Success rarely reveals its secrets to us even when we attain it. Failure is more generous -- it shares its lessons with us, if we just listen. In his Letter to the Bayosphere Community, Dan Gillmor undergoes the rite of self-examination as he looks back on the short history of Bayosphere.
Reports of Bayosphere's demise have been greatly exaggerated. It's not being shut down. But its future is far from clear or secure, and in its failure to achieve its lofty goals there is much to be learned. We'll all be drawing wisdom from this well in coming weeks.
I've had difficulty getting a feel for exactly what Bayosphere is about. It's an experiment in citizen journalism, but that's not its subject matter. In his introductory note last April, Dan talked about the process, which is clearly his passion, but left the topical focus to the community: "Let's build a space where people can find news and opinion they can trust, and information that helps us in our daily lives. I don't know everything that's going on the Bay Area. And I don't know everything about citizen journalism. But you and I, together, know a lot. The Bayosphere team will offer ideas and assistance. In the end, though, we'll all figure this out together."
Perhaps one of the first lessons to take away is the importance of focus. As it unfolded, Bayosphere turned out not to be about the Bay Area at all, and instead became dominated by blog postings about U.S. and world politics. The postings are civil, which is a plus, but there's no shortage of conversation about those topics on the Internet. It's difficult to see a way to add value.
Another might be the importance of managing a core group of social trendsetters. Bayosphere managed to establish a culture fairly free of abuse, but it didn't evolve the atmosphere of topical passion that powers the most successful online communities. Getting there requires leadership -- not individual or directive leadership, but group leadership. If Bayosphere had launched with a cluster of eloquent bloggers dedicated to the proposition that there's something important and compelling about living in the Bay Area, I think it would have unfolded quite differently.
Undoubtedly there are many other lessons having to do with such issues as the importance of promotion and marketing. That lesson is being learned right now by a number of independent CitJ sites.
Bayosphere has inspired me to do some more thinking about our own failures, and to try harder to find the failures hidden in our successes. No one should be deterred from experimenting in this space by the Bayosphere outcomes. We all need to try more, to fail more, and to fail forward.
See also:
- Tim Porter, Citizen Journalism: Making New Mistakes
- William Luciw, The Challenges of Citizen Journalism
- Lloyd@Work, Gillmor on Learning the Hard Way
- Online News Squared, Tide Goes Out at Bayosphere