REMEDIES: Mega Changes. Macro Level.

The EXISTENTIAL THREAT to our free press system marks the death of incrementalism, and the advent of mega change at the macro level in the areas of revenue, content, audience, distribution, personnel, legal and technological issues.

Changes in REVENUE MODELS include a more equitable revenue distribution among content producers and content aggregators and distributers (Google, Facebook, Twitter); establishment of micro-payments (pay for click) to FB accounts for User Generated Content (UGC); the monetization of FB’s News Feeds for ads served on user’s news feed; establishment of ‘newspaper retail’ space for community access.

Changes in CONTENT DESCRIPTIONS include: make content aggregators and distributers legally responsible for the labeling of ‘fake news’ and managing troller content; personal identification of account/authorship is required; anonymously authored content is not protected by 1^st Amendment; hate speech is not protected by the1st Amendment; stricter governmental control of hate speech; UGC content published on FB news feeds is owned by individual creator.

Changes in AUDIENCE composition include: stronger emphasis on education from early age about multi-platform news production and consumption; media literacy becomes the 4th of the 3 R’s; citizen journalist curriculum elementary on; monetized UGC creators; social media free zones; training in civic service and engagement.

Changes in DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS include: large-scale, cyber aggregators and social media platforms defined as common content carriers mandating responsibility for verifying content’s authorship and veracity; must establish equitable system of sharing any content or traffic monetization through micro-payment accounts; content’s copyright and ownership payments remain with content producer.

Changes in PERSONNEL MANDATES include: recognition that individual employee, manager, contributor, or other is fundamental asset/resource; individual’s well-being is measure of company or organization’s sanity; individual’s life-long dimensions of well-being include economic, psychological, medical, and others; individual is entitled to equitable portion of content’s monetization and ownership; all necessary training.

Changes in LEGAL ORIENTATION include: aggressive legal strategies to insure journalism’s interests and well-being in issues of defamation, content ownership, access to government and public records; protection of journalists’ life, liberty, and financial interests; equitable balance among competing and varying levels of corporate, civic, public and content production interests.

Changes in TECHNOLOGY’s role include: technology is a utility necessary for individual’s and society’s well-being: individuals are entitled to ubiquitous access at fair prices to the constantly improving technology of content production and consumption; the ultimate imperatives of technology: liberation>dependence; inclusion>exclusion; creation>stagnation; knowledge>ignorance; common>individual interest, equitable.