The most amazing thing about community media is the rawness of it.
People aren't writing or speaking out about issues and topics they choose to, to make money or achieve any sort of physical gain. They are creating community media to express themselves freely and openly with people in their area. Unlike mass media, that usually has an ulterior motive for broadcasting whatever message they may have. "Every instance of community media--whether alternative, social-change focused, or minimalist in its approach to free speech--involves self-expression." The people who use community media are doing so in order to bring attention to a topic they feel passionate about, and create awareness in their community.
The self expression part of the article discusses how new technology has changed how people participate in the media. It has also increased how many people can become involved, and that these people do not have to be creating community media for professional reasons. Many of these new outlets for media have even blurred the boundaries between private and public conversations. I think we can all attest to this with the conversations we see between our friends or ourselves and friends on Facebook, some of which wouldn't usually be so public before we had social networks.
I definitely agree that one of the best things about community media truly is the rawness of it. I know from my experience with community media both as a user and as a member of the audience I find being able to openly express how I feel about a particular subject to be very liberating.
ReplyDeleteI have also find that there are times when after watching the news or listening to the radio I like to search on people’s blogs or status updates about the subject because I do like to know what the people think. I think that because of community media myself and many of my peers are actually more in tune with what is going on in the world.