Comments on: What’s a medium?

By: Interactive teaching position at CUNY « BuzzMachine

Interactive teaching position at CUNY « BuzzMachine — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 19:16:58 +0000

[...] the sales pitch. We’re doing many exciting things at the school and it is growing robustly. Here are a few posts I’ve written about what we’re doing. But first: Please do NOT use my [...]

By: ThickCulture » Web, Print, & the Singularity of Media

ThickCulture » Web, Print, & the Singularity of Media — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 02:04:08 +0000

[...] that be the forthcoming declarative utterance to end all utterances? If so, let me be one of the first few to coin [...]

By: CUNY Journalism goes “trackless” | Currentbuzz

CUNY Journalism goes “trackless” | Currentbuzz — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 23:49:09 +0000

[...] via What’s a medium? « BuzzMachine. [...]

By: From notepad to TypePad-the role of the reporter in the digital age | American Abroad

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 23:41:45 +0000

[...] the popular web analyst Jeff Jarvis approvingly posted on his blog: “Now, every time a journalist goes out to cover news, she must be equipped and prepared to [...]

By: CollegeJourn wrap-up: Should j-students read newspapers? – Innovation in College Media

Tue, 24 Mar 2009 08:51:19 +0000

[...] program established a concept of complete convergence instead of forced tracks. Jeff Jarvis explains it best: The bigger point is that media is becoming singular. Especially as newspapers die and more people [...]

By: markbrand

markbrand — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 18:02:35 +0000

“Understanding Media” is a required offset to a millisecond connected Internet storytelling-feedback curriculum. McLuhan’s book reminds that even roads, clothing, and clocks are media. As each medium evolves do many see what in the inventory of effects is displaced. Today’s Internet squarely puts behind us, the newspaper print that is yesterday’s news told well.

Computerized browsership is but one medium and but one lesson. The interesting discourse of media remains. What source, presence, and audience does a media best engage and more importantly, as journal-artist, what medium is to be chosen and what art makes it best? In school you can slow down what goes on in the crib: Sensitive play with media to make sense; owning one’s voice, visualization, feeling, the skilled hand; finally the playground to understand what is sensitive to which viewer – for some media play better with listeners, others with viewers, others for empathic souls. Surely for each media, the effect of time is key. Media vary with audience sensibility. For your audient might get it in an instant picture, hit with the idea of written, or feel it through the music of winding narrative. The presence inherent in a source takes sense to match a chosen medium for the intended effect.

By: Joel Sucherman

Joel Sucherman — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 12:30:47 +0000

This is the message I deliver to J-School students every time I get in front of them. Photos, video, graphics, Twitter, Facebook – these are all tools that go with the reporting basics to make you a storyteller. Understand them all (and whatever new tools continue to emerge), master some, and you will find success. No one is saying the skills and instincts of a reporter are not important. Of course they still continue to be. But knowing how to use all the tools at your disposal makes you a more valuable reporter and better at your job.

By: Michael Becker

Michael Becker — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 17:05:40 +0000

You say that Twitter is not journalism, but that’s the same as saying that a notebook is not journalism. You’re identifying the tools use in the process of journalism — and I agree with Jeff that Twitter is a tool — with journalism itself.

Maybe Twitter won’t last. Maybe it will burn itself out as it becomes more and more mainstream. Hard to say. But that shouldn’t stop us from using it to its full extent — and then some — while we have it in our toolboxes.

Shirky (and others) have said that this is a time for experiments in journalism. Let’s get off the reactionary “it ain’t what it used to be” track and try some new approaches. Failures provide lessons too.

By: Hypercrit » Flip cameras turn everbody into paparazzi

Hypercrit » Flip cameras turn everbody into paparazzi — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 16:55:54 +0000

[...] — Interestingly, in another post, Jarvis says that CUNY’s journalism program now teaches all media as if they were one, [...]

By: k.a.m.

k.a.m. — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 16:31:22 +0000

Take me with you. And while you’re at it, lure others to follow you on Twitter.

I got to here via Jay Cross while surfing for Weapons of Mass Instruction (the book).

Go figure.

By the way, I’m glad you spelled fishing with an F or else I’d be inclined to think you were PH-ishing.

By: Jeff Jarvis

Jeff Jarvis — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 12:41:06 +0000

On what basis do you say this? We do teach alt text. We also teach reporting.

By: Jeff Jarvis

Jeff Jarvis — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 12:37:09 +0000

It’s what we heard from students – note the comments from graduates below. Once again, there’s no “getting rid of” here except getting rid of a requirement and adding more choice. Students may take the exact same courses they would have taken in tracks, and most will. But now they have additional choices. What’s not to love?

By: Michelle Johnson

Michelle Johnson — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 11:46:39 +0000

Question: Have you guys or anyone else surveyed students to ask what THEY think of dropping tracks?

Do they feel like they’re getting what they need to be competitive?

By: J

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 10:30:30 +0000

Same here. These days, after ten minutes or so on the internet – reading tweets, emailing, facebooking, blah, blah – I realise that all i really want to do is go out and go fishing.

By: Joe Clark

Joe Clark — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 03:51:21 +0000

Gee. Flash. No wonder J-grads don’t have a frigging clue what HTML is.

Mid-level business executives and blind teenagers are two groups who’ve been able to comprehend Web standards in minutes, while people like you are sending kids out with nothing more than the ability to export to “HTML” from MS Word and otherwise produce tag soup.

Don’t believe me? Ask your kids this question: “What’s an alt text?”

By: Ninja

Ninja — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:44:49 +0000

Newsflash: This particular revolution has been going on since 1970. Have we only just noticed that the computer changed the way we communicate and associate? Those of us in journalism, and writers in general, have been blogging all our lives. It’s just a different presentation. Take all the technology away from me and I’ll get my message out. I promise. I’ll scratch it on the wall.

By: Chad Manudo

Chad Manudo — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 21:10:07 +0000

This is REAL jounalism…old school and new school…
http://tinyurl.com/d4bdnq

By: Leslie

Leslie — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 20:44:39 +0000

This is EXCELLENT news! But I see that many people here are missing the point. As the official guinea pig for the CUNY inaugural class…straddling a journalism, broadcast and new media education was challenging but necessary.
To Watch Out… who said anything about Twitter??? Students get a first rate JOURNALISM education first and foremost…new media is a just a broad name for various publishing tools–not the journalism itself.
To everyone else…this is not just about new media. Anyone can pick up a camcorder or ipod and hit record…making quality material is what should separate the professional journalist from the amateur. Students need to learn to record broadcast quality media–audio, video, and print-worthy photographs, that can stream online, run in a nightly news broadcast, or command a front page. To focus on New Media without the journalism and broadcast and photo skill is a big mistake and I am THRILLED that it only took a few classes for the our school to take this pioneering step. Kudos to Prout, Junnakar, and Jarvis! I am super-Proud!

By: fred wilson

fred wilson — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 20:43:30 +0000

great decision Jeff.

you guys are making lots of smart decisions over there

By: Mike Manitoba

Mike Manitoba — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 19:37:09 +0000

Guess I jumped the Twitter train too early (2006). Bores the hell out of me now.

By: Buzz Machine « Undeadjournalist

Buzz Machine « Undeadjournalist — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:58:57 +0000

[...] started following, but its writer, Jeff Jarvis, had a post this morning that caught my interest: What’s a Medium? In it, the journalism prof talks about how his school, CUNY (City University of New York) [...]

By: Candice

Candice — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:31:22 +0000

I agree with Joe O. As a member of CUNY’s inaugural class, I’m happy to see this change made, though it doesn’t help the broadcast and interactive students of ’07.

Am I bitter? To say yes would be an understatement. Have I gained new confidence in my alma mater for finally waking up? I think so.

Keep leading the way Jeff!

By: Joseph Lopez, PhD Candidate

Joseph Lopez, PhD Candidate — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:18:59 +0000

It still amazes me how academia (communication especially) has been so reluctant to accept the internet. Instead of recognizing the potential it has often run scared clinging to their “old media”. I am glad to see you all at CUNY are taking note. I work in a special lab called the ACTLab at UT where we have been doing New Media since 1993 with Sandy Stone. While there are many people late to the party (15+ years), they are always welcomed and we hope that people will learn that collaboration and exploration is the key to find the “new” in new media, rather then just trying to box it up and re-teach it. Good luck with your new program direction, it sounds wonderful!

By: Dan Sinker

Dan Sinker — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:08:13 +0000

Bravo Jeff! You all at CUNY are leading a change that I suspect we’ll see throughout J departments in the next few years. I know I’ve been advocating for doing exactly this within mine.

Keep up the great work.

By: Jeff Jarvis

Jeff Jarvis — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 16:38:12 +0000

No one is saying that Twitter replaces the rest of journalism. It is a tool, another one in our pack. It can be used to bring readers to stories. It can be used to impart facts during an event. It can be used to find witnesses to interview. It has a use. The point is to give journalists the power to use all the tools they can to do the best journalism they can.

Sorry you feel this way, whoever you are, but there is no change for an individual student, who can, as I said, take the exact same classes as when tracks were required. The only thing that happened here is that students get more choice – and more advice about those choices.