From the recently-discovered weblog of Michael Perelman, an uplifting story about a civic-minded news service in Monrovia, Liberia.
Perelman says:
I don’t really have a good foundation in this
technology. I realize that it doesn’t take much to sit at a keyboard
and make grant pronouncements about the way the world should be.Today I read in the New York Times about the
“blogger” using centuries-old technology in a way that puts the modern
media to shame.The article describes Alfred Sirleaf, the
33-year-old managing editor of The Daily Talk, a white plywood shed
trumpeting the latest headlines along Tubman Boulevard, one of the
capital’s main thoroughfares.He writes his stories very carefully on large
blackboards and even makes accommodations to help communicate the
material to illiterates. He had to struggle to get a high school
education. He has been arrested. And yet he continues to persevere.And most of all the displays a spirit that puts the the corporate media to shame.
From the New York Times article:
The shoestring operation brings him no income.
“I just manage along with whatever money I can
find,” he said. Occasional gifts of cash and pre-paid cellphone cards
keep him in business.
