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Proposal from knightcontest.com

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Mapping Local News – Building the Virtual Model of a Local Community

Primary Contact Name

Aaron Presnall

Describe your project

We believe the future of local news will blend mobile communications with virtual worlds online: the simplest way to find out what is going on around you is to go to a community 4D virtual model, ‘drill-down’ to the micro level, the time span and the category of news (e.g. crime watch, local sales, calendar of events), and then expand headlines pinpointed across the 4D community map. We will create a platform capable of building such a 4D model as a joint effort by local community members. The 'Official' version of the model & news will be edited and 'owned' by local community editorial boards, elected through members' votes among the most prominent contributors. The latest, not-yet-approved 'Live version', as well as 'Un-official' versions will allow for alternative ideas and fun, designed by 'unofficial' groups or individuals. The 4D map itself will be fully updateable, restricted only by GPS coordinates and anchored prominent blocks/buildings. Members can use a simple set of tools to add/upgrade blocks, even individual buildings, as well as any content related to them. It will span across time, preserving past records and displaying plans for the future. News items are collected from multiple sources: incl. sms, mms, e-mail, blogs, etc.; classified in several dimensions by search-and-sort tools; and then assembled in the 'Live room' where they are commented and rated. They get a 'reliability tag' generated by a combination of factors, including the previous history of the source and consistency with other trusted sources. Those who 'pass' are directed to their location on the 'official' map. The system integrates professional journalism, focusing on precision, with citizen journalism, focusing on speed. Companies can purchase an official presence on the map (still allowing comments on their services), thus making the project sustainable. The platform will combine Drupal open source CMS with additional original open source modules: java 3D rendering, full mobile functionality, GPS, search-and-sort tools, voting.

Primary Contact Email

apresnall@jeffersoninst.org

Organization or Business Name

Jefferson Institute

Who would want to use it and why?

There is a special appeal to enabling a community to build its own virtual model, bound by the process of gathering news and data. Anyone who wants to know what is at the moment going on in the vicinity, using internet or mobile technology will be able to quickly act while on the move, either contributing a story or acquiring information. As Drupal cms is already established world wide and all additional modules will be built as open source around the Drupal core, the technology will be universally available. With relatively good mobile/internet penetration in selected areas and a large number of highly educated unemployed people, we expect our 4D models to grow quickly, and in time expand to most municipalities in Serbia, and beyond.

Why are you the best person or organization to develop this project?

The Jefferson Institute has a successful history of building and implementing novel technological solutions, ranging from networking Serbia’s military educational facilities, to building automated production lines for digital archives, to redesigning and restructuring the online presence of government institutions in Serbia. We are currently in a position to build all the necessary software for the 4D Local News Map at a high quality/cost ratio. Through our contacts with developers in Serbia, currently outsourcing for major US and Germany based software firms, we are able to gather a team of highly skilled programmers, with long experience in building virtual 3D worlds, mobile functionality, complex data structuring, and GIS and GPS tracking. By contracting these overseas programmers directly, we cut out the middleman, reducing cost and enhancing speed while maintaining top quality. We rely on widely used high end open source software, (Drupal CMS, PostgreSQL database, JOGL etc.), and follow high standards in software production, (OGC's OpenGIS Specifications, Drupal best practices, etc.). As a result, the 4D Local News Map will be fully available to the open source community, and with detailed documentation in English. We will rigorously field-test the 4D Local News Map platform in a challenging operational environment: four selected municipalities in Serbia - two municipalities in Belgrade and two small towns, then calibrate it in response to user feedback. Through cooperation with LokalPres, a society which gathers over sixty local print and electronic media in Serbia, we will assure the project gets full spirited grass roots level promotion and mobilizes a large number of people to quickly put substantial portions of local community 4D models online. Our contacts in national and international media development organizations will help us to roll out the tested and calibrated platform globally.

U.S. State

Country

United States

What potentially bigger thing might happen if everything went perfectly and the stars all aligned?

Citizens of four municipalities in Serbia will get fully functional 4D models of their local communities, with vital news and event announcements arriving from all available sources, helping them more easily interact with their community and its happenings, while planning activities at home and while on the move using mobile gadgets. The project will get full support from news agencies and media companies in Serbia and attract a large number of citizen journalists. Having embraced the network, the media companies involved will foster an increased trust, and shared responsibility for maintaining the 4D models. The News Map will become a continuous source of interesting local stories scooped by citizen journalists, and followed in depth by professional journalists and specialized newspapers. The 4D Local News Map will became a major crossroads on the Internet, one of the first places to go to when one needs to be informed on local issues. Online boards of editors will bring awareness of local community needs and problems to a substantially new level, helping decision makers to take appropriate steps in time. Cutting edge technology will attract a younger audience into communal effort through news. Their energy will boost the project development and their involvement will help to integrate them into community life. The project will become self-sustaining – attracting ad revenue to cover low operating costs. Packed into an easy to implement open source bundle, and provided with manuals and technical support, the software supporting this project will be used elsewhere to bring local news to the 21st century. All remaining 186 municipalities in Serbia will join the project and build a continuous 4D model of Serbia local news/events. Communities around the world using the software will create an interlinked news map network and exchange their experiences.

How will you be able to measure whether or not your project has really made a difference?

This project will introduce technological novelty and addresses the public in a very direct way, so it will be relatively easy to measure its success through: The number of citizens involved in building 4D models of their local communities. The composition of initial editorial boards (to be drafted mostly among the national and local media news editors and journalists) The trends of weekly/daily/hourly use: in terms of platform (mobile/fixed) traffic (eyeballs), and number of contributed news/map upgrades. The number of enlisted citizen journalists. The number and quality of uploaded news. The support from news agencies and media companies. The evaluation of the project through feedback from the audience. The numbers of younger audience involvement. The number of companies interested in their presence in the project and the revenue from advertising. Communities involved in this project will share their experience in organizing editorial boards, rate the news, and gradually create the best solutions for their specific needs. The feedback from the open source community on the quality and relevance of the additional original software created for the project, as well as the functionality of the full software collection used in the project. The number of additional municipalities in Serbia joining the project. The number of communities using the project software bundle worldwide. The number of imitations of this project produced worldwide.

Web site

http://www.jeffersoninst.org

Requested amount from Knight News Challenge

$780000

What unmet need does your proposal answer?

We believe that one of the key points where the spatial collection and presentation of data really matters are local news. The specific location makes a real difference in local news, as opposed to national and general news, where spatial positioning often serves just as an additional reference. If something is going on in your neighborhood, it is sometimes more important to know where it is happening then exactly what is going on. For example, that a specific street is closed for traffic is sometimes more important than why. Spatial presentation is also in many cases quicker to inspect. For example, if you want to choose a safe corridor for your evening walk, you can easily envision the distribution of reported crimes at a glance looking at a map, while going through a text list makes it almost incomprehensible. Using mapped information is especially useful outdoors. The internet/mobile technology combined with our 4D news model will enable quick action while on the move, either contributing a story or acquiring information. We expect that most users will find these 4D local news models online everyday tools in local community life. We also expect that many will enjoy participation in building 3D models; contribution of news, pictures, videos; and also presentation of their projects, homes, and funny ideas. The technology implemented in the project will be fully documented in English and thus globally available. Newly built software and spatial data extensions for Drupal cms and its key modules will greatly improve the potential to build spatially oriented applications for the open source community worldwide.

Total cost of project, including all sources of funding

$780000

What specific, unique opportunity do you see that will make this project more successful than others trying to fill that general

This project brings together the cutting edge developments in several major branches of information technologies in a way not tried before, and we are determined to deliver it all under the GNU General Public License. Some recent developments made this possible: Open source software: The 1.3 release of PostGIS now makes PostgreSQL capable of delivering full spatial data store/search functionality for this project. As of the release of Drupal CMS 5.0 in 2007, several major magazines (including The New York Observer) have built their web sites relying entirely on Drupal CMS and its additional modules. The Java Open GL project (JOGL) has proved that it can move all advanced 3D rendering functions to client machines. Several open source 3D modeling packages are now mostly compatible with the project needs. All this progress allows us to scale down what would have been, only a year ago, a multi-million dollar investment in software R&D, to an achievable not-for-profit project. GPS: In September 2007 seven additional satellites were launched to help reduce error and make public GPS more precise. These corrections are now being implemented in low cost public GPS devices, including mobile phones. We believe Serbia is an optimal place to develop and test the whole system. From the technological viewpoint, Serbia already has advanced IT public services, including full mobile phone and GPS functionality and relatively good internet connections and penetration in major cities. On the other hand, Serbia's vast human resources, low income per capita and a large number of highly educated unemployed people, eager to catch up with the west, allow for a relatively low cost software development, system implementation and field-testing.

Expected amount of time to complete project (in whole years):

1years

How will people learn about what you are doing?

Through the cooperation with LokalPres, a society which gathers over 60 local media in Serbia, we are able to provide the initial boost to the project, making sure it gets a full promotion and mobilizes a large number of people to quickly put substantial portions of local community 4D models online. Our contacts in major nationwide media in Serbia will enable us to obtain the publicity this project needs and deserves. The participating publishers and journalists would, of course, themselves be responsible for publicizing the project in their newspapers and electronic media, who can establish direct inter server exchange XML feeds to the Local News Map platform. If approved, the Knight Foundation’s funding would provide for at least one person engaged full time in promoting the project both in local communities and targeted media, with a special focus on informing high schools, colleges and universities, as well as local corporations, citizen's organizations, and NGOs. Our promoter will also work on collecting advertising revenue for the project to make it fully sustainable.

Do you have any other funding or investment? We’re interested in knowing who else is interested in your project.

The Jefferson Institute is prepared to contribute a substantial in-kind management component to the project

Are you working with anyone else to complete this project? If so, please give names and what they would do?

The American Association of Community Colleges has expressed strong interest in the Local News Map platform as a potential offer for student papers at their 1,000 member community colleges. We will work with the LokalPres, Kragujevac, to win the support of over 60 local media in Serbia in their network. They will help us draft the best journalists and editors from local media for this project and train them to use the full potential of the software. We will also work in cooperation with several high city officials in Belgrade, Subotica and Kragujevac to provide news and updates related to communal services and city development plans. We will engage several selected editors from major media in Serbia, to help promote the project on the national level. Major traditional media from the four communities where we will test the Local News Map platform have agreed, in principal, to establish XML feeds of their content to the News Map.

Who else is working in this area? How does your work fit into the larger context of work in this area?

To our knowledge, no one has ever done anything quite in the scope of this project. Parts of it can be found in several major efforts on the internet. Google maps / Google Earth delivers a consistent effort to build a model of the whole planet, but not in any way related to news, or to local communities. Wikipedia, preceded and followed by large number of more specialized websites, has shown how serious data collection can be built through joint efforts of users. There are hundreds of successful websites involved in many ways with citizen journalism, some of them utilizing the concept of Live room, where news data are assembled before they are verified, and a voting system to rate them, but to our knowledge no one has yet seriously tackled the complex problem of spatially positioning news data. Also, our system of verifying data is more complex as it incorporates the gps/mobile systems of tracking, to our knowledge not used before in the field. The current project is therefore unique in its focus and span: building virtual 4D models of local communities, with precisely spatially located and mapped local news, implementing full scale citizen journalism relying on mobile gadgets technology, and an automated system for news classification and verification

What do you guarantee will happen if you complete the activities in this proposal?

1) Open source software developed featuring: Drupal CMS and additional modules integrated into a highly professional online newspaper platform, expanded to incorporate spatial data and functions and a system for automatic categorization, evaluating, and rating news, using the PostgreSQL + PostGIS database. The system for automatic GPS/GSM positioning, backed up with self positioning, and full input output functionality for mobile gadgets. User friendly online 3D modeling capabilities in low, medium and high resolution versions. Simple and fast delivery of 4D community models in cell phone, smart phone and desktop variants featuring: Official, Live, Project and Fun versions; Time/space span selection and navigation; News categories selection; Map resolution selection; User customizable preferences. The online system for networking 4D community models into a continuous virtual space/time, including accessing, editing, implementing and exchanging inter-board decisions and guiding the general development of the project. 2) Two servers prepared (main and mirror) with large enough storage capacity and tape backup to host the system. 3) 4D models built of 4 municipalities in Serbia: New Belgrade (youngest municipality in Belgrade, capitol of Serbia); Old City (oldest municipality in Belgrade); Subotica (a major city in Vojvodina province, with mixed Serbian/Hungarian population); Kragujevac (a major city in central Serbia) 4) Initial editorial boards drafted and trained for all 4 field-test municipalities. 5) User feedback collected and the system calibrated on the run to best suit community user needs. 6) Self-sustainability achieved, so that low fixed internet expenses and technical support are paid from ad revenues. 7) Full project documentation prepared in English and the source code made available on the Internet.