Internet and virtual worlds (defined both as communication tools – email, messenger, chat rooms, electronic libraries, electronic audio-visual libraries – and artistic media of expression) represent the trademark of the contemporary times, molding implicitly the cultural and social practices as we speak. Since the feminism revolution and the post structuralism movement, there has not […]
Daylife is Epic: An Interview with Jeff Jarvis
The launch of news site Daylife almost two weeks ago was met by a flurry of feedback from thoughtful types across the web. So what happened? Bloggers alternately fawned over Daylife’s “engagingly pretty” interface and decried its lack of interactivity. TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington, a Daylife investor, was disappointed at the absence of commenting and RSS […]
Wikipedia Founder to Offer Free Software & Hosting
Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales just announced the launch of Openserving, a site that offers free web hosting and wiki software. So how is that different from Wales for-profit Wikia? Well, it’s not. Yet. The big move that has guys like Reuters declaring, “Wikipedia founder remakes Web-publishing economics” is Openserving’s seeming encouragement of user-implemented advertisements. Right […]
How Blogs Become Journalism
Acknowledging that “citizen journalism has forced news organizations to change the way they do business,” news site OnMilwaukee.com announced last month it would invite readers to launch their own blogs on all things Milwaukeean. So how are they faring? Ironically, publisher Andy Tarnoff predicted the news site’s biggest problem in his inaugural article: There’s only […]
Digg to Feature User-Generated Content
Digg, a news website that ranks links according to user votes, may be ready to shake things up a little more. A friend familiar with the matter tells me that the self-proclaimed "user driven social content website" has plans to start featuring user-generated content. Presently all listings on Digg point to external sites. What would […]
Open Up the Business Model: How Citizen Journalists Get Rewarded
About 50 million Americans have added their original content to the Internet’s bounty. Most haven’t seen a dime. Five of the ten fastest growing brands on the Web rely on users for content. Most, like MySpace, Flickr and Heavy.com, do not pay their contributors. But the tide may be changing towards systems of compensation. Interestingly, […]