[Music]
journalism has a problem and because
journalism has a problem we all have a
problem that problem is knowing what’s
true for a century or more we relied on
journalism to tell us what was true
in the form of stories stories that we
went to hear in a vast media theater we
called the media sitting as an audience
in that theater held our culture
together there was gravity there the
gravity of agreement about what
journalism told us was true then the
internet came along and blew that
theater up it did that by giving us a
vast new habitat a digital habitat where
everyone and everything was connected
this was new to human experience
there was nothing quite like this it was
strange to us and strange to our
institutions because the internet
doesn’t have gravity it doesn’t have
distance there’s no gravity because the
Internet is not a place you’re either
there or you’re not there and if you are
there the distance between you and
anyone or anything else is zero so the
defining limits of media in the physical
world the ones that gave shape to our
theatre aren’t there so living in this
place is is just utterly strange to us
so if you’re in publishing the terms
distribution and circulation are gone
they’re obsolete and for
Broadcasters range and coverage are also
gone these are just delivery costs that
disappear in the digital world meanwhile
each of us can also publish we can also
broadcast we can forage for facts and
share those with anyone anywhere who
might be interested this means that any
of us can do the job in the digital
world that journalism did in the
physical one but the job is not the same
it’s not the same because we are now
digital as well as physical beings and
we need new ways to inform each other
about what’s true ways we can trust now
we can’t trust we can’t trust the new
digital media that have grown up and
built up on top of the ruins of the old
media theater we can’t trust it because
it is funded by surveillance based
advertising
we can’t trust surveillance based
advertising because it wants to shove
tracking beacons in the private parts of
our computers and mobile devices
besides massively violating personal
privacy tracking based advertising hosts
a black market in fraud and malware and
it supports fake news by making
so who can we trust to tell us what’s
true
the answer is each other and the place
to start is here in the physical world
we could do that right now
we look around at the people around us
we’ll notice that everybody looks
different and everybody sounds different
this is by nature’s design and by our
own we are all so different than we were
five minutes ago
if you tell me and is also by design is
that we you know we we learn best from
each other so if you tell me something I
didn’t know I’m not just informed by
that I am formed by it I am changed I’m
not exactly who I was in this sense we
are all authors of each other and what
we call authority is the right that we
give certain others to form us to make
us who we are
journalism had that authority in the old
physical world and it earned that
authority by being honest and
responsible we can do that too we have a
good example of that from a few months
ago in Montecito which is a town next
door to us here in Santa Barbara when
debris floes devastated the town debris
flows are rivers of boulders and mud
that flow off the face of a mountain
when a heavy rain storm follows a
wildfire many people were killed many
homes were destroyed many roads were
covered in boulders and mud or blocked
and the whole town was evacuated very
little information or news got out while
the town was evacuated and rest
workers did their jobs but countless
people stepped up to inform each other
using digital tools there were pilots
and ham radio operators who posted what
they knew online there were authorities
on geology who explained debris flows
and how they happen in helpful ways
there were official sources like the
police fire and rescue who published
what they needed to through official
channels and victims and and survivors
posted things on YouTube and county
workers public official of public people
would gather data and publish those in
helpful maps that helped each other it
helped all of us out and the traditional
media the print and broadcast media they
did their job – and they did it well but
their job wasn’t just telling a story it
was sharing it with the rest of us so
one of the clearest takeaways that we
have from this experience is that the
traditional media can’t do the job
because they’re just trying to tell a
story that’s the old way that you there
are too many important facts for a story
to tell by itself that didn’t work and
that won’t work now and it frankly never
did the whole story that we’re in now is
about how we adapt together to lives
that are both digital and physical and
how we rebuild the cultural center that
we lost we can’t do that by turning our
lives over to systems whose job is to
spy on us that will only drive us
farther apart than we are
we can rebuild our Civic and cultural
center by informing each other the way
we did in Montecito this is how we
formed civilization in the first place
and it’s how we reformed it over and
over again
now it’s by using digital tools to help
our communities that we can become the
best possible authors of each other and
of the culture we share thank you [Applause]
journalism has a problem and because
journalism has a problem we all have a
problem that problem is knowing what’s
true for a century or more we relied on
journalism to tell us what was true
in the form of stories stories that we
went to hear in a vast media theater we
called the media sitting as an audience
in that theater held our culture
together there was gravity there the
gravity of agreement about what
journalism told us was true then the
internet came along and blew that
theater up it did that by giving us a
vast new habitat a digital habitat where
everyone and everything was connected
this was new to human experience
there was nothing quite like this it was
strange to us and strange to our
institutions because the internet
doesn’t have gravity it doesn’t have
distance there’s no gravity because the
Internet is not a place you’re either
there or you’re not there and if you are
there the distance between you and
anyone or anything else is zero so the
defining limits of media in the physical
world the ones that gave shape to our
theatre aren’t there so living in this
place is is just utterly strange to us
so if you’re in publishing the terms
distribution and circulation are gone
they’re obsolete and for
Broadcasters range and coverage are also
gone these are just delivery costs that
disappear in the digital world meanwhile
each of us can also publish we can also
broadcast we can forage for facts and
share those with anyone anywhere who
might be interested this means that any
of us can do the job in the digital
world that journalism did in the
physical one but the job is not the same
it’s not the same because we are now
digital as well as physical beings and
we need new ways to inform each other
about what’s true ways we can trust now
we can’t trust we can’t trust the new
digital media that have grown up and
built up on top of the ruins of the old
media theater we can’t trust it because
it is funded by surveillance based
advertising
we can’t trust surveillance based
advertising because it wants to shove
tracking beacons in the private parts of
our computers and mobile devices
besides massively violating personal
privacy tracking based advertising hosts
a black market in fraud and malware and
it supports fake news by making
so who can we trust to tell us what’s
true
the answer is each other and the place
to start is here in the physical world
we could do that right now
we look around at the people around us
we’ll notice that everybody looks
different and everybody sounds different
this is by nature’s design and by our
own we are all so different than we were
five minutes ago
if you tell me and is also by design is
that we you know we we learn best from
each other so if you tell me something I
didn’t know I’m not just informed by
that I am formed by it I am changed I’m
not exactly who I was in this sense we
are all authors of each other and what
we call authority is the right that we
give certain others to form us to make
us who we are
journalism had that authority in the old
physical world and it earned that
authority by being honest and
responsible we can do that too we have a
good example of that from a few months
ago in Montecito which is a town next
door to us here in Santa Barbara when
debris floes devastated the town debris
flows are rivers of boulders and mud
that flow off the face of a mountain
when a heavy rain storm follows a
wildfire many people were killed many
homes were destroyed many roads were
covered in boulders and mud or blocked
and the whole town was evacuated very
little information or news got out while
the town was evacuated and rest
workers did their jobs but countless
people stepped up to inform each other
using digital tools there were pilots
and ham radio operators who posted what
they knew online there were authorities
on geology who explained debris flows
and how they happen in helpful ways
there were official sources like the
police fire and rescue who published
what they needed to through official
channels and victims and and survivors
posted things on YouTube and county
workers public official of public people
would gather data and publish those in
helpful maps that helped each other it
helped all of us out and the traditional
media the print and broadcast media they
did their job – and they did it well but
their job wasn’t just telling a story it
was sharing it with the rest of us so
one of the clearest takeaways that we
have from this experience is that the
traditional media can’t do the job
because they’re just trying to tell a
story that’s the old way that you there
are too many important facts for a story
to tell by itself that didn’t work and
that won’t work now and it frankly never
did the whole story that we’re in now is
about how we adapt together to lives
that are both digital and physical and
how we rebuild the cultural center that
we lost we can’t do that by turning our
lives over to systems whose job is to
spy on us that will only drive us
farther apart than we are
we can rebuild our Civic and cultural
center by informing each other the way
we did in Montecito this is how we
formed civilization in the first place
and it’s how we reformed it over and
over again
now it’s by using digital tools to help
our communities that we can become the
best possible authors of each other and
of the culture we share thank you [Applause]
Please follow and like us: