The always insightful Amy Gahran poses a little thought experiment that I believe I’ve posted on a few times:
“What if social media (Twitter, Facebook, Delicious, Google Earth, etc.) were the only tool you could use to deliver the benefits of journalism to your community? You could still gather information however you choose (through in-person interviews, phone, Web, archive research, etc. — even social media), but you could only deliver your work via social media. How would you do it?”
I suspect this experiment is already out of the lab and we’ll see more and more examples. And I especially like the notion that “creativity thrives on constraints.” 140 characters. 30 sec of video. Boiling a story down to its essence.
What is the average length of stories that air in your 4 minute newscasts. Oops, that’s three minutes of content. How much space does a story get in a one-minute news capsule?
Okay, I’ll buy into the latest celeb “news” getting 30/140, but EVERYTHING? Really? I suppose that’s where links come in for those who want, you know, actual content.