That's Tim Porter's closing line at Debating the Future of Newspapers, where his readers have picked up a "community role of newspapers" discussion thread from the Online Newspapers mailing list. (His July 4 blog has related links, too.)

"Don't call it citizen journalism, if you object to that phrase," one comment says, "But figure out how to do it, how to manage it, how to make it core to who you are."

The message is similar to yesterday's New York Times story, "Why Newspapers Are Betting on Audience Participation," picking up from the discussion-starting Times story last month, provocatively titled "The Newspaper of the Future." Part of yesterday's focus was on the Greensboro, N.C., News & Record; last month's story was on a Lawrence, Kan., company's multimedia approach to its local area, providing news, information and interaction with readers, from online voter's guides to sports scores by cellphone, and now podcasts.

I've linked to the June Times story and other references to Lawrence and Greensboro before, but a repeat won't hurt... and might remind me to read it again myself to pick up the discussion when I get back to organizing my fall courses.


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