Hot on the heels of our discussion last week about the future of journalism comes this article from the Sunday Seattle Times:

Regulators: is blogging lobbying?

The upshot, online political activists could be required to publicly disclose their finances.  However, non-traditional journalistic bloggers, whose topics range from news reporting to advocacy, and even fundraising, may face the same requirements.

True to their own journalistic integrity the Times interviewed people on both sides of the issue.

For example, blogger David Goldstein thinks an important part of his “hobby” is to raise the level of public debate and urge people to get involved.  He points our that newspaper editorialists and radio commentators do the same thing, but they’re exempt from the Public Disclosure law.

On the other hand, Lobbyist Steve Gano recognizes the allure of the internet for advocacy groups.  If they’re not regulated online, what’s going to stop registered state lobbyists from going to the internet to lobby?

According to the article it is the changing definitions of journalism that is at the heart of the issue.  However, Doug Ellis, assistant Director of the Public Disclosure Commission thinks it is a non-issue noting that “bloggers who perform a journalistic function” will probably be exempt since they are exempt from current campaign finance laws.

It could be a non-issue for another reason however.  Authors Marie Hojnacki and David Kimball studied the effects of campaign contributions by PAC’s and lobbyists representing PAC’s.  In their article “PAC Contributions and Lobbying Contacts in Congressional Committees” published in Politcal Research Quarterly in March of 2001, Hojnacki and Kimball focused on campaign contributions from PAC’s and their lobbyists to see if there was any correlation between dollar amounts and access to members of congress or their staff.

Using the 104th Congress and the four issues of product liability, financial services deregulation, crime control and criminal justice reform, and grazing use and management the authors:

“selected 241 groups for the product liability issue, 119 groups for financial services deregulation, 160 groups for anticrime proposals, and 128 groups for grazing use and management”

All 648 groups were asked to participate but in the end only 70 indicated they were active on the issues.  The authors acknowledge that this is a small sample size but still suggest that the results are significant.

And their conclusion… money doesn’t give the PAC’s an advantage:

“Overall, we see little reason to be surprised that opportunities for donor groups to meet directly with legislators are not facilitated by the relatively small sums of money individual PACs can give to legislators. For one, contributions are only one of an array of different advocacy activities in which groups engage in order to affect legislative behavior and outcomes. Second, given the rising costs of campaigning, any one PAC probably has little reason to believe that its contribution will stand out from all the others a legislator receives. Interest groups seeking access to a wide audience in Congress, then, will be most successful when they do the difficult work of organizing a network of supporters in a substantial number of legislative districts”

This study focused on traditional lobbying efforts and didn’t include information about online lobbying.  However, at the root of the public disclosure laws is the belief that lobbyists are using money to influence lawmakers inappropriately.  This study shows that organization of support seems to be the key factor.  In that case maybe it would be better to ask the lobbyists and the PAC’s to publicly disclose the names of their members instead.

Oh wait maybe that’s a worse idea.

Maury

When asked to briefly sum up my experience in Digital Democracy this quarter and compare it to my expectations, I must admit I’m a little bit challenged.  To begin with, did I have a preconceived notion?  I suppose I did.  Would we discuss and analyze current political discourse?  Would we explore the use of the internet during the 2008 campaign?  Would be review past elections for insight?  Would I learn another technique for using social media.  Would I finally acknowledge that the internet is a revolution?

…Well on that last part, probably not.

That being said, I did learn something I hadn’t expected.  Specifically, during election night, as I was tweeting news results, I suddenly felt like I was a part of it.  What ever ‘it’ is.  I can’t say that about previous elections.  Normally I would have voted and put the whole process out of my mind.  This time I feel like my participation mattered.  In the past I wouldn’t have spent the evening watching and waiting for each new announcement.  I certainly wouldn’t have been communicating with my peers.  Or with the other people tweeting that night.  I would have filled out my ballot, and went home.  Done …end of story…next.  I wouldn’t have thought that I made a difference, at all.  I’m not suggesting I did make a difference this time, but I really felt good about myself and the democratic process.

Nope not even journalism.

It is no secret that the time honored tradition of print journalism is going the way of the American Bison circa 1890… nearly extinct. Now in its death throes, we were asked to read a series of articles focusing on the decline of newspapers and what can be done about it.

I’d argue there really isn’t much to be done about it, but since I don’t want to send some of the newspaper aficionados to a corner where they will curl in the fetal position and rock back and forth, let’s just humor them, read the articles and see just what can be done.

The first article I read was from Media Life Magazine. It was an interview with David T. Clark, an analyst of publishing and advertising for Deutsche Bank Securities. He seems to paint the rosiest picture of the industry suggesting that the current financial crisis facing newspapers is just an economic downturn. As if there will be an upturn. I struggled with his analysis for several reasons. First, if 70% of income comes from non classified business ads, the why is he lamenting the loss of classified ads so much.  Second, he implies that the situation is cyclical and that the future of newspapers will improve as the economy improves. Why? Because that is what happened in the past? Most savvy investors know: past performance is no guarantee of future returns. Clark suggests that one of the saving graces for newspapers, but by no means their only source of salvation, is local coverage.

This sentiment is repeated Ben Leubsdorf in his article “Can Print Newspapers Survive?”

Leubsdorf quotes Frank Pine who might be a little too optimistic, “There’s no other news media that covers communities like community print newspapers,” he said. “Who else is going to the city council meeting?”

…um http://www.seattlechannel.org/

Another strength of newspapers is their integrity. He quotes Vicki Gowler from the Idaho Statesmen: “Online, particularly with blogs, and particularly anonymously, has been able to do a lot of stuff without being accountable. We’re accountable,” she said. “I’d rather be later with the story and be right than rush it out there…that is going to distinguish us over time.”

Of course over in West Seattle they have a blog that is full of Journalistic integrity.

But maybe Luebsdorf isn’t so sure about the future of newspapers since he also quotes Paul Gillin of Newspaper Death Watch: “There is no hope for the major metropolitan U.S. newspaper industry. No hope. Run away…it will be gone in 20 years.”

Both Articles also suggest that newspapers can survive if they can find a way to appeal to a younger and broader audience. Currently the largest audience for print newspapers is older people and Baby Boomers. They must find a way to appeal to the Gen X’ers and the Millennial’s who are now the largest generation. This reminds me of the classic Aesop fable ‘The Miller, The Son, and the Donkey’. “He who tries to please everybody pleases nobody.”

What seems to be missing from all the articles is the possibility that newspapers are not meant to survive. More importantly, many people are suggesting that professional journalism and newspapers are a necessary component of society and that some how we all would be worse off with out them. Based on the information in Vin Crosbie’s article “Transforming American Newspapers” in 1604 the print Newspaper industry was nonexistent. That was only 400 years ago, or in geologic time, a blink of the eye.

I was reminded by one of my Philosophy professors that sometimes, we, (humanity) hold a little too fast to tradition and use it as an excuse to maintain the status quo, not allowing ourselves to see a bigger picture. His example: If you ever get stuck listening to a snob at a dinner party wax eloquently about how his family has been a member of an exclusive county club for four generations, it is your duty to point to them that 5 generations ago they were not members, and that they might not be members one generation from now.

Blogger Scott Karp of Publishing 2.0 expresses this thought so much better than I can:

The Market and The Internet Don’t Care if you make money.

To put it another way, bison hunter was a viable career in the late 1800’s and when it started to decline, there was lots of moaning and gnashing of teeth at the time, but no one is complaining about it now are they?

On Sunday, I managed to catch a few minutes of an interview with Authors Morely Winograd and Michael Hais. They were on Book TV on Cspan2 promoting their book “Millennial Makeover”.  Their premise is that the millennial generation is poised to politically realign the country during this next election and will hold sway over the political process for the next 40 years.  Their evidence of this? History!  As it has happened in the past, so will it happen in the future.

But who exactly are the Millennials?  According to the authors, the Millennial Generation technically is anyone who was born between 1982 and 2003.  What makes them so powerful is that they are now the largest generation with at least a million larger than the previous ‘largest generation’ the baby boomers and twice as many as the Gen ‘X’ers.  More importantly, according to the authors, they are a civic minded group based partly on their make up.  They are the most ethnically diverse generation, more than 40 pecent are African American, Latino, and Asian.  20% have at least one immigrant parent, and more than half are women.  As a result  they are socially tolerant, and unwilling to let injustice and unfair practices stand.  The subtitle of their book is “Myspace, Youtube, and the Future of American Politics”, indicates that the millennials are also using the new tools of the internet to connect and engage.

Winograd and Hais suggest that the last time a large generation was civically engaged was the ‘Greatest’ or ‘G.I.’ generation, who had lived through the depression, WW2 and the rise of communism.  And last time they elected FDR, a democrat who helped to create a whole host of social programs.  His idealism (and theirs) caused a great political re-alingment that dominated politics for the next 30+years.  Both the authors expect the election of 2008 to usher in another re-alignment that is equally civically engaged, if not more so.  This does bode well for Obama, who has campaigned on a platform of change, but the authors don’t rule out McCain, who has the character of service and sacrifice going for him, they reminds us again that this new generation is very similar to and respectful of the ‘Greatest’ generation and the sacrifices and service that generation performed during WW2.

They also suggest that as the power of this generation grows, they will shift the focus of the media and society as well.  This really isn’t a stretch when you consider that the media and society tend to reflect who ever is in charge.

Their interview was fascinating, and fortunately BooKTV has it available online.  They also have a website Millenial Makeover , and there are several videos and mp3’s that showcase the authors during various interviews. These two make some compelling arguments and are well worth a listen.

Their may be more to the story as to why these Millennials are so engaged.  It might be better understood in light of the research presented by Casey A. Klofstad, in his article titled “Talk Leads to Recruitment” published in Politcal Research Quarterly in June of 2007.  Klofstad indicates that civic engagement can be based on peer influences, in other words, some of these Millennials may be politically active because their peers are politically active, and have engaged them in the political discussions. Klofstad suggests these discussions lead to recruitment.

Klofstad acknowledges the challenge in studying the affects of discussions on behavior since it can be hard to quantify.  He created a research tool called the C-SNIP, which stands for Collegiate Social Network Interaction Project, so that he can collect the data in a way that allows quantifiable analysis.  For example, how do you infer that a behavior was caused by peer interaction.  His solution, surveying participants on their civic engagement before and after meeting a new peer group.  C-SNIP was designed to collect data in this way.  Klofstad’s specific solution was to survey high school students just as they entered a college dormitory at the beginning their freshman year.  They were surveyed again at the end of the year.  This method can assess if they were or were not affected by their new peer group, their dorm mates.   Since the students are assigned randomly to their dormitories, the problem of selection bias was mitigated.

Klofstad’s results indicate that yes indeed, discussions among peers can lead to recruitment and action.  This might explain why these Millennials are so engaged, in part because their peers are and that the Milliennals on the whole are engaged in discussions every day.  Their widepread use of the internet, one of the defining aspects of the Millennials, supports this kind of discussion quite well.  Klofstad was encouraged by his findings but cautioned that further study was necessary since his research group was relatively small and homogenous.

So while Winograd and Hais suggest that the interent plays a big part in the civic engagement of this new generation, Klofstad helps to explain why.

On the subject of copyright (on of the aspect of DRM, our topic this week) I present three videos to entertain you.

First up is a parody of the Wii Fit Commercial:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iYBmAVuBns

Next I present a Parody of a Republican Party slogan:

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/ea0b05d406

Finally I offer a musical interlude featuring Diamond Dave and the Fab Four:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTxZs-pRZ_M

As far as I know none of these clips have run into any legal trouble.  At least they are still posted and if there had been any legal challenges to them I would think they wouldn’t be online anymore.  I think they are entertaining but two of them make me question if they are borderline copyright infringement.

First of all, the Wii commercial is clearly a parody and as such probably safe from action.

The Republican Slogan however is a little more questionable.  The Republican Part can’t really complain since it quite deftly parodies their slogan.  However can the GOP be sued by Effexor for using their trademark and can the makers of Effexor sue the producers of this video since they too are using Effexor’s Trademark, and not to spoof the drug company?

Finally The mash-up of the Beatles and David Lee Roth really interests me.  In this case it is not a parody of either artist, at least I can’t detect any.  And I would assume the producer of this video didn’t get permission from any of the concerned parties.  So what would be the creator’s protection from being sued for copyright infringement? Has the new piece substantially transformed the original clips so as to be safe?  I don’t think so.  This is entertaining and certainly required a lot of skill and vision to edit these two performances together, but the originals are still recognizable and not transformed at all.  Maybe enhanced, but I don’t think that would pass the test in a court of law.

Understand that I’m not suggesting these videos should be removed, I’m just trying to understand the extent of the law, or the protection from the law.

The truth is I don’t know well enough to say one way or the other, so I’m curious to hear what someone else thinks. Any comments.

Maury

I was reminded of this beta search engine after last weeks presentation by Sean about Live Search. Obviously the big feature is the visual interface. Similar to the iTunes album art search feature, searchme.com lets you shuffle through the results of your search request in the same manner. More importantly you can search the Web, Videos or Images. When you select Video, just like Live Search, the videos play in the search results window. and you can shuffle forward or back in the list. My only compliant: so far the video results are all from Youtube. As the search engine improves it might start finding videos on other sites. I haven’t found any .MOV files yet, just Flash. Anyway, feel free to check it out.

SearchMe.com

Maury

If you were a former hippie who traveled cross-country in a Ford Pinto you might enjoy this clip:

Joe Cocker Translated (Similar to the Carmina Burana clip we watched a couple of weeks ago)

If you are clearly a fan of the lead singer from the Talking Heads you might be fascinated by these two links:

David Byrne – Playing the Building

David Bryne – NPR

If you prefer good old-fashioned sucking up:

larry-miller-from-pretty-woman

Maury

A good friend pointed me to FLAC, which stands for Free Lossless Audio Codec and I decided it warranted a review for my streaming media class. The goal of FLAC is to compress audio files without reducing the quality of the audio stream unlike mp3’s, a noble goal to be sure. At least it is a noble goal for all the audiophiles like my friend who can actually hear the difference. My problem with reviewing the effectiveness of FLAC is twofold:

1. I’m loath to admit this in public but the truth is I can’t hear the difference between the audio on my CD’s and the MP3’s I encoded at 128K. Good for me since it means I can store more songs on my iPod, bad for my friend if he wants to listen to my music as well.

2. I wouldn’t want you to take my word for it (refer to #1above), so to properly review this codec, I will have to ask another friend, one that has a nuanced and trained ear for music, to help me by listening and comparing a single track, uncompressed and compressed using FLAC and MP3. This only becomes a problem when it is time for him to describe the differences. The man doesn’t know how to ‘briefly sum up’… but I mean that with the utmost respect.

The FLAC website is chock full of technical details, some I understand and some I don’t. (refer to #1 above) I can however touch on some of the highlights. The following is borrowed verbatim from the FLAC website, I give them full credit:

• Lossless: The encoding of audio (PCM) data incurs no loss of information, and the decoded audio is bit-for-bit identical to what went into the encoder. Each frame contains a 16-bit CRC of the frame data for detecting transmission errors. The integrity of the audio data is further insured by storing an MD5 signature of the original unencoded audio data in the file header, which can be compared against later during decoding or testing.
• Fast: FLAC is asymmetric in favor of decode speed. Decoding requires only integer arithmetic, and is much less compute-intensive than for most perceptual codecs. Real-time decode performance is easily achievable on even modest hardware.
• Hardware support: FLAC is supported by dozens of consumer electronic devices, from portable players, to home stereo equipment, to car stereo.
• Flexible metadata: FLAC’s metadata system supports tags, cover art, seek tables, and cue sheets. Applications can write their own APPLICATION metadata once they register an ID. New metadata blocks can be defined and implemented in future versions of FLAC without breaking older streams or decoders.
• Seekable: FLAC supports fast sample-accurate seeking. Not only is this useful for playback, it makes FLAC files suitable for use in editing applications.
• Streamable: Each FLAC frame contains enough data to decode that frame. FLAC does not even rely on previous or following frames. FLAC uses sync codes and CRCs (similar to MPEG and other formats), which, along with framing, allow decoders to pick up in the middle of a stream with a minimum of delay.
• Suitable for archiving: FLAC is an open format, and there is no generation loss if you need to convert your data to another format in the future. In addition to the frame CRCs and MD5 signature, flac has a verify option that decodes the encoded stream in parallel with the encoding process and compares the result to the original, aborting with an error if there is a mismatch.
• Convenient CD archiving: FLAC has a “cue sheet” metadata block for storing a CD table of contents and all track and index points. For instance, you can rip a CD to a single file, then import the CD’s extracted cue sheet while encoding to yield a single file representation of the entire CD. If your original CD is damaged, the cue sheet can be exported later in order to burn an exact copy.
• Error resistant: Because of FLAC’s framing, stream errors limit the damage to the frame in which the error occurred, typically a small fraction of a second worth of data. Contrast this with some other lossless codecs, in which a single error destroys the remainder of the stream.

For me this info is interesting but it really doesn’t help me form an opinion. Maybe you are like myself and would rather just hear the comparison and see the differences in files sizes. Below I offer you a comparison:

Here is the WAV file(31MB):

midnight-sun

Here is an MP3 encoded at 320Kbps(7.1MB):

midnight-sun320

Here is an MP3 encoded at 128Kbps(2.8MB)

midnight-sun128

And finally, since WordPress doesn’t support FLAC files here is a link to the FLAC version of this song(20MB)

www.sendspace.com/file/c9p0uy

My conclusion… Well I think you already know my conclusion (Refer to #1 Above).  As for my friend…  He didn’t hear any difference either.  Of course he admitted that he was listening to everything with 50 year old ears and maybe someone with youth on their side should give a listen.  If space is the issue, it seems to me to stick with the MP3.  I haven’t experimented with archiving yet, but since the FLAC file only reduced the original by 1/3 it doesn’t look like I will find it very useful.  I’m eager to hear other opinions, so I encourage you all to give a listen .

BTW the song is:

Midnight Sun by The Strawbs

Maury

I found this while bopping around the net and thought some might find it interesting. Below is a link to an interview with Jonathan Zittrain from All Things Considered. He is an Oxford Law Professor (is that good enough for you Hanson? ) and author of “The Future of the Internet, and How to Stop it”.

I haven’t read the book yet, but the audio clip provides a nice overview of his main theme. I think he makes some interesting points but the one that really struck me was his suggestion that, although censorship may seem like a giant leap conceptually, it’s not a giant leap technologically. Zittrain isn’t a pessimist however, I really believe he is just concerned that people become more aware of the limitations of the devices we use. We’ve talked in the past about the real control of the internet belonging to those who control the bandwidth, this is just further expression of that idea. *He was also on Charlie Rose, the video runs about 30 minutes but is more in depth than his interview on ATC.*

Maury

All Things Considered-Jonathan Zittrain

This was a funny segment on the Prairie Home Companion from Mothers Day, very timely since we just talked about this in last weeks class.  PHC is on the cutting edge of social media and technology as always.  It runs about 7 minutes so give it a listen, and be entertained.
Maury
a-mothers-day-call