Media It's Your Time to Save the World

The media world is rapidly changing and while I love it sometimes if feels like I am spinning just a bit out of control. Rich, multi, social thoroughly 247 media is great for the particular level of Crackberry, Facebook, IM, Twitter Hell that I inhabit daily.

It is also a good time for media to give a little something back. And you know what, it just might be able to save the world.

My Apprenticeship
I have spent the last seven years in an amazing apprenticeship, and the last year and half as head of media, with the global nonprofit One Economy. In my position I have had the privilege in helping to connect over 14 million low-income folks around the world to information and tools that have made a difference. My apprenticeship will most likely never end, and this blog is an acknowledgment that I need to keep listening to both supporters and doubters, but most importantly to the people that great media can serve.

My work requires me to think about how I can help build a different kind of media company; one that leverages the quality of broadcast media with the innovation of interactive media, but most importantly all for a public purpose. My goal in this blog is to explore how public purpose media is both is set apart from the the larger media world by its particular mission, but also using those exciting, powerful tools of rich, interactive and social media to help people accomplish important life tasks.

What is Public Purpose Media?
This question will be something that is constantly discussed on this blog, but for me public purpose media can roughly be defined as content that helps people move forward from inspiration to action. The unique opportunity of interactive technology is that we can help people immediately; you can be inspired by a piece of video, audio or even written content and then help is right there, one click away.

A single mother watches a piece of video about the experiences of how someone just like her found their career and the ability to find career counseling near her is one click away. A mother listens and then participates in a discussion on the best ways to find affordable child care, and the online search tool is one click away. That to me is granular form of media with a public purpose.

The best way to predict the future is to invent it
Alan Kay

The Next Media...The Next Steps
The promise of public purpose media is creating great information, interactive, useful tools and engaging content that helps inspire a user or even a community to take the next step in their life journey. In this blog you will hear more about what is happening around the world, what this form of media hopes to become and how dedicated people all over the world are doing it. I invite you to participate by telling all of us what we can do to make the world a better place. And I hope that you have as much fun as we have had on the journey so far.