Ben Franklin and Newspapers in the Cloud

A while back now the Newspaper Club caught my eye. A simple, anyone-can-use printing service seems a great idea, and it is certainly positive. But I never mentioned it to anyone because, straight away, the concept felt tired (even to an unconditional-lover of print). I forgot about it. 

Then, this week, I read about some Journalists in New York (and John Paton at CUNY) who are making newspapers in the cloud. The ‘Ben Franklin Project’ seems like a more creative antidote, enabling collaborative, sustainable and potent publishing.

They are using free web-tools to produce an issue of their paper (hence in the cloud). But perhaps more importantly, they are proposing a way to reconfigure reporting and publishing, online and print, the relationship between the crowd and journalism. 

Here is a nice piece explaining the Ben Franklin Project. 

posted by Ossie Froggatt-Smith.

Posted 2 years ago

About:

A gnome is:

a) a maxim which imparts knowledge, often taught to the young
b) a legendary dwarf

gnome online is:

Ossie Froggatt-Smith works 9-5 as an editor and sometimes a journalist. He studied Byzantium and still thinks about it all the time. He manages gnome.

Edward Randell is a journalist. He sings in Paris with the Voice Messengers, and has written for the TLS and Jazzwise. He edits gnome.

Roberta Klimt spends a lot of time at the British Library, so much that she gets paid for it. She blogs and writes at gnome and the Oxford Left Review. She also studies medieval Italian literature.

Andrew Naughtie studies sociology. He lives in Bristol, but is moving to Chicago, Illinois! He blogs and writes at gnome.





At gnome, we get together with people and promote non-fiction writing because we think that:

a) young non-fiction writing is v v under-appreciated
b) writers are discouraged by brutal subs and celebrities

If you would like to:

a) suggest some useful links/blogs/events to gnome
b) write a non-fiction essay to be produced by gnome

we would love to hear it.

Submit by clicking submit, or get in touch, by emailing gnome [dot] magazine [at] googlemail [dot] com.

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