A Vast Wasteland, Five Decades Later
On September 12th Harvard hosted a forum entitled "News and Entertainment in the Digital Age: A Vast Wasteland Revisited" The event grew into a deeply thoughtful conversation about the state of media today and where we might be headed 50 years from now.
- Here is a link to the event.
[Today] News and Entertainment in the Digital Age: A Vast Wasteland Revisited | Berkman CenterMonday, September 12, 5:00pmFree and Open to the Public; RSVP required for those attending in person via the form belowThis event will be webcast live at 5:00 pm ET and archived on our site shortly after.Austin North Hall; Overflow in Austin East/West.- And you can read the full speech here:
Half a Century of the ‘Vast Wasteland’Fifty years ago today, my dad, Newton Minow, the 35-year old Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, spoke to the National Association of Broadcasters. What he said was so ground-breaking and so resonant that it has been included in many collections of the best speeches of the 20th century.- Or listen to it here:
American Rhetoric: Newton Minow -- Address to the National Association of
Broadcasters (Television and the Public Interest)Television and the Public Interest delivered 9 May 1961, National Association of Broadcasters, Washington, DC Plug-in required for flash audio click for pdf click for flash [AUTHENTICITY CERTIFIED: Text version below transcribed directly from audio] Governor Collins, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen.- And the poem that inspired the famous line.
Minow's opening remarks were brief but touched on some of the key motivations behind his decision to give the "vast wasteland" speech. He noted that television had become the dominant mode of communication in America, but there had been little or no public debate about its role in society. At its most basic, Minow argued, the role of government should be to expand choice. When he looked out at the television landscape, at a transformative technology, he was left feeling that we could and we must, do better.
- Looking at the media today Minow said he was most concerned about the role of media in elections and politics. As meaningful political coverage has dwindled to nearly nothing, we have created the modern media and elections machine which he summed up this way:
- At this point the conversation turned to the various panelists and special guests in the room including: Ann Marie Lipinski (Nieman Foundation), Jonathan Alter (Bloomberg View), Terry Fisher (Harvard Law School), Yochai Benkler (Harvard Law School), John Palfrey (Harvard Law School), Jonathan Zittrain (Harvard Law School), and special guests include Susan Crawford (Cardozo School of Law), Perry Hewitt (Harvard University), Ellen Goodman (Rutgers University School of Law - Camden), Virginia Heffernan (New York Times), Reed Hundt (Former Chairman of the FCC), Kevin Martin (Former Chairman of the FCC / Patton Boggs), Nicholas Negroponte (One Laptop per Child), Ethan Zuckerman (C4/Berkman Center), and more.
- The focus of the first few comments was really on the state of accountability reporting, and how digital platforms have disrupted the longtime business model, while also providing new modes of journalism and communications.This debate is a familiar one, but it took a unique turn when Ethan Zuckerman talked about the way that video - especially citizen videos from around the globe - are becoming a universal human language. While this was meant to point out how new technology and platforms like YouTube have democratized news and media making, one participant pointed out that it also shows how powerful TV could have been.TV still has the potential to be a tranformative medium, if it can embrace the way video is changing how we tell stories.
