Last week we had the opportunity to participate in a symposium honoring Phil Meyer, Knight Chair of Journalism at the University of North Carolina-Chapel. About 30 journalism educators, practitioners and former students of Phil's spent the better part of two days kicking hard on the topic “”Raising the Ante: The Internet's Impact on Journalism Education and Existing Theories of Mass Communication.”

Kathleen Frankovic, director of surveys for CBS News, used the symposium as the basis for her column last week at cbsnews.com. The column (not quite a blog) is called “Poll Positions” (about public opinion, polls and the process of conducting and reporting them). Here is her column's link: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/02/opinion/pollpositions/main3988828.shtml

Kathy's column makes reference to something we wrote on the topic of the future of polling. That short paper, but with all of its hyperlinks, can be found at “Are We Researching How To Do Research?”

On Thursday night Phil gave a short speech at a dinner attended by the participants and his family. In “Something strange and possibly dangerous,” he highlighted that change is not coming, it is here, and that all of us have to change out thinking and practices if democracy is to survive.

“We need to turn our conversation toward an economic theory of journalism. We need to apply existing theory to understanding the processes and effects of the new media. We need to learn how to sell enlightened understanding to the public so that it can preserve its democratic values. The synergy of mass media and mass production is gone, probably forever. Something strange – and possibly dangerous — is taking its place.”

Strange and dangerous and something most exciting.