Jurnalisme Warga, Ruang Warga untuk Bersuara

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Jurnalisme Warga, Ruang Warga untuk Bersuara

Indonesia
Organization type: 
nonprofit/ngo/citizen sector
Budget: 
< $1,000
Website:
http://www.sloka.or.id
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Project Summary
Elevator Pitch

Concise Summary: Help us pitch this solution! Provide an explanation within 3-4 short sentences.

Usually the residents could only consume, but now they are involved in the information chain as both the producer and the consum

About Project

Problem: What problem is this project trying to address?

Information technology provides good opportunities for the residents to not only access various information, but also produce it. Using information technologies like the internet and mobile phones that become more and more affordable, the residents should be able to easily share the information of their surroundings. However, they have not taken full advantage of those opportunities yet. There are at least four requirements to allow the residents to benefit from information technology properly. First, all residents have to realize the importance of sharing information of their surroundings. Second, they have to be able to share the information or producing it themselves using tech devices. Third, the devices like mobile phones, computers, or the internet have to be available to support the activity of sharing and producing information. Also, some continuous assistance for the residents is required in order to allow them properly produce and deliver the information to others. Consequently, it is important that a resident support team is available to deliver the training and assistance in the process of writing. This program will involve the residents of Denpasar, Bali,

Solution: What is the proposed solution? Please be specific!

In order to enable the residents to be actively involved in producing the information, a campaign is needed so that they are willing to take part throughout the process. This campaign is done offline by using posters, stickers, and other possible ways of delivering the campaign. The training will be delivered periodically, at least once in every two months, involving participants who are from the community. The training aims at the ability to use tech devices like mobile phones, computers, and the internet, as well as the technique in producing the information. In general, the residents actually can afford the products, but their capability of using them effectively and efficiently is something that requires more assurance. Most of these people mainly use the technology as a means of entertainment and personal business. Starting today, we are trying to embrace and show them how to widely share the information regarding their own surroundings, such as their public service, facility, and likewise. It is also necessary to provide this program's target communities with appropriate communication tools. The tools like computers, internet connection and mobile phones have to be available at certain spots in the community, such as the town hall or one of the residents' house. This way, the technology by itself will be able to come and make it easy for the residents to use it not only as a means of accessing the information, but also producing it. A support team is required in order to continuously encourage the residents to use the technology in their activities of accessing and
Impact: How does it Work

Example: Walk us through a specific example(s) of how this solution makes a difference; include its primary activities.

The use of information technology may bridge the gap of mainstream media elitism. Using mobile phones, the residents will be able to share information with each other in no time. The residents will be able to reach more media consumer when they are connected to the Internet. Thus, it is necessary that they are provided with the media in which they can directly share information and interact with each other. Through this citizen journalism program that we have been developing, we are trying to encourage and train the residents so that they can share the information they have with other people. Aside from training the residents to enable them to produce information, we also provide a blog where these people can share the information. The blog is currently managed collaboratively by Sloka Institute and Bali Blogger Community (BBC). Through the training programs we hold, hopefully more and more residents will be encouraged to take part and write on the blog. There are more than 160 contributors and 7 administrators who are currently managing this blog. The contributors come from different backgrounds, including lecturers, housewives, college students, civil servants, activists, and many more. Upon the presence of information technology, these contributors are able to share information despite they are miles apart. For example, not all of these contributors reside in Bali. Many of them live in different parts of the country. Members of the administrator team can also work collaboratively even though they are far away from each other. In the long run, we are hoping to embrace
Sustainability

Marketplace: Who else is addressing the problem outlined here? How does the proposed project differ from these approaches?

Our partners in this citizen journalism program include journalists, bloggers, netizens, common citizens, an internet service provider, and the town's youth community. Each and every party has roles and challenges specific to their own capabilities. The journalists and bloggers will deliver training programs to the residents on how to produce information and tell the world about it by using the blog. The main challenge is the need of continuous collaboration between these two parties to work it out. The youth community in the town will be the boundary partner of this program, in which they will also be participating in the production process of the information. Meanwhile, the netizens and common citizens are the beneficiaries of this program where they can access and involve themselves in the created blog. Whereas it is the internet service provider' job to make internet connection available and accessible around the town so that the residents can take advantage of it. For the town's youth community, in particular, this could be a challenging effort as we have never been worked directly with them previously. In spite of this, we are optimistic about reaching them by approaching
About You
Organization:
Sloka Institute
About You
First Name

Anton

Last Name

Muhajir

Twitter URL

http://www.twitter.com/antonemus

Facebook URL

http://www.facebook.com/antonemus

About Your Organization
Organization Name

Sloka Institute

Organization Country

, BA

Country where this project is creating social impact

, BA

How long has your organization been operating?

1‐5 years

The information you provide here will be used to fill in any parts of your profile that have been left blank, such as interests, organization information, and website. No contact information will be made public. Please uncheck here if you do not want this to happen..

Innovation
Select the stage that best applies to your solution

Growth (your pilot is up and running, and starting to expand)

How long have you been in operation?

Operating for 1‐5 years

Social Impact
FOUNDING STORY: We want to hear about your “Aha!” moment. Share the story of where and when the founder(s) saw this solution’s potential to change the world.

When TIME awarded Person of The Year 2006 to netizens, it directly came into my mind that, aha!, it's time for people to start produce information, not merely receiving it. In that inspiring article, TIME wrote about netizens who collaboratively changed the world through the use of the Internet. For instance, YouTube, Myspace, blog, and so on. The article stayed in my mind for a while and later on inspired me to do a similar thing in Bali based on my passion and world, journalism and blog.
So, with the help from my friends, I initiated citizen journalism blogging in Denpasar, Bali. That was how www.balebengong.net was created and got online since June 2007 after being established for the first time and developed in April 2007 on blogspot.com. This is the same blog that gathered bloggers all over Bali and later on established Bali Blogger Community (BBC).
While the residents only act as readers or consumers in the mainstream media, this citizen journalism encourages every resident to produce their own information. It has been proven that, as time goes by, there is an increase in the number of non-journalist residents who write on the blog. Although people have not considered it

Specify both the depth and scale of your solution’s social impact to date

The main power of this program is the residents and the Internet themselves. Generally, the mainstream media in Bali has less than 50 journalists each. This citizen journalism blog alone has more than 160 contributors. Additionally, it happened before we manage the blog intensively or embrace the residents. If there are more and more residents take part as contributors, it is likely that there will also be much more information circulating and becoming the alternatives of mainstream media in Bali.
The residents will be more knowledgeable as it is easier now to share information via communication technology as well as the Internet. Using mobile phones, the residents are able to exchange text messages that can be propagated further via Twitter or Facebook. They can also share longer and more comprehensive information with wider coverage by utilizing social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook.
We are focusing the social impact of this program towards the urban audience in Bali, especially Denpasar. This is mainly due to their Internet literacy, which is better than those who reside in the outskirts or the areas that are not covered by internet service. The primary target of

What is your projected impact within the next 1-5 years? Is your idea replicable? If so, how?

For the next 1-5 years, I am hoping that this program will motivate every resident to share information among them via various kinds of alternative media, including this very program of citizen journalism. Through this blog, the residents can retrieve alternative information aside from that of mainstream media. If the residents are able to produce information by themselves, the availability of information will consequently be increasing in number and diversity. The more information that is accessible, the better the knowledge of the residents will be. These people will also get used to thinking in diversity.
This idea can be applied in other regions, not only Bali. It can be done simply by creating a blog, portal or a media that not only involves the residents as consumers, but also make

Winning entries present a strong plan for how they will achieve and mark growth. Identify your six-month milestone for growing your impact

The presence of active citizen correspondents and information centres as well as communication devices in six indigenous communi

Six-Month Tasks
Task 1

Identifying and socializing the program to the youth communities in the community as a preliminary stage to introduce the progra

Task 2

Delivering training programs for citizen correspondents from the town's youth community so that they will eventually be able to

Task 3

Establishing information centres (mobile phones, computers and Internet) in every community that becomes the program location.

Now think bigger! Identify your 12-month impact milestone

The existence of balanced alternative information that is accessible periodically from the citizen correspondents who particular

12-Month Tasks
Task 1

Identification, socialization and training for the residents, especially the youths of the indigenous community

Task 2

Mentoring residents so that they can write about their daily surrounding through the use of information technology.

Task 3

Publish the result of residents' reportage through blog and trigger discussions through social networks, such as Facebook and Tw

How many people have been impacted by your project?

1,001 - 10,000

How many people could be impacted by your project in the next three years?

More than 10,000

Sustainability
Explain how your company, program, service or product is structured

Hybrid model

What barriers have hindered the success of your project to date? How do you plan to overcome these and other challenges as you grow your solution?

Referring to our four-year-experience in managing citizen journalism blog, the barrier of the success of this program is that it is difficult to persuade residents to produce and propagate information through blog continuously. Thus, there will be a mentoring team who regularly reminds, encourages, and mentors residents to produce that information. Another possible challenge is that the residents are too busy to produce information. To resolve that problem, a schedule will be made to enable residents to produce the information regularly with different topics.
Boredom will be another challenge. One of the ways is doing a shared reportage for a specific topic, which eventually will make the residents closer.

How do you see the information-technology and media sectors shifting over the next decade? How will your solution adapt to and/or drive that changing environment?

On the next decade, information technology devices (such as mobile phone & computer) and internet connection will be more affordable. This will be the chance for residents to use and utilize information technology more easily. Despite the fact that information technology becomes more affordable, residents are not capable to use it productively yet. Therefore, citizen journalism gives room and chance for residents to use it more positively, such as by producing information like texts, images, or videos.

Failure is not always an option. If your solution fails to gain traction in the next two years, what other applications of the idea could you explore?

If the idea of persuading the town's youth community to actively produce information through this citizen journalism blog failed, we will anticipate it by changing our target from the town's youth community to non-governmental organization (NGO). To date, we are quite involved with NGO because we frequently do some activities together, including information technology and citizen journalism training. The strategy and implementation pattern of the program are not too much different. However, the base is changed from the town's youth community to NGO activist community. The issues will still be varied.

Expand on your selections, explaining how you will sustain funding

For the initial phase, the program realization fund will be derived from individuals or NGO. Nevertheless, in order to make this program more interesting as well as giving some economic benefit for the citizens, a system of article payment must be built. Since the blog is managed together by the citizens, they will be responsible to pay the articles. Not only rating an article, they can also donate or become advertisers in this blog. This is a method we have not yet tried. However, it is a big opportunity to be an experiment of community media management such as citizen journalism blog.
Another funding source is advertisement, like the one in mainstream media. However, this new source will rely more on residents' small businesses by the system of reviewing their products or services.

Tell us about your partnerships

So far we build partnership between journalists, bloggers, internet development service providers, and residents. Each partner has their own role. The journalists become the editor and primary admin of the blog. The bloggers are the blog's designer and programmer. The internet development service providers support domain and hosting. While the residents become the major contributor of the blog.
For periodic realization of citizen journalism training, with around 100 alumni since 2010 until now, we have been supported by philanthropy community in Bali.

What type of team (staff, volunteers, etc.) will ensure that you achieve the growth milestones identified in the Social Impact section?

The team in this program includes program coordinators, mentors, designers, programmers, and the residents. The program coordinators will coordinate the program implementation, as well as being the main admin and editor. The mentors will work in the field more often, not only for mentoring residents in producing information but also writing as the residents' correspondent. The designers and programmers will work more on the blog's appearance and functionalities. The residents will be represented by at least two members of the town's youth community who a

Changemakers is a collaborative and supportive space. Please specify any community resources you would need to grow and sustain your initiative. Select all that apply

Human resources or talent, Marketing or media, Research or information, Collaboration or networking, Pro-bono help (legal, financial, etc.).

Specify any resources you might offer to support other initiatives. Select all that apply

Marketing or media, Collaboration or networking.

Please elaborate on any needs or offers you have mentioned above and/or suggest categories of support that aren’t specified within the list

We need support related to human resource enhancement because so far we mostly depend on our own experience in implementing the program, without having any formal education or training associated with citizen journalism or information technology. We need marketing or promotion support because we do not give enough consideration on those aspects. We also need other parties who are capable to do some researches related to the development of information technology, especially the citizen journalism in Bali or Indonesia.
We need network support to expand the opportunity or information access both globally or nationally. We still lack in networking support, particularly in global level. We also need free-of-charge help, especially for mentoring or consulting.

Summary
Define your company, program, service or product in 1-2 short sentences

Sloka Institute develops citizen journalism blog where the citizens do not only get information but also provide it on their own