In the Spring 2007 Issue of CMR, Alliance for Community Media Executive Director, Anthony Riddle writes

“Look at the wonderful opportunities presented by the technologies in this issue of Community Media Review. The presentations only scratch the surface of the possibilities for your PEG community. The truth is, however wonderful each is on its own, none can find its true potential unless integrated into your existing resources.

How does a cable-based live program drive an audience to your blog?

How can a blog be used to add to your viewership?

Can a website offer in-depth materials to viewers who became interested in a topic?

Can we share program materials electronically, quickly between producers and PEG centers?

Can these tools organize our communities politically?”

Felicia Sullivan has mentioned that community media centers should at least try integrating new media tools into existing resources. But, she’s also said that a center shouldn’t worry about using all tools - only those that best serve the needs of a community.

For example, a PEG TV center may use Blogger and blip.tv to distribute videos using an RSS feed and tags. But the same center may not feel that Drupal is right for them. Using a video blog alongside an existing website might just be the answer based on available resources and community needs.

Over at Austin360.com, the “Entertainment” side of the online Austin-American Statesman in TX, there’s a post titled “Lonelygirl15, Public Access TV and the YouTube revolution” on the Almost Urban blog. It was written by Deborah Sengupta back in March during the annual SXSW festival, where the LonelyGirl15 producers made a panel appearance.

In her post, Sengupta adds that Public Access TV in Austin (PACT) is a great educational resource for the public to use in learning how to make media for distribution on the Internet:

“. . . PACT Austin offers a very reasonably priced TV producer training program. For less than $200, you can learn everything from how to operate a camera to how to edit your work in Final Cut Pro. Not just for conspiracy theorists, it’s actually a great resource for musicians, artists and garden variety soapbox philosophers with a desire to learn how to broadcast. And perhaps, to join the YouTube revolution.”

It’s great to see people in the “blogosphere” making connections about why Public Access TV is important and relevant in an “Age of YouTube”. It’s even more important for community media centers to educate their producers about RSS, tagging and metadata (along with video production training) in order for PEG access TV content to be found, watched and shared alongside the LonelyGirl15’s of the YouTube world.

Jason Daniels set up a wiki as a place for Public Access TV stations to add their RSS feeds. See an earlier post on why this matters.

Here’s the blurb from the wiki:

“Welcome. This space has been created to help folks working in PEG TV and related community media ventures to contribute their RSS feeds. This aggregation of feeds can then be repurposed for the sake of amplifying our collective voices. In more tangible terms - the feeds can be used within the news aggregator module of a drupal cms web page or online video player (like Democracy).”

Bravo!