Jimmy Wales, co-founder of Wikipedia, spoke to Media Bistro about the plight of magazines and the importance of community-based journalism.
Wales says that magazines, although “useful in certain contexts” are in trouble because they don’t provide as much content as websites and they don’t come free.
‘Why should I subscribe to a photography magazine, when I can go and get massive amounts of information, that’s much more detailed and much more in-tune with my interests, online, and it’s good quality?’ The idea that people will pay for quality, and that the traditional magazine is quality — that doesn’t really hold up.
He also believes that the success of Wikia and Wikipedia lie in that fact that they’re community-based.
Communities are capable of high-quality work. Journalists and magazines both operate in communities and should consider moving away from the ‘top-down’ and ‘broadcast’ way of thinking towards more of a ‘community facilitator and moderator’ way of thinking.
I wouldn’t say that the anonymous editing of Wikipedia is “high-quality,” but it does show a real interest on the part of citizens to be participants in media (duh). Maybe we were always interested, and we were never given a platform. Either way, in an age of Wikipedia, blogging, Facebook, and opinion-based TV news, I think the debate over the role of public journalism is pretty much over.
