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MARCH 29-30, 2012
In June 2011, a groundbreaking Federal Communications Commission staff report offered the following assessment of our digital media landscape:
“In most ways today’s media landscape is more vibrant than ever, offering faster and cheaper distribution networks, fewer barriers to entry, and more ways to consume information. Choice abounds. Local TV stations, newspapers and a flood of innovative web start-ups are now using a dazzling array of digital tools to improve the way they gather and disseminate the news — not just nationally or internationally but block-by-block. The digital tools that have helped topple governments abroad are providing Americans powerful new ways to consume, share and even report the news.
Yet, in part because of the digital revolution, serious problems have arisen, as well. Most significant among them: in many communities, we now face a shortage of local, professional, accountability reporting. This is likely to lead to the kinds of problems that are, not surprisingly, associated with a lack of accountability — more government waste, more local corruption, less effective schools, and other serious community problems. The independent watchdog function that the Founding Fathers envisioned for journalism — going so far as to call it crucial to a healthy democracy — is in some cases at risk at the local level.”
With this assessment as its background, I/S: A Journal of Law and Policy for the Information Society, is staging a major multidisciplinary conference to evaluate the potential for online journalism to meet America’s ongoing information needs. “The Future of Online Journalism: News, Community, and Democracy in the Digital Age” will bring together leading figures from communication studies, economics, journalism, law, and sociology to discuss the economic viability of online news and the impact of online journalism on community information needs and democratic self-governance. The presentations will include the following topics: