Goals, Challenges & Emerging Opportunities

• Nurture the communication and publishing capabilities of an expanding network of hyperlinked small business and community organizations.
• Use outreach opportunities like community publishing "boot camps" and similar initiatives to raise awareness for the idea of creating and nurturing a cohesive network of hyperlinked communities.
• Encourage consensus on issues of greatest concern to our communities.
• Actively frame and clearly communicate grassroots-driven and community-focused messages.
• Focus this organic grassroots network's growing strength and coherence to counter the onslaught of "spin" produced daily by the well-funded corpo-government message machine.
• Capture sufficient public "mind share" on issues of greatest concern to our communities, and direct citizens to the appropriate grassroots resource for more information.

• Large media companies view local communities as "consumer markets."
• A focus on maximizing profit at the expense of balanced news coverage contributes to the "Wal-Martizing" of communities.
• Relentless drive to increase "market share" with heavy reliance on sensational "if it bleeds it leads" coverage, augmented by vacuous "advertorial" fluff, grievously distorts any real understanding of issues and challenges facing citizens and their communities.
• Corporate media thrives while small organizations and the communities they support suffer.

Corporate-Owned Media

Grassroots Community Organizations

Strong on Infotainment	Weak on Community	Weak on Infotainment	Strong on Community
- slick, compelling yet meaningless "news" - lots of sports hero and celebrity worship - consumer oriented puffery is also advertiser friendly	- poor regard for community concerns - little understanding of community issues - centralized, remote and hierarchical news management	- focused on real issues and concerns affecting the community - such concerns lack glamor, pizazz or easy solutions	- long-established community relationships - strong grasp of community concerns - localized issue management and flattened hierarchy

Corporate-Owned Media: Receding Yet Remains Dominant	Grassroots Media: Growing But Vulnerable
- owned by a handful of large corporations - driven by the profit motive - corporate and government press releases are the source for much of what passes as "news" - controlled by centralized, authoritarian and top-down management hierarchy - corporate monoculture stifles wide array of potential sources for news and opinion	- "owned" by a large and diverse array of small business and community organizations - focused on improving community - issues important to citizens and their communities take precedence - guided by dispersed, democratic and bottom-up authority - complex community ecosystems encourage a wide diversity of opinion and ideas