Media Connections Made

Filed: June 13, 2009 at 12:15 am |

For the past two days, I’ve been immersed in discussions about new media/old media and all their intersections.

I don’t have a clearer sense of whether newspapers will survive, or how good journalism will be funded (I’ll still argue, as I did in one session, that reader-supported journalism such as spot.us is a promising idea but not viable on a large scale). But I do know nonprofits are doing all they can to make the best of this crazy new world — and to ensure that their stories don’t get lost in the shuffle.

The Making Media Connections 2009 conference, Chicago’s largest media conference, brought together a few hundred people engaged in various aspects of news making/promoting/reporting. The keynotes and a few of the larger sessions were blogged live, and a number of attendees, such as Marc van Bree, took excellent notes. Trainer Beth Kanter (who I turned into a geeky fan around when meeting in the elevator) posted a bunch of good information from her session on listening literacy.

In the midst of all this, the conference sponsor, Community Media Workshop, released a report on the state of local online news — “The NEW News: Journalism We Want and Need” that sparked much discussion outside and inside the conference.

I taught a workshop on how nonprofit organizations use blogs and other social media to advocate issues and connect with conversations in their communities. Nowadays participants all know what a blog is, and some are blogging for their organizations, so the focus is more on writing engaging entries, tracking and organizing information, and making your voice heard in a sea of  voices (here are a few tips).

I also had the pleasure of taking part in a panel titled “Words on the Web” with three super smart panelists — Patrice Tuohy, founder of TrueQuest Communications; Brad Flora, creator of WindyCitizen.com; Annie Kinnaird Williams, business development director of Emma Email — and moderator extraordinaire, consultant Emily Culbertson, who has my full support in her war on jargon.

Flora mentioned driving traffic to your site by “plugging holes in the internet” — creating or highlighting resources that other sites will want to link to. It’s a neat turn of phrase for an essential but often overlooked step.

Building skills and sharing information are a big part of the conference, but so is networking. This year the connecting also took place on Twitter — see coverage at #mmc2009. I’m psyched to have met so many great folks, particularly as conversations continue about the future of Chicago’s old and new media.