Collab/Space Chicago

How can media startups break through, survive and thrive? That will be the focus of the upcoming Collab/Space Chicago workshop on September 24, 2014, the day before the ONA14 conference, sponsored by the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships and hosted by TechNexus. It will be an all-day, hands-on workshop focused on media innovation and spotlighting cutting-edge media startups -- in Chicago and beyond. We'll select several innovative media startups to present their startups in lightning fashion and take questions from the audience. We'll also do collaborative exercises to learn how to work better together in the digital age, and then break out into groups to work on the startup challenges and help find ways to overcome their individual obstacles. But we'll also be learning how to take those solutions back to our own workplaces. Plus, we'll be collaborating with a diverse group of participants, including entrepreneurs, journalists, technologists, designers, marketers, investors and major players in the tech and media scene.

Collab/Space Chicago is a production of PBS MediaShift and sponsored by John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships and hosted by TechNexus.

PRESENTING STARTUPS

The following startups will be presenting at Collab/Space Chicago:

Contextly
Datavisual
Outlet
Parsely
PortaBierta Media
Realizing Innovation
Silicon Hills News
SociaLife Chicago
Solar Power Report

Read more about the presenting startups here.

The John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships at Stanford foster journalistic innovation, entrepreneurship and leadership. Each year, twenty outstanding individuals from around the world are selected to participate in the program. They are given the resources to pursue and test their ideas for improving the quality of news and information reaching the public.

TechNexus co-founds disruptive technology ventures on the frontiers of innovation by aligning corporations with entrepreneurs, assembling the right combination of staff, engineers and resources, and then guiding those businesses to customers and markets. Its resources include a national open network for innovation, a content publishing platform, industry-leading research and a 50,000-square-foot incubator at its headquarters in Chicago's Civic Opera Building.

KEY SPEAKERS

Doug Mitchell is a media thinker, producer and innovator who is co-project director of the “NewU” Entrepreneur Fellowship Program for journalists and media professionals of color. Mitchell founded and still leads NPR’s “Next Generation” radio training, and currently is consulting for NPR to help it and NPR stations create and manage a “talent pipeline” into public media. Also, Mitchell is a co-founder of “The Journalism Diversity Project.” He is based in Washington, D.C.

David Cohn is the chief content officer of Circa, an innovative news summary app. After starting out as a technology reporter, Cohn’s career has been about pushing the boundaries of how journalism is done. He was at the forefront of citizen journalism with “Assignment Zero” and the “Beat Blogging” project. He helped to pioneer the practice of crowdfunding for journalists by creating Spot.Us. Cohn is active throughout the news community, serving on the board of several non-profits, teaching at various journalism schools and helping to organize industry events including ONA and TechRaking. He lives in Berkeley, Calif., where he likes to grow things in the garden or bike.

Andy Boyle is a News Applications Developer for the Chicago Tribune, where he’s built projects for the 2012 and 2014 elections, created tools for user-generated content and regularly works on visualizing data, from high school sports to crime. Previously, Andy has worked at the Boston Globe, the St. Petersburg Times and The New York Times Regional Media Group, where his work was cited in the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News. When not speaking at colleges and conferences, Andy is usually writing and telling jokes. His mom would be so proud. You can follow him on Twitter at @andymboyle.

How It Will Work

Media-related startups can apply to present at the workshop. We'll choose startups at various stages of development, who will do presentations for the group and answer questions. They will list their three biggest challenges, whether that's financial, technological, marketing, distribution or something else. Later in the day, we'll get into breakout groups around the startups and help them come up with solutions for their challenges. Those will be presented to the group, and we'll set up pages for each startup on the MediaShift Idea Lab site to follow their progress after the workshop.

The goal will be to collaborate to help these startups succeed in the long run, creating interest groups for them on the spot (and afterwards), while also networking between the tech and media communities.

Who?

You'll get to hear from media innovators and work with them on teams too! Also, we expect key people to attend from local media organization, journalism and communication schools, investment firms and other people active in the entrepreneurial and media scenes.

Agenda

> Targeted talks on collaboration and media innovation.

> Selected media startups present their work and list their challenges.

> Networking lunch

> Collaboration exercise

> Breakout into teams: Work collaboratively to help solve challenges for the startups, and present that to the group.

And a Mixer Too?

After the workshop we'll head out for drinks and snacks for all. It will be a chance to share with we've learned with friends and colleagues. The mixer will take place from 5:30 pm - 7:30 pm, with the location to be announced.