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journalism

Things to read

Paul Wallen, design director at The Huntsville Times, points out the handsome and stirring Assignment Afghanistan. It is an incredible example of bring all the tools and techniques available to tell a more complete story. There are great stories, amazing photographs, maps, flash timelines, video, the works. I encourage you to spend some time, learning about what’s happening in Afghanistan and being inspired by a wonderful project.

I mentioned Mircosoft’s breakfast media table concept in this space yesterday. I tossed out a little flip line about competing against television. And now, today, there’s Google’s CEO:

“History shows that in the face of new technology, those who adapt their business models don’t just survive, they prosper. Technology advances, and no laws can preserve markets that have been passed by.” Google chairman Eric Schmidt may not have intended those remarks as a verbal grenade, but many in his audience of 2,000 television industry members took them that way.

Schmidt was speaking at the 2011 MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival, where he gave the prestigious annual MacTaggart Lecture. The festival is attended by over 2,000 people with a business interest in television, including on-air talent, broadcasters, distributors, support services and digital innovators.

Schmidt was the first person invited to give the MacTaggart Lecture who was not in the television industry. His remarks therefore were tailored to address the interests of his audience, many of whom believe Google has a destructive effect on their business and a cavalier attitude toward copyright.

Viewing will shift, he predicts, and location will become a critically important contextual signal. There’s a lot in that story worth chewing on.

Howard Owens writes:

Every time a small town n’paper publisher puts up a paywall, a potential local indie publisher should hear cash registers ringing.

He should now. Who is Howard Owens? He’s publisher of The Batavian.

There’s a simple principle of economics at play here. Scarcity creates value. But. If you hide behind a paywall you make yourself scarce, at the risk of losing an audience willing to find their information elsewhere. As you might have noticed, information is often plentiful.

Remember, yesterday, when I mentioned either human or algorithm curation? Steffen Konrath found a story that quotes a prediction of 40% of large companies using context-aware computing projects in the next few years. Context motives content and interactivity. That engagement gets results. Forbes picks it up from there:

It’s often said that “content is king.” The ability to create high-quality content that attracts, engages, retains and converts visitors is still an important objective for every website. Content is indeed still the heart and soul of every site. But if content is king, context is its queen; and together they will rule the kingdom of audience engagement and of the corporate Web site experience.

Context is the key to providing Web experiences that deliver business results. Context shortens sales cycles and grows revenue. It increases customer engagement and loyalty. Gartner describes as “Context-Aware Computing,” and defines it as “the concept of leveraging information about the end user to improve the quality of the interaction.” Gartner goes on to note, “Emerging context-enriched services will use location, presence, social attributes and other environmental information to anticipate an end user’s immediate needs, offering more-sophisticated, situation-aware and usable functions.”

[…]

There is no excuse for ignoring context on the Web. Context is just as pervasive and just as available online as it is in the physical world. It comes in as many forms including preferences, behavior, location and social networks, there to be used by savvy marketers if they only would.

There’s that word again, location.

Quick hits: Mindy McAdams on getting that first job in journalism. Great advice. Another Apple employee, another bar, another lost iPhone. I’m beginning to think this is the soft-pedal link technique of choice at Cupertino. The Iron Bowl version of Stranger in a Strange Land. GQ comes down to try to figure it all out. (Hint: Fans can be overzealous.)

Finally, the finalists for the 2011 Online Journalism Awards are publicized. Tons of great material to examine there.

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30
Aug 11

First day of classes

Taught my first class of the semester today. It is a two-hour, one day a week experience. Today we met for about 90 minutes.

I gave them a quiz.

Oh, we did the getting-to-know you portion of the class and they received the syllabus. There were some slides and lots of words and pictures. We rushed headlong into Associated Press style.

And then I gave them homework.

Too much for the first day?

Here was there assignment. Feel free to play along, if you like. Ernest Hemingway is said to have written a six word story that was among his best work. (Even Snopes isn’t sure if this is true or apocryphal, but it works for an exercise in conciseness.)

The story:

For sale: Baby shoes. Never worn.

Beginning, middle and end. So I asked the class to bring back their six word stories next week. The only rules were that it had to be six words, and death could not be the theme.

Now I have to come up with one, too. Feel free to leave yours in the comments below.

And now a pretty picture of a tiny part of our lovely campus:

Samford is a beautiful place.

Speaking of photos, the August photo gallery is now online. Also, you’ll notice a new piece of art across the top of the page, that’s on Cannon Beach, in Oregon. I’d like to go back there soon. Care to donate to the cause?

Naturally when one banner comes off the blog it remains on the Former Blog Banners page. Not sure why I even maintain that page, other than it is neat to see the places I’ve gone all together. Some are more interesting than others, but all of them passed muster to make it here. There’s at least a half-baked story behind each of them.

The piece I wrote here on Saturday was re-published on The War Eagle Reader. It is getting some nice comments, too. Seems everyone is ready for football.

Finally, there’s this, the latest wonderful piece of medical science:

Medical advancements never cease to amaze.

journalism / links / things to read / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
30
Aug 11

Things to read

Where did you have breakfast this morning? Was it on a table like this?

It’s based on Microsoft’s Surface technology, modified by the R&D Lab to create a Times-oriented user experience that reimagines the old “around the breakfast table” reading of the paper. You’ll notice that, in the demo, news is both highly personal and highly social — and that the line between “consumer” and “news consumer” is a thin one. Ads look pretty much the way we’re used to them looking, but they’re also integrated into the tabletop flow of information.

And news itself, in the same way, collapses into the broader universe of information.

Who has time for reading with breakfast? I suspect the biggest opponent will be the television, which may be hard to uproot in the short term.

The ad integration is nice. The curation, either human or algorithm, is even more important in this model.

The first time Bill Gates demoed this premise it was incredible to conceive. Now the interface just looks more and more like an Apple screen. Odd how that happens.

You could be reading about a Twitter libel case on your breakfast infonewstainment table one day. They’re popping up. Be aware of what you say, and of how libel laws work.

Journalists who manage to get that addition to their breakfast nook may be spending a lot of bagel time over LinkedIn.

A new survey from Arketi Group found that the percent of journalists on LinkedIn has increased from 85 percent in 2009. Why?

LinkedIn provides an easy way for reporters to connect with sources.

“It comes as no surprise more BtoB journalists are participating in social media sites, especially LinkedIn,” Mike Neumeier, principal of Arketi Group, says, “LinkedIn provides an online outlet for them to connect with industry sources, find story leads and build their professional networks.”

While more journalists are on LinkedIn than any other social network, they have increased their presence on other networks, too. The survey found that 85 percent of journalists are on Facebook and 84 percent use Twitter. Only 55 percent of journalists used Facebook in 2009, and 24 percent were on Twitter.

Google+ should be included in there too, because it will work very well once it gets passed the early adoption stage. Also, as one commenter under that report notes, there is a difference between having an account and using it. I personally use LinkedIn only sparingly. And yet I get more mail from them than anyone.

Quick hits: Kentucky athletics cracks down on student reporters. (Now with an update.) There’s a bit of muscle flexing from the SIDs and a big reaction from the student-journalists (and the APSE and SPJ). The first in a big wave of 10th anniversary stories coming up, this one examining how we’ve changed since Sept. 11th. Answer: Far more than we’d like. One hundred story ideas, nice feature idea for when you’re reaching for copy. And Forbes personalizes the Washington Post’s infographics designer.

Finally, the Associated Collegiate Press’ multimedia story of the year finalists. All of them are worth checking out. Many are worth studying for inspiration. Great work by busy student-journalists in there.

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29
Aug 11

Mondays, can’t live ’em …

Back to the routine, then. Classes start this week. My first one is tomorrow.

So I polished up a syllabus today. I put together the massive spelling list required of this class. I outlined the first four weeks of class. I wrote the first two lectures. Fired off a solid salvo of Emails.

Things got done.

Also I caught up the July photo gallery. Lot of pictures in there. Tomorrow I’ll catch up the August pictures.

Rode the bike this evening. Got 26.9 miles on the bike, enjoying a dry evening’s air. Only got heckled once, by a car full of young ladies. Also, I think I hate kevlar tires.

Lately my rides haven’t been very good. Too slow, too much struggle or too much pain. Today it was all three. This started when I had to replace my Continental racing tires with some three ply version of heavy duty there’s-debris-in-the-road tires.

Racing tires weigh between 30 to 60 grams less. And I wouldn’t have thought that would be a big difference for a duffer like me, but I’m changing my mind. The problem is that racing tires are more expensive.

On the ride before this I got home to discover my front rim was riding against the brake pad. No wonder it felt like I was going nowhere. I was pedaling through my brake! So, yes, I want my old tires back.

Visited the local Kohl’s tonight. That was the temperature. How’s August where you are?

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29
Aug 11

Things to read

It was vital before the weekend, even as it is dated now, but here’s a bit of specialty reporting worth your attention. What do you do with prisoners during a hurricane? Nothing, apparently, if you’re New York City:

“We are not evacuating Rikers Island,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in a news conference this afternoon. Bloomberg annouced a host of extreme measures being taken by New York City in preparation for the arrival of Hurricane Irene, including a shutdown of the public transit system and the unprecedented mandatory evacuation of some 250,000 people from low-lying areas. But in response to a reporter’s question, the mayor stated in no uncertain terms (and with more than a hint of annoyance) that one group of New Yorkers on vulnerable ground will be staying put.

New York City is surrounded by small islands and barrier beaches, and a glance at the city’s evacuation map reveals all of them to be in Zone A (already under a mandatory evacuation order) or Zone B–all, that is, save one. Rikers Island, which lies in the waters between Queens and the Bronx, is not highlighted at all, meaning it is not to be evacuated under any circumstances.

Speaking of the storm, FEMA asked people to use Twitter and Facebook during the bad weather, for fear of otherwise overloading the cell phone system. How many stories are in that sentence, do you think? Meanwhile, the New York Times says Twitter was a playground.

Was Irene much ado about nothing? As of this writing there are 24 deaths and a great deal of flooding, but was the media too panicked? Did the system get too much hype? You could argue both sides. On one hand you never know about hurricanes until they make landfall, and by then it is too late for the media and government to caution and evacuate people. On the other hand, there’s Howard Kurtz:

Someone has to say it: cable news was utterly swept away by the notion that Irene would turn out to be Armageddon. National news organizations morphed into local eyewitness-news operations, going wall to wall for days with dire warnings about what would turn out to be a Category 1 hurricane, the lowest possible ranking. “Cable news is scaring the crap out of me, and I WORK in cable news,” Bloomberg correspondent Lizzie O’Leary tweeted.

[…]

But the tsunami of hype on this story was relentless, a Category 5 performance that was driven in large measure by ratings. Every producer knew that to abandon the coverage even briefly—say, to cover the continued fighting in Libya—was to risk driving viewers elsewhere. Websites, too, were running dramatic headlines even as it became apparent that the storm wasn’t as powerful as advertised.

Copy editing extends to television graphics. Look at what Irene did to some of our nation’s finest cities:

That’s from MSNBC, and probably a layer or software glitch. “That’s live television” some may say, but remember, in times of crisis it is information people need. Be sure you have it right.

Quick hits: We are all members of the media now. I’ve been saying it in classes and presentations for years now. Some of our peers disagree, but the New York Times sees it. How can Google+ be used in journalism education? Here’s a primer from Bryan Murley. Half of U.S. adults use social media, says a new Pew study. The publishing end run on Apple. Publishers want their control, but Apple’s closed model insists they have control; publishers were only going to give for so long.

There’s a saying in broadcasting that every mic is a hot mic, which means be careful what you say around every microphone, because you might be broadcasting without realizing it. ESPN is telling their employees to consider Twitter a hot mic. Agree or disagree? Internet use is on the rise for farmers. The 9/11 archives, raw footage from a wide variety of TV stations and networks during 9/11/01, and the days that followed, is now online.

Finally, typos are bad (says the guy who leaves a lot of them on his own site). Big typos on signs at school, signos, are embarrassing.