Pop17

Tuesday June 30th, 2009

The Meredith Broadcasting Group announced today that it will transfer current Meredith Video Solutions operations in Portland, OR to WFSB-TV’s 80,000 square foot studio in Hartford, CT.  The relocation will facilitate growth of the Better show by placing studios closer to the primary Meredith Video Solutions office in New York City, where the majority of sales and production takes place.  

“Better currently broadcasts in 50 markets nationwide and is quickly becoming a player of scale in women’s lifestyle programming,” said Kieran Clarke, Executive Vice President of Meredith Video Solutions.  “We believe that the close proximity between New York and Hartford will grow the show by making production more efficient and cost effective.” 

Some thoughts inspired by a Personal Democracy Forum Conference session on social media and Iran

ericmortensen:

Blogger and tweeters represent the information elite.  For true change to happen, information must disseminate.  Information that stays elite is useless to the broader community.  In open societies, social media has had success because information bubbles up from the information elite and seeps into the mainstream as newsapers and television networks pick up on it.

In closed societies there is no “up”.  The government controls means of mass communication.  Information stays elite.  Insular communities stay insular.  And governments can let bloggers/tweeters say whatever they like, because governments can make sure that there ideas never reach a wider audience.

Of course, this only remains true as long as blogs have a relatively small audience.  Should any blog become sufficiently large, a closed government would have to shut it down.  But as long as no particular blogger becomes too influencial, authoritarian governments probably won’t worry too much about the blogging community at large.