[Cross posted at MyDD. Edited slightly to reflect differences between MyDD and DKos. First time diarising all up in this biznatch!]
Hi, everyone.
I've never posted here before so I don't know how many of you are going to see this. I have been thinking for a while now that one of the things that'd be a really useful tool for the liberal, progressive and Democratic movements (I consider all three to be different, although not necessarily discrete or distinct) is a site listing all the publications, major and minor, relating to our movement and to politics, along with submissions guidelines.
More on TEH FL1P! (Sorry, feeling very internet humourish today.)
Blogging has done a lot to not only fact check and correct journalism outlets, but to also create alternative networks of information dissemination. God, I wonder how many people don't even bother reading newspapers, even online editions, any more and just get their news by following stories from their blogs of choice. I don't do that, but I know a lot of people who do. This was a pretty big victory, granted but I think that it's time for the next step.
Whether it's blogs or God only knows what, teh intarwebz have brought out some incredibly knowledgeable people and some incredibly talented writers. You can find diaries/stories (whatever your CMS calls them) with the same level of rigour and clarity that go into academic journals, much less, magazines like TNR and The Prospect.
Now, I think that we should be able to take these talents and get them injected into media outlets. For better or for worse, the mainstream media channels are here to stay, and I think that we should do what we can to maximise their utility. A spreadsheet of publications, organised by media market, distribution, topic areas, editorial biases and submissions guidelines, could serve several functions:
1. It'd make clear exactly where every single magazine or paper stands, so we know who we're dealing with under most circumstances.
2. It'd make it easier for young journalists and freelancers to get their stuff published. This is advantageous for two reasons:
a. We get more of our perspectives out there.
b. It helps develop and train our journalists, making them better at their craft, by getting more published and edited.
c. It helps build up clips for our journalists, which is the key to advancement.
I got this idea by talking to Mike Connery about small magazines like Wire Tap, but I'd really like to see this go forward. W It can be an open-sourced community resource, as far as I'm concerned. There's no reason that these kinds of lists should stay in the hands of communications directors of larger NGO's or in the hands of proprietary sellers.
See, that's the thing. I know that these lists exist, but they're behind firewalls of some kind. What will make this list different is the fact that it'd be open-sourced. Anyone can download it and use, and any changes or updates made would be required to be shared with aeveryone.
Who's interested in helping me put this together?
Get in touch with me through my website.
-dx