Dear readers, contributors, donors and members,
First, a few impressions from the US West Coast. Then details of the New York meet-up and finally, a reminder to anyone who feels like giving but hasn't got around to it yet.
WEST COAST
I have been on the West coast of the US since Thursday last week. I attended the closing conference of a series that MacArthur has sponsored on the future of journalism. I was struck by many things, but very much also by what an extraordinary place is a US university campus. The USC campus is in a poor neighbourhood, so the contrast when you walk in is all the more striking. The beauty of the gardens, the trees; the confidence of the buildings; the studious but somewhat insouciant students. For many undergraduates this is the first real experience of life away from home, and maybe it makes for them a picture of what the good society ought to be. The poor neighbourhood all around USC makes the microcosm all the more relevant.
The three MacArthur conferences have all pointed to the resurgence of "Communitarian News" as a dominant model of news-making. There are good and bad parts to this, and the thought that communities might become all the more self-sufficient for it is sometimes frightening. At USC, I met Dena from the Omidyar Network---a potential oD funder---and found myself saying something like this: ""oD is not not aiming for "neutrality" and we definitely color our pieces with our pro-Democracy, pro-Human Rights values. But when oD articles express opinion, it is with the quiet confidence that the writer is completely solid on their ground. An opinion that needs to be shouted, as so much "communitarian news" does, undermines itself." As I was saying this, I wondered whether I was somehow re-using the thought that David Hayes, our Deputy Editor, planted in me by using this Gandhi quote:
"I would
let the winds of the world blow through the doors and windows of my house
but I will not be blown away."
NEW YORK MEETING
Here are the details. Sorry to those for whom this is in the wrong part of town or at the wrong time---there will be more occasions to meet. We're meeting Thursday 3rd at 5pm. All welcome.
I'm very glad that Solana Larsen, from globalvoices and also openDemocracy board member, will be joining us. We will meet at Apple Bombar a cafe near NYU that she has used before for such meetings. Location is here:
http://www.applerestaurant.com/location.php
I'd love to listen to your thoughts about oD, and I'll also talk through how I'm thinking of opening out the writing, editing, publishing and commissioning process. I'll be very interested in your thoughts about that.
CAMPAIGN
Finally, if you have been thinking of giving but have not yet got around to it, why not now? You can contribute to our "Think Long Term" campaign by clicking here.
Many thanks,
Tony
