I wish there had been a large, loosely but passionately networked group of no-bullshit
vloggers who, in an organized and mutually supportive way, could have "activated" along
the gulf coast to send one person into every New Orleans neighborhood with his or her
camera and a bag of minicasettes and batteries, and just stand in hip deep sewage every
day SHOOTING FOOTAGE ALL DAY LONG.
If that had been the case we would RIGHT NOW be spending our time doing much more
constructive things as video bloggers other than sitting thousands of miles away watching
Geraldo cry and arguing about whether George Bush is the devil.
We would as a community be concentrating all of our efforts on retrieving, copying,
editing, hosting, posting, archiving, indexing, and distributing thousands of hours of
footage in an unstoppable Mainstream Media runaround.
It's a nice idea in principle, but your example is too extreme. Anyone trying to go INTO New Orleans would have been stopped, rightfully so, by the authorities who were desperately trying to get people out. Going into a situation like that makes you just another person who has to be protected, which would be enormously irresponsible - you might be saved at the expense of someone else who had no choice but to be there. At least the large news orgs also have rented helicopters etc. to get their people out - and even they were wisely staying out.
As for standing hip-deep in sewage - not as heroic as it sounds. Especially two weeks after the fact when you start dying of leptospirosis, typhoid, cholera, and other water-borne diseases that you will have contracted in doing so. The longer you spend in that water, the higher your risk. Most of these diseases have a 4-14 day incubation period. The full horror of Katrina has yet to unfold.
Citizen journalism is a fine ideal, but not worth putting your life at risk for.
--
best regards,
Deirdré Straughan
www.straughan.com (personal)
www.tvblob.com (work)
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