Idea Lab

My Advice to Knight on Local Democracy Online

by Steven Clift
2007 Knight News Challenge Winner

The Knight Foundation is beginning to make some waves in local democracy circles. And I am not just saying that because they fund this blog. Earlier this year they hosted a conference with community foundations on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy, then they announced the Knight Center of Digital Excellence focused on universal access to the "digital town square," and most recently announced a commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy and $24 million in matching funds for community foundations (see my collection of online civic engagement resources for community foundations referenced in a...

• July 30, 2008
• 3 comments

Finding Local Community Online

by Steven Clift
2007 Knight News Challenge Winner

I've been thinking a lot about just how "local" most people want to be online. The greatest myth about the Internet is that people only want to go to world online. That they only care about creating social networks with friends or people like themselves with similar interests from thousands of miles away. It is as if the cross-dressing organic gardener from Sweden connecting with those like themselves on the other side of the world (someone I met once who shared his tipping point experience with the power of the Internet) has more virtue than enabling a plant swap online...

• May 2, 2008
• 2 comments

How Would You Engage People in Public Policy?

by Steven Clift
2007 Knight News Challenge Winner

The one million figure is my number, but seriously, the UK government wants advice on how to engage lots of people online. Engage is the key word, the British Prime Minister already receives e-petitions online (nothing like that with the White House, Congress, or even one U.S. governor despite our constitutional right to petition) which is more about political expression than engagement. From the UK-based OpenDemocracy site you can learn about UK government's "desire to hold a national debate on a British Statement of Values as part of the Governance of Britain Green Paper." You can read a summary of...

• March 25, 2008
• 1 comment

Crashing the E-Politics and E-Democracy Gates

by Steven Clift
2007 Knight News Challenge Winner

My focus tends to be the "citizen" in citizen media. Over the last few years I've increasing found myself at conferences like Public Media and the Online News Association. I always feel a bit out of place, because despite the adoption of online interactivity in online news and media, I am still pretty much viewed as a "consumer." Someone to be captured and delivered to advertisers or to become a donor to public broadcasting. Interactivity is often viewed in the context of news be it reacting with reader comments or creating "news." True conversation, the heart of being a citizen...

• February 21, 2008
• 1 comment