News

The John and James L. Knight Foundation announced today that the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program and the Media Lab would receive a grant of $5 Million over the next four years to create and operate a Center for Future Civic Media (C4FCM). The money comes as part of a new initiative the foundation has launched to deploy new media technologies to foster greater civic engagement.

By Carolyn Y. Johnson
Globe Staff / May 24, 2007

The future of journalism is in your hands.

That was the message yesterday as the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation handed out more than $11 million in prize money to various bloggers and computer programmers, and organizations ranging from MIT to MTV, for proposals that will empower ordinary people to participate in digital media.

A handful of New England winners selected from 1,600 applicants took home over half the money from the first Knight News Challenge, with proposals ranging from an online legal resource for citizen journalists to a new MIT Center for Future Civic Media that will develop better ways to connect digital and real-world communities.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation announced today the first winners of an unusual contest to foster blogs and other digital efforts that seek to bring together residents of a city or town in ways that local newspapers historically have done.

The foundation awarded $12-million to universities, nonprofit Internet sites, bloggers, and companies. The largest grant — $5-million — went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to build a Center for Future Civic Media, which will develop new technologies and practices to help newspapers attract readers as a greater number of Americans use the Internet as their primary news source.

The Chronicle of Philanthropy has the complete story.