Communication spaces in the twenty-first century: Newsrooms,websites and garages

The idea of reviewing Nikki Usher’s Interactive Journalism and Sarah R. Davis’ Hackerspaces together may seem odd at first. Indeed, while Usher is focused on exploring advances in computing that ‘offer opportunities … beyond what has ever been possible before’ (p. 2), Davies gives voice to those who ‘complain […] about the digital nature of much contemporary life’ (p. 159). Accordingly, Usher discusses the specifics of ‘the dynamics of the Web’ (p. 27) as an interactive journalists’ particular domain, whereas Davies advocates hackerspaces on the grounds that they increase the value of ‘face-to-face interaction’ (p. 159) and give people an ‘opportunity to develop human connections in real-world environments’ (p. 159). Their research interests as authors of these books appear unrelated, and so do their respective agendas. It does seem that Interactive Journalism and Hackerspaces are expected to attract different audiences, and that the reader who may become interested in one of these studies will almost certainly disregard the other – at least this is the first impression one gets when flicking through the pages of these two books.

However, as we move beyond superficial reading and become immersed in the key problematic negotiated by each author, we come to realise that the two studies intersect. They also complement one another in a number of ways and thus could be read together by an inquisitive reader who is willing to consider the evolution of communication in the twenty-first century from more than one perspective.

Such an attentive reader will soon discover features that connect Usher’s and Davies’ studies. For example, both discussions are future-oriented. Usher says,

There are now vastly greater amounts of data being produced than at any time in the past. The infrastructure and experience of information delivery has evolved to seemingly erase time and space boundaries. This evolution matters to the future of journalism. (p. 2, italics ours)

Davies, on her part, suggests, following Sims, that the models of education that involve hacking and making, ‘assume that children are naturally creative, curious and innovative, and … these characteristics are exactly ones that are required in future businesses’ (p. 139, italics ours).

Inasmuch as journalism is a business in its own right, Davies’ future-oriented reference to education practices that involve hacking and making is relevant to the long-term solution to the crisis of journalism reported in numerous studies as her remark points to the development of key skills that will be required in most professional situations in the future.

Both authors duly account for the phenomenon of increased digitalization of communication among other changes that affect contemporary society. Also, despite Davies’ analysis of hackerspaces and the maker movement, demonstrating resistance to the powerful trend of digitalising communication in various contexts, she talks positively about digital technology and online interactions presenting them as tools that improve social interactions if we use them wisely. Importantly, we get a sense that, in her view, harnessing new technologies and using them to one’s – and one’s community’s – advantage is not the same as losing control and letting technology consume us and change our identities, with people losing their authority over the way they communicate with each other.

Usher, on the contrary, writes about interactive journalism as a process of the digitalization of communication whose emergence and development was caused by circumstances beyond anyone’s control. She admits that there is ‘a crisis in traditional journalism’ (p. 5) in the United States and Western Europe due to ‘the rise in new media technologies’ (p. 6), but rather than dwelling on the problems in traditional journalism, she enthusiastically presents interactive journalism as an effective solution to these problems.

Her perspective is that interactive journalism’s very power is due to ‘the present problems in journalism’ (p. 5) whereby the traditional journalist’s role has declined because members of the general public enjoy greater access to the means of sharing news. Now that nonprofessionals are able to create news content, traditional journalists’ ‘authoritative voice’ (p. 7) has inevitably diminished. Practicing interactive journalism, as Usher demonstrates, is the way journalism adapts to these changes in its effort to survive as a profession.

It becomes apparent further in Usher’s book that the decline in traditional (newspaper) journalism and the demand for new forms of communication between those who give and receive information is linked to the empowerment of readers who have new means of communication at their disposal and are no longer prepared to accept the role of passive listeners or readers. ‘Interactives are critical to the success of traditional journalism today’ (p. 9), Usher asserts, as she investigates the processes that underpin the blurring of boundaries that used to separate professional paid journalists and amateurs who have now gained access to the tools of creating news content and have a greater choice of information sources.

Moreover, as we progress with the reading of Hackerspaces, we realise that the idea of blurring the distinction between a professional and an amateur, which continues to stimulate the digitalization of media and interactivity in journalism, also underpins the movement of hackers and makers either operating outside the domain of the Web or functioning on its fringes. Davies writes about ‘craftism’ that ‘enable[s] enthusiastic amateurs to turn professional’ (p. 15), and we learn that just as professional journalism is under threat from laypersons, so are other professions, for example, professional art. For instance,

The exhibition – held in the UK’s national gallery for the applied arts [in 2011] – featured arts and crafts classed as fine art alongside pieces created by amateurs and enthusiasts, from ceramics to needlework to beaded QR codes and 3D printers (pp. 15–16).

This brings us to another point of intersection between the two studies in question. We observe that on the one hand, Usher emphasises the significance of the democratisation of journalistic practice whereby an individual reader can access information specifically relevant to them, as ‘the ability to search for personal experience specific to the individual is a unique result of this new near data capacity enabled through interactive journalism’ (p. 165). Davies, on the other hand, draws on the process of democratisation when discussing DIY and crafting, which ‘free people from elite-mandated principles of ‘good taste’ or ‘style’ (p. 26). Thus, inasmuch as non-professional news creators and news readers, who take control over their own use of information, impact on journalism as a profession, greater access to tools and technologies seen in the hacker and maker movement ‘will enable more people to take control of innovation, industry and science itself’ (p. 27), as Davies suggests.

As we continue with our examination of both books, we can confirm that they both deal with the consequences of the increased democratisation of communication processes. These consequences are significant: for journalism, this means, in Usher’s words, ‘the emergence of a new occupational identity’ (p. 3), and in the case of hacking, ‘[b]y aligning yourself with the characteristics of the hacker spirit … you become part of a wider fraternity of hackers, a movement that reaches beyond yourself or your local hacker or makerspace to encompass a way of life followed by people all over the globe’ (p. 130), as Davies maintains.

However, when we talk about hacking and computing, we tend to think about hackers who gain unauthorised access to data in a computer or a computerised system. In her book, Davies rehabilitates the term ‘hacker’, which, she admits, has become unfairly associated with illegal activity as ‘breaking and entering on computers, networks and servers’ (p. 3). She makes a point to present hacking, following the American Dialect Society’s definition, as ‘mak[ing] one’s day-to-day behaviour or activities more efficient’ ‘ (p. 4). Usher, explaining the history behind interactive journalism, also stresses that

The hacker journalist should never be conflated with anti-social hackers who have nefarious intentions – hackers who break into computers or steal passwords, who steal data from governments or news organizations, or who obtain credit card information illegally. Hacking is instead used here to mean a pro-social activity and outlook toward creating software. These programmers ‘hack’ out of the joy of building software for common good. (p. 75)

Drawing on the history of hacking in journalism, Usher explains that hacking as a technical craft is traceable to the 1960s computer culture, where ‘email was developed as an early “hack”’ (pp. 75–76). Hacking, thus understood, ‘imbue[s] a spirit of community, openness, participation and experimentation’ (p. 76) – the same qualities that Davies finds in the philosophy behind the hacker and maker movement. The author of Hackerspaces confirms that ‘hacker ethics’ comprising a philosophy of openness and decentralisation, where ‘transparency and sharing are key’ (p. 29), derives from the early computer culture. She maintains though that these ideals are also applicable to ‘other kinds of activities’ (p. 30), by which she primarily means activities that take place in hackerspaces.

We learn from Davies’ book that hackerspaces, despite being grounded in the physicality of space and equipment and notwithstanding the importance of face-to-face interactions within this real space, ‘also operate through parallel virtual environments’ (p. 55) by using, for example, websites, Facebook pages, wikis, and email lists. However, online activities remain secondary to those taking place in real time and real space:

To understand what a hackerspace is, nothing comes close to the experience of stepping into one, and being immersed in its noises, smells, textures and colours. Hackerspaces are, above all, physical spaces in which people spend time, either alone or (more often) with other people. (p. 8)

Hackerspace is a domain where one is made to realise that online communications provide incomplete experiences and, stripped of many sensory features, are existentially deficient and are not a substitute for the concrete physicality of handling objects and sharing physical space with others in a functional way. In a hackerspace, when one engages with his or her real life environment and physical equipment, he or she counteracts the deficiencies of digital communication and digital activity. Hackerspaces provide multisensory experiences where nothing is cut out and everything remains, and where people reconnect with each other and with their own creative power.

Davies writes about hackerspaces where people access ‘new personal and social worlds’ (p. 20), but what exactly are these places? Examples include garages, former factories, shops, private or open to all, ‘physical spaces operated collectively, where members can use equipment they might not be able to afford, or have space for, by themselves’ (p. 3). A hackerspace is a special space – ‘a kind of twenty-first century update of the tinkering your grandparents might have done in their garage’ (p. 5), which is about ‘taking control over the technologies that surround you’ (p. 5).

Speaking of communication space, just as a hacker and maker cannot completely escape from the contemporary digital culture, as he or she looks up the online information about the new hackerspace or sends an email to a fellow hacker, the hacker journalist cannot escape from the physicality of real places and objects in his or her professional role. For example, Usher offers the case of how one interactive journalist negotiates the physical space in which hacker journalists operate–a newsroom:

Given some of the complicated interactives I had seen online – maps of conflict zones with layers of photos, sounds, and videos, election guides, and user-generated content efforts – I expected a robust team. Instead … I found one full-time interactive journalist … busily putting together a steady stream of interactives. (p. 105)

The Al Jazeera English interactive journalist Mohammed el-Haddad, with a background in computer science, relied on text-based journalists to supply him with material, and ‘sat in the middle of the online reporters and online op-ed editor’ (p. 105). His role, by his own admission, was more technical than journalistic. As Usher describes his routine in detail, she convincingly demonstrates that interactive journalism is an area where traditional journalism merges with computer programming. ‘[S]eamless interactions’ between Haddad and the reporters were necessary for the entire process of news production to run smoothly, as the latter ‘were learning on the fly to help put together these interactives’ (p. 105).

We can see from Usher’s account how the physical space of the newsroom, as well as the physical spaces whose digitalised imagery appears in news content, contributes to the multidimensional domain of interactive journalism. This way of negotiating space, where the physicality of the newsroom is secondary to the rich and vibrant online environment, differs significantly from the hacker’s approach, and both can be juxtaposed and usefully compared.

As for interactive journalism as a profession, Usher’s example shows Haddad’s programming skills and the reporters’ traditional functions, merging, and even though these different functions can still be performed by different individuals, it becomes clear that in the future it will no longer be practical to separate the role of a reporter from that of a programmer. Usher’s account convincingly demonstrates why those who engage in journalism should now be competent in programming as well.

It may be relevant to point out that merging the journalistic role and that of a programmer is a tendency that is opposite to the tendencies of division and specialisation of labour, which we tend to associate with social evolution. A separate study would be needed in order to ascertain whether or not this is important, but it is worth noting that this merging of professional functions is taking place in an era, which the Harvard Business Review has labelled the age of hyperspecialization, ¹ referring to the current trend dominating the world of professionals.

Nevertheless, as combining journalistic skills and computer science becomes a new requirement for a twenty-first-century journalist, these new demands of the journalistic profession give rise to the new journalistic identity. This is something that Usher celebrates as the basis for openness and ‘a culture of transparency’ (p. 191) and ‘radical sharing’ (p. 191), whereby ‘the process of news work, which often appears to be a mysterious and secretive process’ (p. 191), becomes exposed and visible.

The idea of the openness of interactive journalism emphasised by Usher correlates with the idea of openness that Davies associates with hackerspaces and the maker movement as the latter gives people an opportunity to access those activities, which were gendered or class-bound in the past, in an environment that ‘aim[s] to be open and welcoming’ (p. 53).

As we discover more correlations and intersections in Usher’s and Davies’ books, we begin to see Interactive Journalism and Hackerspaces as studies that specifically explore the space in which communication evolves.

Other areas that are connected with this include, for example, the update on what constitutes knowledge in the domains of interactive journalism and the maker movement. In interactive journalism, the particular approach to knowledge involves the need for a journalist to have ‘special skills and more abstract knowledge about how to do journalism’ (p. 27). Skills that are specific to interactive journalists refer to ‘special knowledge about the code’ (p. 27), which translates into their ability ‘to communicate, use, and manipulate specific coding languages to create, modify, and improve on interactives, which often allows them to contribute back to a larger programming journalism community with new insights’ (p. 27).

Unlike traditional journalists, interactive journalists know how to negotiate the dynamics of the Web while creating immersive, engaging stories. ‘[C]omputationally enabled journalism’ (p. 27) combines narrating a story with ‘the creation of computer-enabled tools’ (p. 27) aimed at enabling users ‘to find stories of their own accord, exploring news independently rather than being offered a specific, time-bound, and ordered narrative’ (p. 28). Knowledge that interactive journalism provides is not framed in a linear fashion or encapsulated in any fixed prescriptive form, as ‘stories can be told in different ways – perhaps ways that were never before possible’ (p. 28).

The principle of openness and sharing knowledge, which underlies the practice of interactive journalism as shown in Usher’s book, meets with the hackers’ idea that an acquired skill or knowledge is not ‘just yours’ (p. 67) and must be shared, as Davies reports when discussing key aspects ‘of the spirit of being a hacker’ (p. 68).

The next question worth addressing is what do people, who are involved in these new forms of communication, say about interactive journalism, hacking and the changing communication space?

Usher’s account reveals that the role of interactive journalist emerged with programmers migrating to the newsroom rather than journalists taking up programming. The reason why certain programmers decided to leave a commercial programming job was the desire to unleash their creativity:

Most of the hackers who have come to newsrooms have backgrounds in commercial IT, which they left because of the emphasis on client-side work and the limits on creative expression. The newsroom, with new challenges every day, offers hacker journalists a chance to build new projects to help illustrate social problems and issues in the public interest, which they argue would have otherwise been impossible in their old jobs. (p. 76)

Davies’ entire book is largely based on the results she obtained while visiting hackerspaces across the US and interviewing people. Her findings reveal that it is common for a hackerspace to emerge as a continuation of an already established communication practice among a group of people:

In most of the spaces we visited a community had emerged before a physical space. That community might have developed through personal connections and friendships, through social media and meet-ups, or … through a specific search for others interested in hackerspaces. (pp. 47–48)

Typically, a hackerspace appears after a series of informal meetings in people’s own homes, bars or in a borrowed space, when members of the group are ready to find a permanent physical space, work out how they plan to organise it and possibly register a non-profit organisation. Having said that, why does one want to be a hacker in the first place? Interestingly, the reasoning behind some people’s desire to engage in physical hacking is similar to the motivation behind programmers aspiring to do journalism: in both cases, people want to ‘overcome limitations’ (Davies, p. 61) in the world around them.

This latter point inadvertently brings Usher’s and Davies’ narratives close together: experimenting with the communication medium by either creating a hackerspace or introducing new ways of doing journalism could be seen as two sides of one coin whereby the aspiration to overcome various limitations motivates the twenty-first-century person to explore the world and reassert one’s own active position in it. One can do this in various ways, and interactive journalism and the hacker and maker movement are but two examples of that.

Considering Interactive Journalism and Hackerspaces from this perspective, we suggest that one should possibly read the former first as a thorough and multifaceted study of the evolution of journalism and what it means for both journalists, readers and communication in general. After the reader becomes immersed in the vivid and compelling text that leaves the impression that from now on, communication equates digital communication, Hackerspaces will serve as a useful ‘however’, offering a narrative that presents an alternative to the process of communication digitalization. One can imagine a semicolon that separates both studies, which approach the problem of communication in the twenty-first century from different angles and thus could be legitimately placed on the same bookshelf.

To conclude, Nikki Usher, who is also the author of Making News at The New York Times, is Associate Professor at The George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs, while Sarah R. Davies is Assistant Professor in the Department of Media, Cognition and Communication at the University of Copenhagen.