Poynter Online - Converging to Fix the Commute This is the future of news in my view, and according to the folks at Newsplex and elsewhere. Several news organizations combined resources to produce a project that allows viewers to get involved with something that everybody thinks about -- traffic. The tie-in to what the transportation agencies are doing and what legislators are doing about traffic is very forward thinking and represents community journalism at its most innovative. By allowing readers to see how much different improvements will cost, and then letting voters talk back to the pols about which ones they are willing to vote to pay, the media organizations are breaking new ground. I heard the developer of the previous project, Waterfront Renaissance speak and was shocked at how many of the older newspeople in the audience discounted what he said because he told them he didn't read newspapers. He meant newsprint versions of the news. The audience just couldn't fathom that there is lots of news on the Web. The young man contended he didn't trust the mass news corps and would rather be his own gatekeeper, and evaluate some stories by reading about them in several different forms. I think that is the way things are going. Television news has just overtaken news in print as the main way Americans get their news, but with the demassifcation of broadcast, the Internet and wireless will be grabbing bigger shares of the news consumers. Interactive features like the "Fix the Commute" that are local, provide meaningful interaction and will have an impact on the real world will draw viewers who are as used to clicking as they are to couch potatoing.