With science journalism in retreat, universities try new strategy for informing the public

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_13344185

With science journalism in retreat, universities try new strategy for informing the public

By Paul Rogers

[e-mail]
Posted: 09/15/2009 06:07:11 PM PDT
Updated: 09/16/2009 04:46:52 AM PDT

Concerned that journalism's economic problems are reducing Americans' understanding of science, medicine and other research, 35 of the nation's top universities — including Stanford and UC-Berkeley — on Tuesday announced they will feed their own accounts of their discoveries directly to top news sites on the Internet.

Under the plan, the universities have formed what is essentially their own nonprofit wire service, called Futurity, to provide articles to popular Web sites such as Yahoo News and Google News, along with MySpace and Twitter.

"We've been really concerned. Our preference would be to have the level of coverage of science and research that we enjoyed for decades," said Lisa Lapin, assistant vice president for university communications at Stanford.

Fewer reporters

"But the major news organizations haven't had the resources to provide that independent, objective look at what we are doing. It's been declining."

…

http://futurity.org/

[Taverner]

1. This is a good thing

Let the Universities SPEAK

[silverweb]

2. Excellent.

:thumbsup:

[eShirl]

3. YES. n/t

[amborin]

4. great!

[mopinko]

5. awesome, now if only

we could figure out how to get people to separate the wheat from the chafe, we would be good.

[imdjh]

7. No, this is perfect for the internet. Can't wait until every university does this.

Then every tenured whackjob out there will flow directly into an artery of misinformation and disinformation to be quoted immediately on bulletin boards.

[Viking12]

10. Hey, that may just put propagandists like Marc Marano out of business

If it were to evolve as you suggest, there would be no need for middle-men Climate Deniers like Marano.

Seriously, though -- most universities already create their own press releases for research at their institutions. In many cases, they are as poorly written and misleading as articles written by ill-informed journalists. That problem needs to be addressed if this is going to work

[imdjh]

11. You mean like begging the UN to give money to the Maldives to offset their own stupidity?

[Viking12]

12. Morano begged the UN for money?

Your post is nonsense. :wtf:

[Nihil]

8. Sounds like it would be a painful task ...

> if only we could figure out how to get people to separate
> the wheat from the chafe

:hide:

[OKIsItJustMe]

9. Indeed!

Remember Sturgeon’s Law, “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_Law#.E2.80.9CNinety_percent_of_everything_is_crud.E2.80.9D">Ninety percent of everything is crud.”

[tridim]

6. I love this idea!

:bounce:

Thinking about building a portal site with these feeds.. Hmmmm.