What is folk media?
Folk Media, as we use the term, is any sort of art or communication created by an individual, a small business, nonprofit, or an informal group, created outside of the influence of big media companies or other large institutions. A folk media-maker can be rich or poor, liberal or conservative, young or old — there is no ideological or demographic prerequisites to engage in folk media. Folk media-makers are independent media-makers. They can be illustrators, journalists, talk show hosts, dancers, videobloggers, sculptors, novelists, drummers, etc., so long as they’re not letting big media companies or other powerful interests call the shots over what they create or how it’s distributed. The creations of folk media-makers make our mediascape much richer, the artistic frontier more vibrant, and our public dialogue far more diverse, open, and free. Although a great many folk media-makers are amateurs at creating media, folk media also very much includes work produced by professionals who
