NEW YORK -- As many Americans carried their frustrations over the Clinton scandal into voting booths with them on Tuesday, a new online forum is preparing to examine hot-button issues away from the media glare.
Debuting Thursday, Reality Check is a discussion forum designed to encourage the kind of in-depth, personal, risk-taking discussions that rarely happen online, outside of targeted support groups and long-standing communities like The Well and Echo. Reality Check is a project of the Silicon Alley-based Web Lab, a socially-conscious think tank that producer Barry Joseph describes as "the research and development arm of the Web."
The site will tackle one big issue at a time, exploring multiple dimensions in smaller topic-centered forums generated by the participants. Until the end of the year, Topic A will be the impeachment challenge facing the White House and the events leading up to it -- including the months-long Monica obsession in the press, and the publication of the Starr Report.
Joseph cites the O.J. Simpson trial and the death of Princess Diana as events of the scale that will be Reality Check's turf.
Using the power of collective discourse to help people get off the media spin cycle is one of the site's main ambitions, says Web Lab founder Marc Weiss.
"When the Starr Report hit, I spent most of that weekend online reading, like many people," Weiss recalls. "There was this feeling that Congress had crossed some line, and that all the institutions were out of control. There was also a feeling that we couldn't do anything about it. People were just tuning out, which is the equivalent of getting depressed. By launching Reality Check, we're trying to create at least one place where public discourse could be heightened instead of degraded." Participants are also invited to address open letters to people involved in the issues at hand and to suggest other subjects worthy of public attention who are being ignored.
In an atmosphere where "politics has become a blood sport and Congressional debate is trench warfare," says Weiss, the site is non-partisan. Its guidelines specify that 'Reality Check' is not a place to rehash partisan politics or obsess over the details of another media explosion that has overwhelmed us all. Instead, it's a place to sort out what we think about an event (or a set of events) that is so heavily covered by the media that we've lost track of what's important."
To encourage substantive discussion, participants are asked to make a commitment of at least four weeks before joining the conversation. The creators of Reality Check hope that by creating an environment that engenders personal disclosure, the site will set forth a model of online give-and-take that has matured beyond posturing and ad hominem attacks. Those who don't register to participate can still read the dialogue groups, but can't join in or create new discussion topics.
The seeds of Web Lab's current project were sown in a series of online salons related to P.O.V., the PBS independent-film showcase Weiss originated in 1987. In a report on the lessons learned in those salons, Joseph criticized what he called "the Invisible Man culture" of the Net, a culture of pseudonymous voyeurs and drive-by flaming.
Joseph wrote, "Marshall McLuhan instructs us that those who looked at the content of media were missing the point. 'Content,' McLuhan said, 'is the juicy piece of meat that distracts the watchdogs of the mind' -- the watchdogs on the lookout for the influence underlying the content... It is not what we find on the Web that is important, but how the way we interact with the Web influences how we interact with others." If traffic on The Well is any indication of the level of interest in the kinds of discussion that Reality Check will be offering, the new site should draw some interest. Out of hundreds of conclaves on the Well, the media conference -- the one most similar in purview to Reality Check -- is consistently among the top five most active forums.
One aspect of Reality Check, however, is very unlike The Well, which greets members with the totemic phrase "You own your own words." Postings on the new site will become the intellectual property of the Web Lab, for use in books and other media projects that may be generated by the dialogues.
"We can imagine making a book out of it," says Weiss. One can equally imagine that clause in the membership guidelines being dropped after potential participants raise a fuss about personal disclosures being republished without permission.
Reality Check is currently staffed by volunteers and one paid editor. Funding comes from the Web Lab, which is supported by private backing and corporate sponsors like AT&T. The Web Lab may consider seeking sponsorship for Reality Check if the site takes off. The conferencing software the Web Lab and GMD Studios developed for the site will be available for license.
Having a built-in funding source will relieve Reality Check of the kind of bottom-line pressures that proved fatal for another notable effort to create a Web-based haven for in-depth discussion: Howard Rheingold's Electric Minds. Rheingold thinks Reality Check is on the right track.
"They're doing a good job of ensuring high quality discourse by seeking groups of people who are committed to staying with the conversation," he says.
"Democracy is not just about voting," Rheingold says. "It's also about citizens who are informed enough to debate the issues of the day. The ability of citizens to communicate with each other without mediation is enormously important in an era where the news media have such an enormous impact on political decision making."
