A lazy Sunday of links and one thought on “citizen journalism” at the end…

• Currently looking for post-production funding, Jason Boritz and Jonathan Salemi have been filming a documentary about entrepreneur Mark Husmann’s quest to build a billion dollar business.
• A new early-stage seed venture fund in Zeeland, Michigan, Momentum.
• Speaking of which, look for previously-discussed venture-launch firm Venture 51 to open up shop on Monday.
• Jason Mendelson, FAS 157 is stupid:
  

  I object because it’s not possible to “fairly value” a private, early-stage portfolio the way that FAS 157 wants us to. This process injects a ton of false precision and costs and benefits neither the venture firm, nor its investors.

  … It’s all false precision that adds unintelligent discretion to the valuation process.

  Valuing early-stage ventures is as much art as science…

• Basil Peters at Angel Blog, Why VCs Will Block Good Exits.
• Venture Hacks, We don’t pay you to work here:
  

  The problem isn’t that money is a weak motivator. The problem is that money is a terribly strong motivator. By itself, money motivates the wrong people to do the wrong things in the quest for more money.

  Every rational company in the world is trying to hire the best people in the world. And all but one of them will fail at this task. There can only be one company with the best people. Hiring the best is a failing strategy.

  … Organizations must be designed to thrive with ordinary people. If businesses can thrive with the capabilities of ordinary people, they can also thrive with extraordinary people.

• Ed Cotton, Brands will make everyone an expert:
  

  Detailed facts and knowledge that were previously available to experts are now accessible to all.

  Everyone can pretend to understand what the experts are talking about and everyone can see how they work.

  … Years ago, this would have been too much for the average consumer to process or too technical, now it’s fair game. In fact, digging deeper and learning more has become something of an international hobby. If it’s there, we want to find it.

• But I’m sorry, I’m not convinced about “citizen journalism”; it still just strikes me as a sea of banalities. Professional journalists arose because we needed people to sift through the noise to find the important signals; perhaps the most important thing to come from the expected rise of citizen journalists will be to remind us that journalists can still be valuable and to provide a clear signal to journalists of the changes they need to make. It’s not important whether journalists use print newspapers, blogs or Twitter, but we still need quality, balanced reporting: we still need filters.

  As usual, the answer isn’t either / or, but both…