Distraction Therapy

The latest Decentered Media podcast asked what it is that we gain when we make our own media, rather than allowing the large-scale processed media producers create things for us? In what way do we benefit if we run our own radio show or produce our own photography exhibition?

Community media challenges us to more than just imitate what the maintream media already offers, and allows us to represent our lives from our own perspectives and in our own ways. It was great to hear about the experience of producing community-led media from active practioners and advocates of community media, including Jurian, Steve, Peter, Iman, and Gerhart. A big thanks as ever to John Coster for hosting the podcast at the Doc Media Center.

The latest Decentered Media podcast took place at the Doc Media Centre, and John Coster and myself where joined by Jas, Jurian, Peter, Aiden and Laury. We talked about how documentary and news mediates our experiences, and how different types of media help us to understand our world and our experiences. We take a look at the Don McCullin documentary on the BBC iPlayer, and ask how television news and social media shapes our expectations about how we document the world.

This weeks podcast explored the difference between social media and community media, and the importance of shaping stories that come from the participants but which are shared with neighbours and fellow citizens in our communities and between our communities.

We also chatted about tips to be a succesful podcaster, but don’t expect to become rich overnight, as we pretty much agreed that this is more a theraputic and a social experience rather than a commercial one.

Thanks again to John Coster for hosting the discussion at the pop-up Documentary Media Centre.

 

 

In this evening’s podcast John Coster and myself met up at the pop-up Documentary Media Center and sheltered from the rain and sleep, and chatted about what it means to feel welcome in our commuities, and how community media can play role in supporting and fostering understanding in these divisive political times.

It was really good to catch up with John, Gerhart and Nas tonight, to chat about the community media projects they have been working on, and what aspects of social gain they see as an outcome of their work. Always nice to have a general chat, this time with some mulled wine and mince pies.

For community media practitioners we are used to making distinctions between our social gain activity and our commercial activity. As community media groups are usually consituted on a not-for-profit basis, its our priority to put resources back into our communities. But is this the only model of social engagement that we can point to, or are there other ways of helping people in our communities to understand what’s going on?

What if local businesses themselves develop and run their own community media services? Media services that help communities to talk about the life in their communities and that help us to form networks who help us to realise what is important about the neighbourhoods in which we live?

Today I spoke with Luke St Clair, who supports Oadby TV, a hyperlocal television channel that uses social media to support people in Oadby neighbourhoods with the Love Oadby campaign and social media channels.

What an amazing day discussing community media and why the social gain mission matters! This podcast was recorded following the Mapping Community Media workshop that Katie Moylan and I put together as a collaboration between the University of Leicester and the Community Media Associaiton. I’m so grateful for all the people who travelled to Leicester from across the country, and those who sent us messages and supported the day. A few of us met up afterwards in the Six Degrees Coffee shop in Leicester, and we chatted about why social gain matters to how we think about community media, and in what ways we can be moving the debate about community media forward with our supporters, partners and policy makers. Watch out for a fuller blog report that I’ll post later on. But thanks to everyone who took part today.

This morning I chatted over Skype with Terry Lee from the University of Bedfordshire. We talked about Terry’s background supporting community radio, his work with the Community Media Associaiton, and Terry’s appoach to teaching radio at Radio Lab. We also chatted about the Fantastic Noise podcast, and the freedom that podcasts have given us to discover and innovate with this new form of sound-based media.

Many community media projects and community radio stations struggle because they only have one approach to sustainable business planning. I visited John Sketchley earlier today to find out more about John’s appraoch to developing HermitageFM in Coalville. John’s approach is mindful that in reallity only ten percent of running a community radio station is related to radio – the rest is community.

What’s the role of independent and grassroots food producer? Today I visited the Northampton Food Festival with Matthew O’Callaghan, who told me about the work he does promoting independent food in the East Midlands, and the upcoming Chocfest that takes place in Melton Mowbray 17th & 18th November.