News Hub is a working title for a web publication concept. It takes a similar approach to the one Git Hub? takes for software project communities, applying it to news/communications communities devoted to a specifict topic. Each News Hub is single-topic (e.g. "the financial crises"), is easily created and comes with a gamut of tools integrated together. It's kind of a communications center in a box.
The strength of this model is that it takes tools and concepts that we're already familiar with and bundles them together in a coherent package that can be instantiated in a couple of minutes. I love Git Hub? because it allows me to put the code I'm working on under version control, gives me a place to take notes and an easy way to collaborate with others. It also immortalizes the work I've done, placing it in the public sphere, encouraging re-use and additions. The wiki is there, so I use it, and documentation happens fairly naturally. And it does all these things for me; the only thing I have to do is push my code to their server.
With the News Hub, the same quick-setup approach allows topical hubs to be set up at a moment's notice as news breaks.
A News Hub...
- ...is a Community Publication started and fostered by CommunityOrganizers?
- ...has a blog for linear thoughts and time sensitive news
- ...and a wiki for collecting and networking ideas and information about the topic
- ...has media galleries (photo/video) could integrate with Flickr/Vimeo via API?
- ...is built around tribes: small, focused groups devoted to a topic or shared interest. This needs more unpacking and translating out of my head, but it's the core of the concept.
The two core pieces of the hub are the blog and the wiki.
The Blog
The blog is useful for time-sensitive information. Think breaking news. It is also a great place for initial launching-pad discussions to take place, through carefully moderated comments or alternately, pingbacks.
So far, it seems that linear, one-off creations (like a book or a blog) tend to be strongest when authored by a single person or small group. They're also best when created by those who have the resources to dedicate full-time (or the passion to devote nearly-full time) to them. To create tight works with a clear thesis statement requires individual experience, wisdom and a tight focus, only one of which crowds have. Initial experiments with linear creative work--Penguin's crowd-sourced novel and numerous "citizen journalism" projects--have been less than successful, not because they're bad goals, but because they don't tap into the strengths of community.
The blog becomes the director of the News Hub, authored by the core community organizers. It acts as a springboard by inviting discussion and contribution through the wiki.
The Wiki
The wiki is everything the blog is not. Wikis are an ideal medium for community to be involved in. It is non-linear. It is a process-oriented medium. Wikis are never "finished": they are always in flux and always being worked on. They encourage small additions. Every little bit of knowledge added is kept forever and refined gradually. This is the perfect outlet for the wisdom of the crowds. Everybody knows something and can contribute something, however small. Every bit permanently adds to the strength of the whole. The wiki also becomes the historian of the News Hub. As the knowledge communicated in breaking-news blog post becomes less useful as time-sensitive data, it can be reincarnated as useful non-linear (topical) information. In addition to being the community outlet, and the historian, the wiki is also the researcher and resource center. Articles on advanced topics can be linked to explanations in the wiki.
Implementation details
- uses MarkdownForFormatting with the addition of the wiki bracket syntax for wiki links
Categories: Communication, Community