Thoughts on Reading

The last three articles by Kelly and Miel really coincided with my personal beliefs, and it was refreshing to see it written down. Kelly was explaining that even with the exponential rise of citizen journalists and blogs, mainstream (legacy) media are still at the center of discourse and will not be destroyed. I definitely agree with Kelly and Miel that if blogs are giving more voice and diversity to subjects of conversation and bringing about more democracy and engagement then great, but I don't think that this will completely upend traditional journalism. People on the web still need general, well-researched news so they don't keep seeking out stories embracing their opinion. Also Miel pointed out that the blogosphere hasn't exactly proven itself yet. It hasn't gotten into the nitty-gritty, hard journalism that would be required of them if traditional journalists went under. It won't magically happen- it will take hard work. I certainly agree with that standpoint.
As far as for an online news publication, several pointers could be taken from the articles by Jackson and Nicholas. We, as a society, do multitask too often and fragment our attention unconsciously. Most young adults are only getting a constant stream of bite size news, and they get annoyed of all the clutter involved in receiving the news. Nicholas talked about how the Internet, and Google in particular, is dumbing down our generation. There's so much digital choice and pleasure in bouncing around sites while also saving time, that young adults are hardly stopping long enough to obtain any worthwhile knowledge. Therefore, for an online publication I think it's important to not dumb-down the news. We need to put important, talked-about-news on the front page so younger adults can go to that site, read up quickly on important current events and then go. We don't need to win them over by fancy gadgets or visual aids particularly, but just by meaningful news stories that will make them feel better as citizens. The publication has to be unique enough that people actually stop to read it and not just bounce on, and I think a lot of that can come from being neat, uncluttered and to the point.