Press Release
July 22, 2004
"We the Media": The Dismantling of Big Media's Monopoly on the News
Sebastopol, CA--For the first time, bloggers have been awarded press
credentials to cover the national political conventions. That's a harbinger
of bigger changes in the media landscape, according to nationally known
columnist Dan Gillmor. His new book, We the Media: Grassroots
Journalism by the People, for the People, tells the story of the grassroots
journalists--including bloggers--who are dismantling Big Media's monopoly
on the news. Through Internet-fueled, interactive vehicles like weblogs,
these readers-turned-reporters are transforming the news from a lecture to
a conversation. They're publishing in real time to a worldwide audience that's
eager to read their independent, unfiltered reports. And the impact of their
work is just beginning to be felt by professional journalists and the
newsmakers they cover. We the Media sheds light on this deep shift in
how we make--and consume--the news.
We the Media is essential reading for all participants in the news
cycle:
Consumers learn how they can become producers of the news. Gillmor
lays out the tools of the grassroots journalist's trade, including personal
web journals (called weblogs or blogs), Internet chat groups, email, and
cell phones. He also illustrates how, in this age of media consolidation
and diminished reporting, to "roll your own" news, drawing from the array
of sources available online and even over the phone.
Newsmakers--politicians, business executives, celebrities--get a
wake-up call. The control that newsmakers enjoyed in the top-down world
of Big Media is seriously undermined in the Internet Age. Gillmor shows
newsmakers how to successfully play by the new rules and shift from
"control" to "engagement."
Journalists discover that the new grassroots journalism presents
opportunity as well as challenge to their profession. One of the first
mainstream journalists to have a blog, Gillmor says, "My readers know more
than I do, and that's a good thing." In We the Media, he makes the case
to his colleagues that, in the face of a plethora of Internet-fueled news
vehicles, they must change or become irrelevant.
At its core, We the Media is a book about people. People like Glenn
Reynolds, a law professor whose blog postings on the intersection of
technology and liberty garnered him enough readers and influence that he
became a source for professional journalists. Or Ben Chandler, whose upset
Congressional victory was fueled by contributions that came in response to
ads on a handful of political blogs. Or Iraqi blogger Zayed, whose Healing
Irag blog (healingiraq.blogspot.com) scooped Big Media. Or "acridrabbit,"
who inspired an online community to become investigative reporters and
discover that the dying Kaycee Nichols' sad tale was a hoax. Give the
people tools to make the news, We the Media asserts, and they will.
Journalism in the 21st century will be fundamentally different from the
Big Media that prevails today. We the Media casts light on the future of
journalism, and invites us all to be part of it.
Additional Resources:
We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People
Dan Gillmor
ISBN: 0-596-00733-7, 320 pages, $24.95 US, $36.95 CA
order@oreilly.com
1-800-998-9938; 1-707-827-7000
About O'Reilly
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