Students at the University of British Columbia talk about changing Votermedia from a once-a-year system to a continuous year-round system for funding blogs about their student union, the Alma Mater Society (AMS). ‘”I think it’s something that I hope will only grow and prosper, you know, not just during the season where people elect their AMS executives, but the entire year.’” (Justin McElroy, Coordinating Editor, The Ubyssey.)
Transcript
Bijan Ahmadian – AMS President 2010-2011:
So the biggest opportunity I see at UBC is to extend the votermedia from beyond the election to make it a continuous one throughout the year, and really experiment with that.
Alex Lougheed – AMS VP Academic 2008-2009; Blogger, UBC Insiders:
One of the big changes that I would personally like to see with [votermedia] is it moving from what it currently is, predominantly an elections-based event that happens annually, to what is more of a continuous round-the-clock kind of coverage system. So there are certain times when you obviously want media to pay more attention to what’s going on within student politics. And the biggest time and occasion for that is elections, because they set the tone for the year. But the thing is, after that, you still need coverage going on. You still need that kind of independent voice carrying forward, to make sure that what happens during the elections, is carried through with, throughout the rest of the year. [Insert: Photo by Gerald Deo – AMS Elections All-Candidates Forum, 2009-01-29]
Justin McElroy – Coordinating Editor, The Ubyssey:
…during the month of January there’s hundreds and hundreds of posts overall. During the other 11 months, there’s very very little, simply because there’s no funding. And as a result, what gets focused on, and what people are debating, may go towards the more sensational, and election-ready, rather than, without provoking laughter, the issues that matter.
Taylor Lukacin – Blogger, AMS Confidential:
As you can see though, from the funding, from the mini-[votermedia] that occurred, it would obviously be great to have that all year round.
…it took us, I think, ten days to get 1%. We were at 0% for a while, and then we reached 10% and just kept growing… [Insert: Coloured graph was linked from UBC Insiders – Voter Funded Media Results, 2010-02-03 but then swivel.com died 🙁 ]
Kai Green – Blogger, AMS Confidential:
…and there were some frantic midnight texts “Oh My God, 10%!”
Taylor Lukacin – Blogger, AMS Confidential:
… and we just saw it grow over time so continuous is really great for that. And then when everything was reset in March again, for the AUS elections, it was really great to see the results and…
Kai Green – Blogger, AMS Confidential:
…to be number 1!
Justin McElroy – Coordinating Editor, The Ubyssey:
… your point about continuous is, people don’t participate with the media on a one-time basis, and thus voting for media on a one-time basis is, in my mind, a silly way of doing it. People decide what they like for media every single day, simply based on what articles are the best out there, and what’s illuminating them, and what’s making them critically think, and what’s making them argue with people on comments. And when you have continuous it forces people to be more engaged and to think about that. And therefore as media, continually post and continue to prove their relevance to students. I think this past year with continuous as well as in during the spring and summer of 2008 I believe it was, when there was continuous, it makes people more accountable, simply because that money is always possibly coming in, and therefore you have an incentive to always produce for students. [Insert: Votermedia.org – UBC AMS Media Horserace, May 2010]
Matthew Naylor – AMS VP External 2007-2008:
Yeah, one of the things that we have now, that we didn’t have four years ago is actual data. We have evidence to show that, one, [VoterMedia] works. It’s able to provide coverage, it’s able to raise the quality of debate, and it’s able to hold candidates to account. And we have some evidence that says that certain voting systems are better than other voting systems, and a growing public consensus, both amongst the political class and the media that moving towards a certain system, in this case continuous [votermedia], would be a good idea.
Isabel Ferreras – AMS Elections Administrator 2010:
I guess what I would say, to improve the [votermedia] contest in the future, I would say we should allocate more money towards continuous [votermedia], and perhaps eventually get rid of one-time [votermedia] altogether.
Alex Lougheed – AMS VP Academic 2008-2009; Blogger, UBC Insiders:
…continuous [votermedia] kind of yielded results that people thought were more accurate, given the amount of effort the [voter media] had been putting in, and the amount of contribution they give to that dialog. Whereas one-time [votermedia] was a bit more… there was a lot more noise in the results. So going ahead… it’s kind of hard to say. Because with one-off [votermedia], you have more people voting, you have a more engaged population, and that provides an incentive for the [voter media] to reach those people and to say “Hey, you should vote for us if you’re going to vote anyways.”
Matthew Naylor – AMS VP External 2007-2008:
…the school paper came out after the last VFM contest in the last election and said that [votermedia] should move from the one-time system that we have now to a continuous system, and I think that that’s a good choice, and I would encourage the AMS to take that step. [Insert: The Ubyssey – Editorial: [Votermedia] should be continuous, May 2010]
Justin McElroy – Coordinating Editor, The Ubyssey:
I think it’s something that I hope will only grow and prosper, not just during the season where people elect their AMS executives, but the entire year.
Credits:
- Music: Funkorama by Kevin MacLeod
- Video Production: Mark Latham & Irfaan Hafeez. Shot: April-June 2010; Released: November 2010