[MGP-Forum Announce] E-journalism project tonight

[Robert Washburn]

I am sending this as a follow up from the Media Giraffe conference in June
to let you know about the exciting things we are doing here in Canada.
 
Tonight at 7 p.m. EST, we will hold a municipal candidates debate live
online through a website created by the e-journalism program at Loyalist
College. It is one of several sites the program maintains as part of our
ongoing work around the use of online journalism to facilitate democracy. We
have developed our own brand of online journalism called e-journalism, the
next level of online journalism. Our tenants are to educate, engage and
empower our audiences through the tools of online journalism and to explore
new and exciting ways to help our audience understand and be involved in
their world.
 
This is the third mayoralty debate hosted by Loyalist College¹s e-journalism
program. Tonight we will expand the horizons of e-journalism and online
democracy in a bold and exciting way. Besides being able to listen to this
event on CJLX 91X FM, our campus/community radio station, the audience will
be able to hear everything being streamed live over the Internet. And, as in
the past, our team of e-journalism students are collecting questions via
email.
 
But, this year, there is more:  much, much more. Using cell phones and text
messaging, we have e-journalism students throughout the community, including
one student at tonight¹s Belleville Bulls hockey game at Yardman Arena,
getting voters to ask questions. These questions, from across our city, are
being collected and sent to our e-host, Leah Kellar, who will ask them to
our candidates here in Alumni Hall. This is a revolutionary step for
journalism and for democracy, as we are going to extraordinary efforts to
ensure voters can have their say and ask candidates to address their
concerns.
 
All questions will be posted to our website, whether they are asked during
the debate or not. We encourage all candidates to come to our site and
respond, using this incredible medium as a powerful tool of democracy.
 
This is our efforts to practice public journalism¹s mandate to work with our
community  to assist them become more engaged in the election.
 
Please visit the website at http://vote.onlinedemocracy.ca (emphasize there
is no www).
 
This is the first in a series of projects Loyalist College will be unveiling
over the next few months. Please stay tuned as we launch a number of
interesting projects online as part of our commitment to explore
e-journalism and practice its tenants as a means of serving our community
and to help define the future of our industry.

Thanks.

Rob w.
-- 
Robert Washburn
Professor, e-journalism
"Educate. Engage. Empower." - Program Mission Statement

E-journalism program
Loyalist College, Belleville, On.
K8N 5B9
613-969-1913 ext. 2157
cell: 613-242-7532
rwashburn at loyalistc.on.ca
http://www.thepioneer.com
http://onlinedemocracy.ca
http://portalonline.org
http://considerthis.onlinedemocracy.ca