Brugerne vil selv bestemme

Af Helle Nissen Kruuse, hnk@djh.dk

• Diagnosen
• De 10 bud

Folk beskæftiget med nyheder i en postmodernistisk verden vil blive mødt af brugere, der siger nej til autoriteter, bestemmere, objektivitet, sendetider...

Vi er midt i et skifte fra modernismen til postmodernisme, og jo før nyhedsindustrien indser det, jo bedre bliver den i stand til at agere i det ny verdensbillede.

Påstanden fremsættes i en tankevækkende kommentar af Terry L. Heaton, hvis karriere har spændt fra mange års amerikansk broadcast-tv over et internet-research firma og nu senest til hans nystiftede konsulentvirksomhed Donata Communications, Nashville, USA. eJour har fået tilladelse til at bringe kommentaren, der blev offentliggjort i magasinet The Digital Journalism, februar 2003.

Diagnosen

Hans brobyggende erfaring med tv og nettet præger hans overvejelser om bruger-adfærd i en postmodernistisk verden befolket af mennesker, han kalder 'pomos'.

Terry Heaton illustrerer forskellen mellem modernister og pomo'erne således:

• Modernists share a universal faith in logic and science. Pomos see the realism of limitations.
• Words like purpose, design and hierarchy are modernist, while Pomos would rather use play, chance and anarchy.
• Modernists view much of life of life at arm's length. Pomos experience it as participatory. Life is not 'out there' to Pomos; rather, it is all around us.
• One of the most defining differences is with God, where the modernist would first see God, the Father. The postmodernist would see God, the Holy Spirit. God, the Father, represents distant authority, which Pomos reject, while God, the Holy Spirit, is among us, something we can experience for ourselves.
• For the modernist, the parts logically make up the whole, but the Pomo views the whole as greater than the parts.
• "Use it" is very postmodernist, while "Study it" is very modernist.

Terry Heaton anser pomoerne med deres viden og informationer fra internet som en alvorlig trussel mod enhver institution i Amerika, hvis magt er afledt af indhegnet viden. Pomoer mener ikke, at man bør betale for viden, og de afviser ideen om styrende organer, fordi de ser sig selv som selvstyrende. Han tilføjer:

"Jeg tror, at denne kulturelle forandring får gennemgribende indflydelse på nyhedsindustrien. Pomoer afskyr autoriteter -- specielt hvad de anser for elitært -- og jo mere vi prøver at fremme det, jo hurtigere vil promoer fjerne sig. Jo mere vi prøver at undervise, jo fjernere flytter forsamlingen sig. Pomoer ønsker ikke at blive undervist; de ønsker at lære ved at deltage."

De 10 bud

Hvordan nyhedsjournalistikken skal forme sig i den virkelighed, har Terry Heaton disse bud på:

1. Firstly, there IS no news except television (better: "video") news. Pomos want to see and hear for themselves, not read about it from a distance.
2. News must be available 24/7. Gone are the days when people will tune in at a specific time to be 'given' the news.
3. There's no such thing as a newscast in a postmodernist world. Stories must be available simultaneously, with the viewer able to select at random. Pomos don't believe they should have to wait for anything.
4. News must not be afraid to present the absurdities and contradictions of life as parts of the reality of a multi-cultural, diverse world.
5. News must include everybody's perspective, identify the organization's own perspective, or give none at all. The artificial journalistic hegemony known as objectivity is dead. It never was real and Pomos see through it.
6. News must give up its obsession with stardom and celebrity. Postmodernists reject authority and elitism (newscasters and reporters) in favor of participation and the knowledge acquired therein.
7. Reporters could and perhaps should represent the various tribes. This would provide sort of a global view from which viewers could pick and choose. "Now what?" is an important question for postmodernists, but only insofar as they can make up their own minds.
8. 'Live' is hypercritical, for the Pomo wants to participate more than anything else.
9. News must be interactive, but the goal is participation, not driving viewers to goals or solutions.
10. I believe it's time for TV stations to spin their news departments out as wholly owned subsidiary companies and permit them to seek their own distribution outlets. Create a licensing arrangement with the parent company for broadcast rights, and let the laws of the market determine who continues and who doesn't. Despite their similarities, broadcasters are not Web people, because their interests conflict. Consequently, TV stations only play with the Internet, and in so doing, they miss the point of the technology. They also deny and ignore the primary conduit to the whole postmodernist movement. It will stay that way unless the news becomes its own master, complete with the option to decide how best to distribute its product.