*SADLY MIST
Due to prior commitments I was forced to miss the performance by our very own Daniel Meadows. Bad news as I quite fancied the prospect of Daniel's Meadow hitting Birt's Acre for a slew of pastural Online Media debate.

Here is what I can garner from my peers' musings:

• Journo's Journey: Capture Wales is Daniel's brainchild which seeks to give a voice to anyone with vocal chords on the basis that "every story is of interest to someone somewhere."
• Emma Barnett: "The basic notion is that if people have the tools to create their own content, they will do that, and that this will result in an emerging global conversation." A quote from Dan Gilmour's book: We The Media which sums up the impetus behind Mr. Meadow's project.
• Through a Glass, Sharply: Meadows and Burton should really sit down and hammer one out.
• Hard Blogging: A raised glass to the championing of the little man. There is no need for these stories to offer anything new or ground-breaking, they are fine as mere curios, they need be no more, and that is not to belittle them by any means.
• "death of the author"...?: The Capture Wales team were astonished by the honesty of the people involved and how much they were willing to give. I like this idea that people have a genuine desire to tell their stories and this is a viable platform for that to happen.
• Will Dean: didn't see it either, he was busy smooching Lauren Laverne.
• The Sparkly World of Alexis: Trainee Journalist: "everyone has a story to tell but not everyone can master the QWERTY keyboard." Meadows argues that this is a reason to give them the means to tell that story. Alexis also raises the debate over Meadows' lecture style (reading from a script) causing a rift in the MagLab.
• James Franey's Blog: Deaf ears for Meadows' preaching. His assertion that everyone has a voice should rely on that voice being presented well and succinctly. Capture Wales is not that.
• The Dirty World Of Student Journalism: Another fellow absconder. On looking at the site it is less journalism than an extension of blogs and online networking providing a nice ccounterpoint to traditional News websites.
• Gecko Writer: Meadows claimed that Capture Wales was the only truly interactive form of media on TV, and only in Wales. This may be the case now but the future's bright, the future's riddled with something called UGC(?)
• R & R: If viewed through marketing goggles the Digital Storytelling concept Meadows is peddling falls flat on its lens. If nothing of immediate value is being contributed by Digital Storytelling, does it have a legitimate and sustainable place in the media world?
• Melmoth's Wanderings: Reading a thesis on 'interactivity' word-for-word with your eyes down, does present an illuminating irony. The wheat must be separated from the chaff in order to push Digital Storytelling forward.
• I am Serious, and Don't Call me Shirley: With reference to the BBC's VideoNation equivalent project of some years ago the content on Capture Wales appears to have regressed in quality.
• The Beard: The best of the Capture Wales crop makes it onto the BBC2W graveyard slot: an opportunity for the media moguls to make money without having to produce the content themselves. Sadly the content only ranges from enlightening to utterly mundane.
• The Lord Blog: Ignoring the advances of the new media realm is ignoring the world around you and most importantly your audience. Some 'moving' images from Daniel Meadows.
• The Boy With a Pipe: Capture Wales is destined for the periphery, in light of more accessible community based websites like Youtube and Myspace. What is the role of the editor in these UGC creations... when does your free voice become distorted?
• Kate Mallord: The potential problem of digital exclusion stretches beyond physical means as even if the world was given a videophone, the Murdochs and Googles could still exploit their output.
• The Melting Pot: How far is UGC actually threatening Journalists, it's not as if someone who phones in a mass of police surging down their road is asked to produce a report asap (and pronounce that as it sounds not as separate letters... it's so much more powerful that way). One fifth of British people can't still can't use a computer, so getting onto the streets is still viable.
• Emily Newsom: Online Reflection: Most 'interactive' services are, in actual fact, only 'reactive' according to Meadows. Pressing you red button, text votes and the like are just cynical tokenism. Capture Wales is truly interactive.
• Seventy Percent Nostalgia: how will we sort thorugh the detritus on offer in order to find the genuinely worthwhile stuff? The media 'newser' has no real impact what with the domination by the Murdochs of the media playground.
• Thinking Cap On: The journalist has a right to protect his or her trade rather than hand over the pen to any illiterate or disadvantaged person out there, just like a surgeon wouldn't hand the knife to a pedestrian and take a back seat.
• Diary of a Madman: Why is this project a threat? people are only going to look and listen if they want to, if it grabs them, if it's interesting! As meadows pointed out the established media fraternity knows what its people want and can give it to them. If the media wants Daniel's stuff then so be it... but don't hold your breath.
• Media Musings: Journalists must be as apt at telling stories for themselves as for other people. "News is people," said Harold Evans (good first name... pity about the surname) and therefore surely interactive "peoples" media must work alongside traditional reactive media.
• On The Cut: None of this is new; the concept of real people creating video; the concept of 'newsers' deciding what is newsworthy and what isn't; the hype attached to new media formats. attention spans are waning and hype is increasing, it's getting more and more difficult to find good reading.
• Rutherford's Tiny Tiny Mind: by Meadows' own admission these digital stories are a turn off but his enthusiasm for the cause was a turn on. The line needs to be drawn on relevance, and what one wants to gain from the journalistic experience, whether one wants to tell other peoples' stories or their own.
• Severs' Blog: These stories could provide a resource for news gatherers to pick up ideas but will never have the general appeal needed to succeed on a larger platform. They are too small-fry and introspective.
• Chris White: Yet another fellow absconder but with fairly passed comment. The recognised media needn't lower its standards to cater for this form of "news" as the people haven't exhibited a desire for it. They are happy with Youtube and the like for these purposes.
• Journalism Blog 2006-2007 or: How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Blog: A fine and professional talk from a well-versed online impressario. These videos are snapshots of life and this can only be a good thing.

Well, that succinctly sums up the views of my esteemed peers, and I hope I have done them all justice. Anyone who feels hard done by can happily take it up with my online lawyer.

So what do I think about the dawn of Digital Storytelling (if it can be called the dawn)? It is covenient that Dan Worth is so alphabetically chaallenged as it is with him that I am most in agreement. While I can see that the inclusion of these everyman video stories into the journalistic sphere and expecting people to take an active interest may be a bridge too far. The concept of bringing these methods of entry to the unwashed masses is definitely a good thing.

People are demanding more and more input and they are now getting it, with evermore options for feedback, and not just this but a chance to develop from a story on their own terms. It seems a bit naive to expect quality across the board but the option should be available and naybe the fact that the good ones are hard to find among the bad ones could itself be solved by the users...

1. ratings systems.
2. hit logs.
3. comments.

these and more allow the better ones to stand out of their own volition without needing an editor to sift, while the weaker efforts fall by the wayside. In Dan's words (Worth, not Meadows):

"If this new age of user-generated content is opening up avenues of artistic creation to those who would never have even thought about it before then how can it be anything but a positive thing?"