloggers lounge” even was.

But in the Big Tent, with familiar logos like Digg and Google, the bloggers have a respite to themselves, away from the traditional media facilities in the Pepsi Center parking lot, complete with smoothie bar and massage chairs at the Google retreat. Is all this fueling jealousy