PowerPoint Presentation

News Curation as Journalism,Ethics and New Practices

Thank Doctor Aucoin and department facultyI thank all of you for coming

Relatively new concept. Comes from Museum curator. Opposite to original reportingSearch preserve rearrange information so that they make sense to the visitors. Some may be doing already, some may be new to the concept.

Do not consider this as transfer of knowledge. Discussion is in process. No conclusion is reached yet. Want you to follow reasoning and theories with me and think with me. There will be several contradicting arguments. Give me opinion.

Tell me which side you are on.

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What to take home from this presentationLearn how news curation is different from traditional journalism.Learn tools and skills available.Think about the legal and ethical issues.Learn the related media theory and predict. Think about the question if professionals need to do it.

What is the difference between traditional media vs. new media?

Print vs. Digital? Print vs. Multimedia?Mainstream media vs. Alternative media?Professional vs. Citizen?Old company vs. New company?Dinosaurs vs. Mammals?

The old do not call themselves old. I need your help here. 3

A clip from the movie, Page One, Inside the New York Times,Two journalists debate on the motion of good riddance to the mainstream media.

David Carr, New York Times media writerMichel Wolff, Founder of Newser

Intelligence debateIntroduce David Carr, Michel Wolff, Newser typical curation media. To over simplify Traditional media deserved to be taken over by new media. 4

David Carrs view represented a majority of mainstream. Many new media thrived using Huffington post, Buzzfeed. 5

What is news curation?

. Different names of news curators-information manager, news DJ, human filter. We are bringing together information from lots of different places. We read it, edit it, organize it and present to people, and then give them more information of how they can find out more. (Michael Randle, Huffington post)

Aggregation is mere reuse. Reuse and present. Huffington post, Gawker, Drudgereport, Aggregtation. Flipboard, collection of images on Instagram, Google news 6

Arguments against curation journalism: Curation was once a dirty word. A journalism professor said in an interview: Teaching news curation in J-school is like teaching pick pocketing in police academy.Bill Keller, former editor of the New York Times, wrote: Theres often a thin line between aggregation and theftIn Somalia, this would be called piracy.Patrick Pexton, Washington Post ombudsman, wrote: a perpetual danger of plagiarism in curated stories.

So I have set the stage. Pre test poll here. 7

Arguments for curation journalism Why journalists should do news curation?

1.Information overload and fragmented public (market).2.Transcend physical barrier of time and space.3.Ease of publication and outreach.4.Theoretical argument: a new role of network gatekeeping Legal uncertainty Because objectivity and accuracy still matters.

I will give examples one by one

For theory, is the area of news curation, reuse, reproduce going to be bigger in digital communication?8

Argument 1: Information overload and fragmented public.

-The rise of witness journalism (Jeff Jarvis, 2011).-Too much information for news organizations to handle.

-On the other hand, the publics demand of information has become diverse and specific.

-Two cases of Occupy Wall Street movement coverage. Link1 link 2

By the way storify, mostly used by professional journalists too. Scribblelive, storyful. First simply aggregated arrests made by police. Second, Zucotti park eviction. Mainstream media was not there. 9

Argument 2: Transcend physical barrier of time and space.

-Strength in long distance coverage

-NPRs Andy Carvin is celebrated for his coverage of the Arab Spring through Twitter.

-Washington post curated tweets of the man who first reported the killing of Osama bin Laden. Link

You can make story of all over the world. Many of the Andy Carvins work was done in DC.Sometimes you have time limits of publishing. You cannot wait till printed, air time. You do not have time to rewrite everything. This example, storify can be embedded into online format publication. 10

Argument 3: Ease of publication and outreach.

Cover popular memes from various angles. CBC News in Canada curated stories about Gangnam Style in its early stage. LinkSummarize a long and complex story in a narrative style. Globalposts curated story about Edward Snowden. Link

Guangnam style went viral not only because of the original music video, but because of various types of remixes.Was there a Cortland version? Too old to remember?Edgar snodends exposure of NSA eavesdropping is complex. Verizon wire tappin. Prism program. Foreign head of state. Media critiques would say this is one of the desirable type of curation. Guardian, Der Spiegel, NY times. No orginal reporting. But every text is written by the Global post. 11

Argument 4: New role of network gatekeeping

BarzilaiNahon, K. (2008). Toward a theory of network gatekeeping: A framework for exploring information control. Journal of the American society for information science and technology, 59(9), 1493-1512.Traditional Gatekeeping Network GatekeepingGatekeeperJournalists Journalists, citizens, aggregators or bloggers.Gatekeeping systemClosed.Inside media.Open.Outside media.Definition of NewsFinal product.Ongoing process. Gatekeeping continues after publishing the news.Relationship to the audienceSender and receiver are differentiated. No distinction between sender and receiver.News valueOriginality matters. Link matters. Power Gatekeeper has power.Power is evenly distributed between sender and receiver. Credibility sourceGatekeepers authority.Number of links. ResponsibilityGatekeeper is held responsible for editing, producing and distributing.Gatekeeper can be anonymous. Difficult to claim responsibility.

Curation activities will increase. It is the trend. This model will explain. Origianal. Feedback. Space. Re think Gangnam Style. 12

Argument 5: Legal uncertainty, case laws are in still developing. Two legal grounds:Copyright and Fairness useHot news misappropriation doctrineCases:AFP v. Google News (2002)AP v. All Headline News (2005)Legal issues of curation will be continued to be fought in the courts.

Two legal theories asserted against curationVariant of the common law tort of misappropriationINS AP 1918Plaintiff acquired the content at costTime sensitiveDirect competition with plaintiffDefendant use of information consitiutes free riding on the plaintiffs cost. Tension with the principles of First Amendment, which is to secure the widest possible dissermination of information from divers and antagonistic sources.

Court fight on the two legal ground. At a time of great flux in the media ecosystem, it would be premature, and likely counterproductive, to create rules which would privilege one journalistic business model over others. need legal rules that promote flexibility and free access to information, not closed systems.1918 INS vs. AP

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No news without traditional media?

Can news curation be ethical? How?

Best practice of news curation (based on Berkman Center for Internet and Society)1. Prominently identify the source. Always link to the original source, not only to the story, but authors bio and brand. Always include clear attribution. 2. Minimalism. Reproduce only those portions of the headline or article that are necessary to make your point or to identify the story. 3. Add value to the material. 4. Verify. Do not copy information from unknown or unreliable sources.

How to add values to curated storyAdd original reporting.Data analysisCommentary/analysisFind and filterCompare and round up

Not all of them has to be done. 16

I endorse principle of reciprocity (e.g., Martin, 2014) Recall what Keller said: we have bestowed our highest honor market valuation not on those who labor over the making of original journalism but on aggregation.harvesting revenue that might otherwise be directed to the originators of the material.

We have to ask:-How does your curation affect the original source?-Would news curation destabilize or stabilize a balanced flow of information?

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Should professional journalists do news curation?Should we learn news curation in school?

Argument 6: Verification, its journalists job.Gay girl in Damascus

June 2011Amina Araff

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Minerva of South Korea

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Content curation PR marketing

Focus on target marketIndustry news and insightsConnect interactively with industry leadersCompetitive monitoring

According to Curata, enlightened marketers use a content marketing mix that includes 25% curated content in 2013.

Substantial presence in PR marketing.21

ConclusionCuration can be a process of distinguishing good information from noise.Old principles still matter: Objectivity and follow-up.Relate curation to media theories learned in other classes. Ex) social responsibility model, opinion leader and two-step flow of communication. Think about innovative ways of ethical curation. Ex) Curators Code (Popova, 2012).

In the first stage, we explore our interest in news.Lifestyle (food, fashion..)PoliticsSportsEntertainmentInternationalActivism (environment, anti-poverty, LGBT)* In this stage, we do not do reporting, we curate stories with the software Storify

How news curation project is graded (2 stories, 50 points each, 100 points)Newsworthiness 10 (Be reminded that lifestyle stories such as restaurant reviews will also considered newsworthy).Comment, headline & writing 10Diversity of sources 20-At least three tweets-More than one video (Youtube)-Other online source such as website, news article, facebook4. Overall added value 5 (see slide)5. Focus 5