For important events I am invited to as a speaker, I have the habit to sit down and put to paper an entire manuscript. While this is usually rather time consuming, it allows me to give structure to my thoughts and also focus my argument. I find a few things more irritating than speakers who are unprepared and don’t talk to the point.

Continue reading for the full text of the presentation entitled “Blogs and Podcasts as Tools for Political Education”

Blogs and Podcasts as Tools for Political Education

(Paper presented by Dr. Ronald Meinardus at iBlog2: The Second Philippine Blogging Summit on April 18, 2006 at the University of the Philippines, College of Law, Diliman Campus, Quezon City)

1. Introduction

I am happy for this opportunity to address you face-to-face and meet many individuals in the real world who thus far I am familiar with only through their online existence. While I would term myself a cyberoptimist, I am aware of the downsides coming along with the new digital technologies and the related media: there is a tendency that we reduce our human interactions to the virtual space, which may lead to isolation and atomization. This is one further example of – to use the Kantian term – “the dialectics of enlightenment”: While on the one side, the digital media open up new and unparalleled opportunities to share and create communities, at the same time they may also lead to personal loneliness, separation and social seclusion. I emphasize this point to highlight the importance of such offline, face-to-face meetings as this one here today.

The Friedrich Naumann Foundation – or to be more precise, The Liberal Times Manila Podcast, which the Foundation publishes – is one of the co-sponsors of the Blogging Summit. Basically, the liberal Foundation is an institute for civic or political education. Our basic objective is to train and educate members of society to enable them to participate actively in the political process. The objective of the programs we sponsor is active citizens’ participation, which, in our eyes, is a precondition for democratic consolidation.

While this may sound abstract, the programs we sponsor are very real and practical. The Foundation sponsors a variety of educational programs, workshops, seminars and publications of all sorts. Here, methodological issues are important in our consultancy. In (adult) education the choice of the proper media as teaching tools is essential, yes of strategic importance. In this regard of media usage also, the liberal Foundation would like to be perceived as a progressive institute.

In Germany, the Foundation sponsors an award winning Virtual Academy, and our International Academy for Leadership (IAF) offers online-seminars on many important political issues. These attract participants from all over the world and are particularly popular with young Philippine (political) leaders. Furthermore, our main regional political partner, the Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats (CALD) conducts media workshops where, among other, political blogging and recently also podcasting is promoted.

The new digital media opens new perspectives for political communications and civic education. As most speakers will deal with blogging, I have chosen to put my emphasis on podcasting, where I personally also see the bigger potentials. As most things in life, this preference also has a personal explanation. Before joining the Foundation, I worked for many years as a radio producer in Germany. In my eyes, podcasting may be called a further triumph of the audio format which not a few had already discarded as hopelessly inferior to video and television.

2. Blogs and Podcasts: The most liberal communications tools

Most of the following statements are made with one major and very important reservation: We are talking about technological tools and their social implications in a world that remains highly divided and where the equality of opportunities is nowhere to be seen. Of course, I am referring to the digital divide. This is growing, thus sharpening global inequalities. While this is an overriding concern (also and particularly from a liberal vantage point), I will have to abstract from this issue in the following.

Digital divide or not, the new digital media have revolutionized the way people communicate. Among the most important changes is the empowerment of the individual user: Today, everyone with a computer and an Internet connection is potentially an editor-in-chief. This empowerment of the individual citizen has neutralized the power of the gatekeepers. More and more so called citizens’ journalism is competing with the main stream media or MSM. At the center of all this is the individual. This has enormous political, social and also cultural implications.

The media revolution has also the potential to lead to a paradigm shift in education and pedagogy. The central questions here are: How do we teach most effectively and how do we learn best? For me the answer is short: The best way of learning is “learning by doing,” and to do it yourself. In essence, blogs and podcasts are do-it-yourself media. This quality justifies, yes mandates, their usage in educational programs.

3. Blogs as a tool for (political) education

Thus far, the political impact of blogs has been much higher than that of podcasts. First, blogs have been around much longer than their audio-companions. Second, while blogs are counted in the tens of millions, podcasts are counted in the tens of thousands.

Blogs have become a true challenger of the main stream media; some blogs have more regular visitors than major newspapers have subscribers. The evolving relationship of blogs and newspapers (or citizens’ journalism versus traditional journalism) is one of the most debated issues regarding the future of the media in many countries, particularly the U.S.

However, in the educational field blogging has not yet had the impact as it has had in the field of journalism. And I will argue in this paper that the potential for podcasting is bigger in this field than that of blogs.

Will Richardson, an academic blogging advocate who runs weblogg-ed.com which deals with the possible uses of blogs in the classroom mentions five uses of weblogs for educators. These are:

• Online classroom portals

• Discussion sites

• Filing cabinets for handouts and syllabi

• Collaboration spaces

• Personal portfolios

As five top uses of blogs for students, Will Richardson mentions the following:

• Collaborative work space

• Online journal

• Reader response type work

• Research journal

• Archive

But Richardson concedes that “the concept is still so new to most people that it feels like a bigger risk than it is” and that “the number (of those using blogs in education) is still very, very small.”

I personally have made good experiences with using blogs at seminars and workshops: Provided the participants have computers connected to the Internet, blogs offer a wonderful “collaborative workspace” for summaries and recaps and at the same time a means to get the message out.

4. The Future of Podcasting

Podcasting, as we know it today, is still very young and only a small minority of people actually now what it is all about and use it (either as producers or consumers). At the same time, an interesting debate is taking place as to the potential of the new communications tool. More so as with blogging, the further development of podcasting is a function of technological progress. I base my argument on three assumptions:

• As we move along, the technology of podcasting will become more user friendly, thus attracting those who today are still turned off by technological hurdles.

• The young generation is more open to “playing” and using the digital audio formats. The demographics favor podcasting.

• The mechanisms of distributing podcasts may change; this is the realistic ambition of e.g. the backers of mobilcasting. Still, the basic concept of disseminating digital audio-content should not be affected. I would argue that connecting podcasting and mobile phones would open up totally new markets and potentials for podcasting.

While new scenarios with different data are published frequently, I would agree with the recent assessment from “Bridge Ratings” according to which podcasting is growing and has already begun to take listeners away from traditional radio: “By 2010, today’s 94% penetration for terrestrial radio will have sunk to 85%,” the report says and continues: “Podcasting is beginning to show evidence of cannibalizing radio’s time-spent-listening.”

This, of course, refers mainly to the United States, where according to one source, 60 new podcasts go online daily. In Europe, we see the most development in the United Kingdom, followed by Germany, I assume.

Compared to other audio-media, podcasts have two inherent advantages.

• Journalistically, they can focus far better than the traditional radio programs on specific target audiences. Nowhere does the concept of narrowcasting as opposed to the traditional broadcasting become more compelling than here. Structurally (and strategically) this is a comparative advantage of podcasting which traditional media will never be able to neutralize.

• Podcasts are mobile and portable, and, therefore, reflective of a widespread desire on the consumers’ side.

On average, a German commuter is said to spend 1 hour and 21 minutes every day going to work and returning home (in her private car or using public transport). This time slot will be the battle ground for podcasts and traditional media. I see a very good chance for podcasts to eat into radio’s market share.

5. A Taxonomy of Podcasts

Being the most liberal of communications tools, it is not surprising that podcasts come in various formats or variants. Journalistically we may differentiate between four main formats:

• Talk show

• Monologue/commentary/lecture

• Interview

• Feature story

This is a rough classification, and of course there exists no limit to human creativity in producing audio-programs.

Apart from this differentiation, it is also possible to set apart different groups of podcasts according to the people who produce them and their respective intentions: Here, I can discern at least five such groups:

• Corporate

• Private

• Political/advocacy

• MSM

• Educational

From a progressive and liberal stand point, the proliferation of private, political/advocacy and educational podcasts is the most encouraging. They reflect a communicative empowerment of social groups or sectors that, until recently, had no public voice – or only a meager one.

On the other hand, corporate and MSM podcasts hardly bring a new quality or dimension to the media sphere. In their case, we may speak of a methodological adaptation of well entrenched media powers in an effort to keep in touch with rapid technological development and changing media consumption patterns.

6. Podcasting and Education

My assumption is that the usage of podcasting in education will increase in the future. As with many things, the United States is setting the pace and the benchmark also regarding this field.

Today, we can differentiate between three variants of academic podcasting:

• Course-casts (audio-versions of lectures distributed to students online)

• Podcasts for teachers aimed at their professional development (“train the trainer”) regarding the use of digital information technology in the classroom.

• Podcasts developed by students starting at the elementary level up to university (and beyond)

Most development in the sense of number of new podcasts published should be expected in the latter category. For a fascinating overview of students’ podcasts available online (all United States!) go to “The Education Podcast Network.”

Typical for all three variants of educational podcasts is the high degree of specialization. They all cater for an audience which is much too small to be attractive for traditional media. These podcasts are not driven by commercial objectives but are community centered and educational in nature.

I see great potential for this communication methodology to expand in educative environments. My optimistic perception is enhanced by demographics. Young people more than any other age group are attracted by the technology. Says Don Knezek of the International Society for Technology in Education:

“This is the kind of technology they use for their daily lives. If schools want to reach today’s learners, they can’t ignore it.”

Technorati Tags: Blogs, Podcasts, Politics, Education