What is the media?

Next week marks my 10-year college class reunion.

A lot has changed since then. A lot has stayed the same.

In some ways, I haven’t strayed too far off the beaten path. I’ve been back at my alma mater Marquette University for nearly six years.

But my job today — director of social media — didn’t exist a decade ago when I graduated with a journalism degree. Back then, I wrote for the Associated Press and dreamed that one day I might write for Rolling Stone.

My path started to change when I moved to Montana after graduation and took a seasonal job as a bell boy in a national park. I started a blog — when newspaper articles still noted that it was a contraction of “web log” —and wrote about my backcountry misadventures.

The constraints of needing an editor or an organization to publish evaporated. I fell in love with writing all over again.

I continued to write a blog when I secured my first full-time job in journalism. The blog, called Train with Tim, chronicled my experiencing training a runner for her first marathon. Some of this reporting found its way into the paper, but most was online only.

I continued to blog for the paper — until the day our department was cut and I was laid off. I briefly continued this blog on Wordpress and for a crosstown rival magazine.

Today, the seed of that idea still exists as another blog called The Beer Runner, which you can find on the website of DRAFT Magazine. I have a paid contract to write a certain number of blogs a month, and occasionally my freelance work also appears in their print publication.

I continued to make on-air appearances to talk about my blog or offer social media commentary. This happened as recently as a few days ago when a local talk radio anchor direct messaged me on Twitter and asked if I could discuss who to trust in social media in the wake of the breaking news. (My answer: There has always been misinformation circulating in the media in the chaotic aftermath of tragedy, like this or this. Now there’s just more of it and it moves faster, but it can also get debunked faster.)

Meanwhile, at Marquette University my daily job consists of creating and curating content for social media. Part of this includes a new Medium collection of journalistic reporting about academic research, on topics such as autism and signaling theory. I edit the collection and work with two student writers.

I’m not listing all these credentials just to toot my own horn. I’m trying to show how much has changed but also stayed the same in my 10-year career.

So… Am I still “the media” today or not?

I think we’ve reached a place where technology and convergence has moved faster than our definitions. That isn’t just a philosophical question for think pieces. It also impacts my syllabus.

This fall I’m teaching Media Writing, and I can’t simply approach it as the class of the same name I took when I was a student.

The problem is I don’t really know how to define the media — or, more accurately, where I should start or stop. Is it who signs your paychecks? Or is it the skills you use regardless of who you work for? Does intent or audience matter? Or do you just recognize it when you see it?

I’m wrestling with these questions as I put my syllabus together. I don’t have all the answers yet, but I’m starting to come to one conclusion….

We are all the media.

Once disseminating information, opinions and entertainment was entrusted to the few privileged gatekeepers. But today everyone has the ability to publish communication, make it available to the public, reach an audience and potentially leave an impact.

That means maybe everyone should study the techniques, the power, the ethics and the responsibilities of being the media.

That’s the biggest change in the last 10 years — and the biggest opportunity.