virtualDavis

Click on the image for Kris Krug‘s digital story (yesmagazine.org)

Eleven weeks into the oil disaster that is devastating the Gulf Coast, hope can be hard to find. For photographer Kris Krug, capturing the horrifying impact of our dependence on oil is “my chance to take a little bit of my power back.” To those who feel emotionally overwhelmed by the disaster, Krug advises: “Do something. Action is the antidote to that despair you’re feeling.”(yesmagazine.org)

Photographically, psychologically and philosophically engaging,  Kris Krug’s digital story about the aftermath of the BP oil spill fiasco offers a glimmer of hope. He acknowledges the weight that he’s felt in the months since BP’s well began pumping millions of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. But he also encourages us to act, to overcome the despair by engaging intelectuallay or artistically even if we can’t participate physically in ameliorating the disaster.

“Fears grow over oil spill disaster” (Video via youtube.com)

Is this the understatement of the year: “These guys [BP] don’t have a great record in taking care of people’s health and safety.” This comment, made by Greenpeace’s Mark Floegel about BP’s insistence that shrimpers, fishermen, etc. who wish to assist in the clean up effort must first sign a BP indemnification waiver. (Note, this quotation comes at about 2:20 in the video.)

Google is leveraging its multimodal muscle via the Crisis Response pageto help cover the oil spill, aggregating timely content and publishing updated Google Earth layers to help visualize the scope, evolution and impact of the spill.

“Google is taking a major (though low-profile) step into the realm of crowd sourcing news. Users can upload their videos of the spill or news related to the Gulf oil spill, and the videos are published to a YouTube playlist, making a video record of the disaster and what is being done on the ground to stop it.” (Mother Nature Network)

Perhaps this is the silver lining? Citizens around the world are quickly learning to contribute to the story, create history as it’s made, participate in the global dialogue that until recently was interpreted and disseminated by a few. Citizen journalism is open journalism! This shift is exciting and inspiring. The democratization of information, of news, of history. Can open government be far behind?!?!