Markmedia

Looking for a case study?

Here is an interesting little experiment.
Ever looked for a case study? Need to get in contact with a pregnant single mother of three living in the lap of abject poverty in the west? Try this blog.

It is run by the:101, a team of journalists and bloggers who provide a range of training courses designed to help PRs and journalists work together more effectively , but don't let that put you off.

After years of finding case studies through friends of friends, and word of mouth on forums, websites and PR wires, we decided to see if social media can improve the process.

On the site, you can see a range of requests from journalists who are looking for case studies. If you're able to help, use the contact button on the posting, or leave a comment. You can see recent requests on the blog front page, as well as browse through requests using the category links on the right.

the disruptive power of blogs

In the latest discussion about blogs and their part in the downfall of a Swedish minister [ here, here, here and here ] a side issue caught my attention.

The new Swedish foreign minister - Carl Bildt (a blogger himself) - said in an interview that he could name a number of journalists who had themselves illegally hired household services (the initial reason for the scandal). This can be seen as a threat to journalists. You out us and we will out you.
This got me thinking about the relationship between blogs, journalists and the people they cover.

There is a balance of terror between journalists and their sources. They both have secrets to reveal about each other and there is often (all too often) an unspoken agreement on mutual regard for each others closeted skeletons.
But now the blogosphere butts in. Here there are no gentleman's agreements. No signing of treaties. Non-proliferation is an anathema to bloggers. All must out!
And suddenly things begin to change. Secrets are no longer mutually assured. So the threat from the Sources becomes: follow up on what bloggers dig up and we will out you!

So blogs destabilize the status quo. Shake things up. Make things uncomfortable. Disrupt the balance of (media) power. Of course there will be ethical problems to be faced. It is not always right to publish everything. But on the whole this can only be good for society and the democratic process in general.

cyberdissident handbok

Reportrar utan gränser har just släppt en handbok om bloggandet och cyberaktivism/journalistik.

Bl.a tar man upp hur man kan sätta upp anonyma bloggar, hur man kommer runt filtringssystem och hur kryptering kan användas för att skydda sig från insyn och förföljelser.


Med i boken är  Dan Gillmor, Pressthink av Jay Rosen och nätsäkerhets (och här menar jag hur man skydder individer, inet datasystem) Nart Villeneuve.

Boken finns på engelska, franska, kinesiska, arabiska och persiska från  RSF website.

Blogosfären fortsätter att fördubblas varje halvår

Technocratis Dave Sifry har just släpt den senaste halvårsrapport om blogosfärens väl och ve.
Den visar att tillväxten håller den oerhörda takten, med åter en fördubbling det senaste halvåret.

Technocrati  rknar med ca 80,000 ny bloggar per dag! (vilket är ca. 1 per sekund).

Imorgon kommer data om antallet nya inlgg.

Summary:

Technorati was tracking over 14.2 Million weblogs, and over 1.3 billion links in July 2005
The blogosphere continues to double about every 5.5 months
A new blog is created about every second, there are over 80,000 created daily
About 55% of all blogs are active, and that has remained a consistent statistic for at least a year
About 13% of all blogs are updated at least weekly