It's more than journalism, it's international relations

Clay Shirky's article Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable is excellent. I was moved by the line, ""If the old model is broken, what will work in its place?" The answer is: Nothing will work, but everything might. Now is the time for experiments, lots and lots of experiments, each of which will seem as minor at launch as craiglist did, or Wikipedia did, as octavo volumes did." This is motivating because truly everyone loves technology. Every public library I have been into has lines of people waiting to use the computers. Everyone wants to be involved. It is reassuring to know that although the future is uncertain, the future will certainly be great.

The spot.us website is hopeful at best. I probably will never donate money to an author to write an article. The articles are unique and intriguing. But I am more inclined to wait for other people to donate and let me reek the benefits in the end. I would think that most of the people donating are journalists themselves or interested parties.

The news I enjoy best is headline news. I can get this news for free on CNN.com, which I assume makes most its money from advertisements and TV ad sales. The Associated Press has an option to charge per article. I believe $1.50 is a little high for an article, but they are more trustworthy publications than anything on CNN.com. I probably would never purchase an article for this cost.

As an educated, technologically enthused young person with enough disposable income to afford to purchase articles, I am still not interested in buying. And I can imagine a majority of people are even less inclined to spend their money. I believe websites with micropayments or donations are doomed to fail. I consider myself a realist, not an invertor; I find it difficult to come up with an answer to such an impossible question as, "What will be the future of journalism?"

On another topic, the fall of the publishing industry may be a good thing once this revolution is over. Publishers and editors decide what to print. With a more encompassing medium for journalism, freedom of speech and other rights could be more appreciated. But how far is too far? How will innovative internet companies decide to censor or not censor us? Google is currently participating in a censorship war with the Chinese government. Internet companies are making decisions about international relations that may be better decided by politicians. Could Google spit one too many times in the Chinese government's face and further separate the United States and Chinese relationship? How much power will internet companies have? Publishing firms and newspaper were the main defenders for freedom of speech. They played a major political role. However, the publishers and authors were known. The authors and leaders of the internet are unknown. Society was comfortable trusting publishing firms. Journalists overseas were seen as heroes. In this current revolution, I am not comfortable with the Google board of directors possibly deciding the WW III.