4 Minute Roundup: Knight Commission Report; NPR's Local Venture

Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's special edition, I look at the report that came out today from the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy. The Commission called for strengthening public media, bringing broadcast access to all Americans, and having at least one strong online info hub for each community. Plus, NPR announced it received a \$3 million grant to start a local online news venture with 12 stations, covering community issues in-depth and working with the PBS embeddable video player. I asked Just One Question to Knight Commission executive director Peter Shane, too.\n\nCheck it out:\n\n\n\n

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\n\nBackground music is \"What the World Needs\" by the \"The Ukelele Hipster Kings\":http://www.mevio.com/music/?artist_id=1930 via PodSafe Music Network. \n\nHere are some links to related sites and stories mentioned in the podcast:\n\n\"Knight Commission's Complete List of Recommendations\":http://report.knightcomm.org/complete-list-recommendations\n\n\"Blue Ribbon Commission Calls for Urgent Attention to the Information Needs of America's Communities\":http://www.knightfoundation.org/news/press_room/knight_press_releases/detail.dot?id=351773 at Knight Foundation\n\n\"The Internet's next frontier? News for your neighborhood\":http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/10/the-internets-next-frontier-your-neighborhood.ars at Ars Technica\n\n\"Knight Foundation Report Urges More Information Access\":http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1004018163 at E&P\n\n\"Universal Broadband Key to Saving Media\":http://www.internetnews.com/webcontent/article.php/3842141/Universal+Broadband+Key+to+Saving+Media+Panel.htm at InternetNews\n\n\"Why community still matters in the digital age\":http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_13465890 at San Jose Mercury News\n\n\"NPR Gets \$3 Million Grant For Hyper-Local News Initiative\":http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/02/npr-gets-3-million-grant-for-hyper-local-news-coverage-initiative/ at TechCrunch\n\nNPR Announced New Investigative Project - Legitimizes Bloggers in the Process\":http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlLA/radiodispatched/npr_announced_new_investigative_project_legitimizes_bloggers_in_the_process_138654.asp at FishbowlLA\n\n\"NPR Launching New Online Local Pilot With \$3 Million From CPB, Knight\":http://paidcontent.org/article/419-npr-launching-new-online-local-pilot-with-3-million-from-cpb-knight/ at PaidContent\n\n\"Building the Ideal Community Information Hub\":http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2009/04/building-the-ideal-community-information-hub120.html at MediaShift\n\nAdded Bonus: Here's the entire interview with Peter Shane, if you'd like to hear more from him about the Commission's report:\n\n\n\nHere's a graphical view of last week's MediaShift survey results. The question was: \"How do you deal with technology overload?\"\n\n

\n\nAlso, be sure to vote in our poll about what you think about the Bay Area News Project non-profit venture.\n\nMark Glaser is executive editor of MediaShift and \"Idea Lab\":http://www.pbs.org/idealab. He also writes the bi-weekly OPA Intelligence Report email newsletter for the \"Online Publishers Association\":http://www.online-publishers.org. He lives in San Francisco with his son Julian. You can follow him on Twitter \"@mediatwit\":http://www.twitter.com/mediatwit.\n