Global Learn Day X

Nothing concentrates the mind like visits with sharp customers unafraid to tell you what they don’t like about your product. Last week, I got plenty of that in Dublin which caused me to re-think the central question Google, or other large players, will continuously ask: “What is your plan to reach audiences with sizes worthy of our investment in your enterprise?”

As background, I went to Dublin to plead my case that “community radio” was our best chance to reach a million or more listeners. And that our friends there would help me find a few dozen stations that would be as helpful as NearFM.

Wrong.

Not only were the regular staff at NearFM disinclined to extend themselves to find other stations, even in Ireland, they were not all that excited at “one off” programs that “came around once a year”. While their leader, Jack Bryne, is a true visionary and a gifted writer, and while NearFm has faithfully broadcast segments of GLD for several years, nobody was jumping up and down to make Dublin the “Headquarters” for GLD Eleven; or for that matter, even the “European Headquarters” — at least not without some healthy cash infusions from Sponsors that they hoped I could bring to them.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that Jack has written a 90 page thesis called The Noosphere. It was designed as an activist’s framework to make changes of a lasting kind; a motivating piece that, in standard book form, should be on the New York Times Best Seller List. It’s powerful reading for all those concerned about the great issues facing humankind. And why small radio stations scattered all over the world have the opportunity to make changes that will not be made so long as “Corporate Media” crowds out quiet, thoughtful discourse.

The Noosphere is a call to action for thousands of community radio stations to organize themselves in a way that can help people that live around the block and around the world.

Jack’s masterpiece lays out a vision that’s crucially important for a “safer, saner planet”. One that makes crystal clear that good use of “radio” (to include iPods, MP3, sat radio, net streaming) is the very best chance to cause people to think deeply about the serious issues of the day.

What was missing, as Jack candidly admits, was a “Big Idea” that would be the glue that would bind hundreds (thousands?) of community stations to something meaningfully collaborative. How could “we” provide a comfortable umbrella for serious advocates broadcasting serious issues? How could “we” make that umbrella as good for those attending to global warming as those attending to social justice? to those advocating distance education as those advocating Peace Now?

On the twelve hour flight back, I bent myself to this ‘Big Idea’ question. While I am uncertain if the thoughts I generated will be just another “barking dog” - or be of interest to people like Vint Cerf — they went in this direction.

First, what’s the best part of GLD? Some of us believe the best part of GLD is the metaphor “A Voyage of Discovery”. We would contend that explorations and expeditions and leaky vessels and innovative captains and tough sailors and rocky shores and smart navigators and new chart-making and rich treasure-hunting and way-distant horizons are a lot more exciting than conferences and workshops and broadcasts and programs and iPodding and Blackberries and summits and talk, talk, talk.

Which would you rather do — attend a conference in Cleveland or go around the world with Captain Cook? Which is more compelling - the word “Voyage” or the word “webcast”? Which encourages more cooperation — linkage via those doing rare exploration? or those advertising cohort radio programming?

What lessons could we draw from GLD that might apply to the whole world of activist broadcasting?

Next, I thought of information provided by my Navigator, Blaine Berger, about Google’s interest in matching media buyers with audio content providers. Blaine caused me to visit some sites to learn more. These two, in particular were quite illuminating—

ClickZ and business2

Next, I thought of the biggest gorilla in our part of the world, Nike (here in Oregon) and the power of their swoosh and Nike’s tag line “Just Do It“. Shouldn’t we in the business of community outreach be thinking in the same direction? And if so, what could be our “swoosh”? What could be our tag line?

The questions I began asking included these:

1. How hard would it be to get hundreds of radio stations to “tag” their best stuff with a logo that centered around the word “Voyage”?

2. How could we do this on a completely open source basis?

3. Of what interest would a multitude of “Voyage Programs” (V-Programs?) be to Google? Amazon? Yahoo? Oracle? The University of Phoenix? The University of Oregon? Planned Parenthood? Save the Childen? Global Learn Day? Commonwealth of Learning? Google Scholar? Thinkquest?

4. What about “Grand Voyages”. If the content is already stored, how hard could it be to put on (monthly? quarterly?) 24 hour, round-the world Grand Voyages — each one focused on a particular Very Large Issue?

5. Wouldn’t there be a lot more interest by a “Queen” to help jump start hundreds of Voyages which “sailed” from all parts of the world, every day, than there would be to fund a Voyage that was not much more than small rowboat and hungry crew? That sailed once a year?

6. Which was a better path to large audiences for GLD — one where we “went it alone” and carved our own path? Or one where we benefited from Voyages by other “captains” using “ports” of a kind likely to be friendly to visits from the Ben Franklin?

7. If the power was in the metaphor, why not attach the metaphor to the best stuff that is flooding the audio world? Why not get the boys at Google to figure out how to match Air Lingus to Voyage Programs broadcast in Dublin, Boston, New York and Chicago? Why not couple the power of the Voyage Metaphor with a matchmaking tool that dummies like me could use for GLD?

8. If I were the money-boys at Google, would they believe I could get the Voyage Tag attached to the “best” broadcasts by important thought-makers reaching important, niche markets? Would this be of more appeal than asking for dough for Voyage Number XI, under the banner Global Learn Day? And if so, what are the complementary advantages to doing both?

9. And this too. If I were running a small station in Cairo or Capetown, Prague or Perth, would I want to be part of a Voyage Network? Would I want to attract sponsors in London or New York if I was all alone doing good stuff in Seoul or Santiago? Would I want the best stuff I was sending to Spaniards in Barcelona be heard by Mexicans in Monterey?

That’s what I pondered. All the way from Dublin to Eugene.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 19th, 2007 at 3:06 pm and is filed under Global Learn Day. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.