Author: fms

Felicia M. Sullivan is a researcher, educator and community advocate. With an MA in Media Studies, a MS in Public Policy and over 20 years of community-based practice, she works with community-based organizations towards individual, organizational and community transformation and change. She is currently a researcher at the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRLCE) housed Tufts University’s Tisch College. She is working towards her PhD in Public Policy at the John W. McCormack Graduate School at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Current Research Interests: youth development and out-of-school-time programming, human development and organizational learning in community-based settings, social impacts of communication and technology policy, social movements and change theory, social networks, civic / democratic / participatory communications
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What does a Community Communication system look like?

As I embark upon new work here in Lowell, MA, I am beginning to think through in a broader sense what a community communication systems looks like. What are its defining features? I have come up with some preliminary thoughts which I hope will expand and develop as I add new knowledge and thoughts into my day-to-day work.

So here is what I have thus far, a COMMUNITY COMMUNICATIONS system:

=> preserves and promotes our cultural heritage
=> is accountable to the people it serves
=> is open to all to participate
=> engages its citizens in important dialogues and debates (civic engagement)
=> supports and develops the social and economic life of its citizens
=> resists commercialization and explointation of public ICT resources
=> is flexible and broad in order to provide the right tool for the right situation
=> builds the communication skills (both the message making and tool weilding varieties) of tis community
=> insists on a culture of sharing and public exchange
=> champiions free and creative expression

What are other markers? It is easy to see how such a system differs from mass mediated and commercial communication systems, but how does it differ from our current “public” communication systems? I’m interested in what others have to offer.

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It’s not about the technology, It’s about the people

In the euphoria of new gadgets and high-tech seduction, it is easy to forget that the purpose of any new technology is to expand our humaness. To augment our own human capabilities in order to realize ourselves and our communities more fully.

Communnication tools that isolate, alienate, separate and segregate fail to realize the potential that exists in all of these rapidly developing tools and mechanisms to decentralize control to leverage the power of p2p and distributed networks towards richer lives, stronger communities, and a better world is hard and mindful work.

A magnificent human being who understood this and spread the work of the transformative power of communication died yesterday. Dirk Koning of the Grand Rapids Community Media Center will be missed.

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Terry Heaton’s Pomo blog – Rocket Boom

Terry Heaton’s Pomo blog – videoblogs via RSS

Here writes:

very once in awhile life opens a door and lets you glimpse into the future. Rocketboom is such an experience. The site officially launches on Monday, but there’s plenty to see there even now. It is a video blog (vlog) and probably the best I’ve seen so far. Sites like this are the pioneers of an age that will take advertising dollars from broadcasters. I’ve seen some pretty awful vlogs, but this one is different. Very clever. Very creative.

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Silicon Valley – Dan Gillmor’s eJournal – Four More Years

Silicon Valley – Dan Gillmor’s eJournal – Four More Years:

And this from Dan Gillmor:

“People say there are two Americas. I think there are at least three.

One is Bush’s America: an amalgam of the extreme Christian ‘conservatives,’ corporate interests and the builders of the burgeoning national-security state.

Another is the Democratic ‘left’: wedded to the old, discredited politics in a time that demands creative thinking.

I suspect there’s a third America: members of an increasingly radical middle that will become more obvious in the next few years, tolerant of those who are different and aware that the big problems of our times are being ignored — or made worse — by those in power today.

That third America needs a candidate. Or, maybe, a new party.”