Thank you, Dave Fleet, for drawing my attention Christie Blatchford‘s comments on blogging and online conversation.
The general public has had the ability to join the conversation at newspapers (and magazines) for years through letters to the editor even if the online community believes this to be a new phenomenon, exclusive to themselves. To their credit, editors publish letters that present both supporting and contrary points of view — just like a normal conversation would.
The process of having a letter to the editor printed includes an editorial review which selects the letters that present an intelligent argument or thought in a productive way, and may also involve the refinement of the letter in a way that includes both the author of the letter and the editor of the newspaper. There are many logical and obvious reasons for this approach including the fact that there is a finite amount of space on the printed page.
Comment moderation on a forum, blog or podcast site isn’t even a distant cousin of the newspaper approach. There is a lot of pressure in the online community to not moderate comments in favour of letting people share their uncensored, unrefined and kneejerk thoughts. Ms. Blatchford correctly points out that this typically leads to a ‘brief, ungrammatical shouting match‘.
In the race to be heard online, the favoured approach has become being the contributor that ‘yells’ the loudest — intelligible or not. Website owners would never dare to suggest working with the commenter to make their comments more productive. It’s socially unacceptable and has become an unwritten yet well known rule. Even if that approach were acceptable, most site owners don’t have the time to take that upon themselves, much less do it without consulting with the contributor.
I don’t expect that there will ever be a happy medium to this conundrum and that’s why many journalists won’t take to blogging even if their employer allows and encourages it. It may also be the reason behind the increasing number of newcomer-bloggers that don’t allow comments or provide contact information on their sites. Commenters no longer need the cooperation of the site owner since they can post their own points or counter points on their own sites.
The challenge for newspapers is to find a way to evolve their approach to conversation management from the printed page to the online world — becoming more responsive and yet still working within the ever evolving and increasingly bootstrapped revenue models.
Technology is not community
Congratulations to Connie Crosby and Eden Spodek on launching a great new podcast, Community Divas. The show explores the role and dynamics of community with an apparent focus on social media.
Connie and Eden jumped off the ropes swinging by releasing a great two-part discussion with Jay Moonah. How they limited him to just two episodes is beyond me, and I mean that positively — because Jay has a million insightful ideas, he’s energetic and most importantly, speaks eloquently — not because there’s a running joke that Jay talks a lot.
There was a fleeting moment during which Connie and Eden recognized that some people refer to web services and their verbifed names such as Twitter, Facebook, Ning, MySpace, etc… as community.
Consider that web communication services are tools just like a telephone; they’re widgets that enable people to connect. And like widgets, their appeal cycle is far less permanent than their purpose cycle. That is, if a new tool emerges with a fresh look, improved interface and simpler API, people will flock, en-masse, to the new tool. The constant migration of the community from one tool to the next, and the effort to re-establish itself in a new location is more like changing your bank account to start fresh than flying south to avoid the cold of winter (although, now that I’ve written that I realize there are strong parallels with both).
If the tool really was the community, we would no longer have any connection or way to connect with others in that community when the tool collapsed.
Be sure to follow the discussion over at Community Divas.