The National Black Programming Consortium Technology Now! Leadership Summit

print email discuss by Barbara Abrash

Executive Summary
The National Black Programming Consortium, a member of the CPB Minority Consortia and principal provider of African American programming to PBS, is taking the lead in a rapidly changing digital media environment with initiatives designed to nurture young producers of color, and maximize the potential of multiplatform delivery systems, in order to foster black public engagement and enrich mainstream public interest media.

Technology Now! – a conference organized by NBPC in partnership with WGBH – brought together 120 media professionals to explore issues of equity and access, economic sustainability, and community building in a series of workshops, screenings, and panel discussions. The overarching question was: What are the highest and best uses of new technologies?

Featured speakers included PBS president Paula Kerger, hip-hop artist Chuck D, and journalist Michel Martin.

On November 9, the group paused to pay tribute to the late Ed Bradley, who was remembered not only as a pathbreaking journalist, but as a mentor and inspiration.

Digital technologies have democratized the production, content and circulation of media, transforming possibilities for self-representation, social networking, and access to information. What opportunities does this open for communities of color? What are the barriers? And how can the public mission be served?

Storytelling
“Black people, who are in the vanguard of substance and style, have an opportunity to. reinvigorate public broadcasting with¬ new life and new audiences. To tell stories that matter.”
-NBPC Executive Director Jacquie Jones.

A dizzying array of narrative strategies — non-linear, multiplatform, locative, participatory, and virtual – were on display in the work of media artists such as Carroll Parrott Blue. Blue’s multimedia participatory project, which grew out of her autobiographical book Dawn at my Back, brings to life the history of Houston’s Third Ward – a historic black community — as told by its own people Deirdre Scott and Bryan Carter (aka Bryan Mnemonic) bring a black aesthetic to the African-American virtual world they are building in Second Life, an “immersive environment” of storytelling, performance, classes and social networking. These and other projects – ranging from one-minute social action documentaries designed for cell phones to interactive gallery installations – suggest new imaginative spaces opened by digital media.

Distribution
As digital technologies produce a flood of content, longstanding economic models and patterns of distribution are being disrupted. Like commercial media organizations, noncommercial media producers are searching for ways to monetize content, maximize longtail distribution, find new markets, and leverage capital. Strategic partnerships and new distribution networks are emerging. One example is the partnership that Re:New Media – formerly National Video Resources – is developing with Amazon. Under the proposed plan, Amazon will digitize, index, and distribute the work of independent producers via VOD and DVD download. Producers, who will pay a small fee, retain nonexclusive ownership and a digital file.

New distribution networks need to connect with mainstream business and cultural organization, but community-based networks are equally important. The 250 Historically Black Colleges and Universities, together with the networks of Latino and Native American colleges, potentially offer a vibrant alternative network that may be extended to community churches and organizations.

PBS, WGBH and other public broadcasters are in the vanguard of digital distribution to audiences that increasingly control when, where and how they access content. As they venture into vodcasting, podcasting and enhancing interactive websites, public broadcasters must wrestle with a tangle of digital rights management issues, which face independent producers as well. WGBH is actively working to adapt broadcast-based rights language for noncommercial media . American University’s Best Practices in Fair Use and Duke University’s Bound by Law are recommended practical approaches.

Equity, Access, Ownership
As Internet access for black and white Americans equalizes, access to broadband has become today’s digital divide. While 24/7 broadband access is a basic need for thriving communities, education and economic development, scarce resources, government indifference and fragile infrastructure plague underserved areas. Speakers cited the growing gap in education and training and agreed that supportive federal policies are essential. For many, ownership is key. Chuck D, who pioneered music distribution on the Web, asks, “Are African Americans producers and owners of new media?…. If you leave technological uses to corporations, you’ll get the McDonaldization of culture.”

Community Building
With digital technologies, public media has an opportunity to create new pathways of engagement, open its doors to new audiences. and move beyond consumerism. The Active Citizen Project (ACP) is a storytelling initiative designed for social action that takes place on the Web and in community settings, prisons, and schools. The People’s Election Campaign, for example, has brought together people in five cities to articulate their own issues and solutions, create their own political platforms, and take their mandate to public leaders.

ITVS, Active Voice, and P.O.V. are invigorating public broadcasting with dynamic outreach strategies that build constituencies, engage younger audiences, and have community building components. P.O.V sees Web 2.0 as community-powered information sharing and organizes outreach campaigns and interactive web strategies to connect with diverse audiences. ITVS recently partnered with NBPC on a nationwide outreach campaign in conjunction with the PBS broadcast of Byron Hurt’s Beyond Beats and Rhymes. It also features online games (Fat World), and storytelling sites such as BEYOND THE FIRE: Teen Experiences of War.

A post-conference session highlighted the digital projects of a group of emerging producers mentored by seasoned professionals under a special NPBC training initiative, showing the way to NBPC’s ambitious future plans for training and mentoring the next generation of media makers of color.

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The National Black Programming Consortium Technology Now! Leadership Summit

print email discuss by Barbara Abrash

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