Every journalist needs to know about data. It is not just the preserve of the investigative journalist but can – and should – be used by reporters writing for local papers, magazines, the consumer and trade press and for online publications.
Think about crime statistics, government spending, bin collections, hospital infections and missing kittens and tell me data journalism is not relevant to your title.
If you think you need to be a hacker as well as a hack then you are wrong. Although data journalism combines journalism, research, statistics and programming, you may dabble but you do not need to know much maths or code to get started. It can be as simple as copying and pasting data from an Excel spreadsheet.
You can find out more about getting started and trying your hand at complex data journalism at news:rewired – noise to signal, on 27 May. More details about the event are here and you can order tickets, which cost £156 including VAT, by clicking here.
Here are 10 reasons to give data a go.
1. Everybody loves a list. Did you click on this post as you wanted an easy-to-read list rather than an involved article?
2. Everybody loves a map. Try Quantum GIS (QGIS), a free, open source tool, or OpenHeatMap, a fantastic, east-to-use tool as long as your data is categorised by country, local authority, constituency, region or county.
3. Tools bring data to life. Applications such as ManyEyes and Yahoo Pipes mash data and turn complex numbers and datasets into easy to read visualisations that work well both online and in print. Try this how to guide to Yahoo Pipes to get you started. Here are 22 data visualisation tools from Computer World.
4. Data may need cleaning up. Try using clean up tools like Scraperwiki, which helps non-technical journalists copy a few lines of code to turn a document such as pdf into a number-friendly file like a csv, and Google Refine, which Paul Bradshaw has written some useful posts on over on the Online Journalism Blog.
5. Data of all sorts is increasingly available. The open data movement across the UK is resulting in an increase in the release of data. The possibilities are huge, says Paul Bradshaw on the Guardian’s Datablog. January 2010, saw the launch of data.gov.uk, a fantastic resource for searching for datasets.
6. Data journalism can answer questions. A good place to start in data journalism is to ask a question and answer it by gathering data. Numbers work well. One option is to submit a Freedom of Information request to ask for the numbers. It helps if you ask for a csv file.
7. You can use the crowd. Crowdsourcing by asking a question on Twitter or using a site like Help Me Investigate, an open source tool for people can use to collaborate to investigate questions in the public interest.
8. Data can be personal to every reader. DocumentCloud can highlight and annotate documents to help readers see what is important and learn a document’s back story.
9. “Data journalism is not always presenting the data as journalism. It’s also finding the journalism within the data,” Jay Rosen said in relation to this article on Poynter on how two journalists from the Las Vegas Sun spent two years looking at 2.9 million documents to find out what “what’s right, and wrong, about our local health care delivery system”. The result was that the journalists exposed thousands of preventable medical mistakes in Las Vegas hospitals. The Nevada legislature responded with six pieces of legislation.
10. “Data ethics is just as important as ethics in journalism, in fact they are one in the same,” according to this post on Open Data Wire. Consider the BBC’s FoI request which showed a 43 per cent rise in GPs signing prescriptions for antidepressants and the ethics of unquestioningly relating this to the recession. Ben Goldacre has highlighted the problems with seeing patterns in data.
Source: Journalism.co.uk
Showing posts with label Journalist. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Journalist. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Journalists need to better understand the business of digital journalism, study says
The Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism has published a new report on digital news economics, which highlighted how the relationship between content and advertising is changing, and what this means for the news business. The report comes just after the Pew Research Center's report on how people navigate the digital news environment
The main aim of Columbia's research was to find out what kinds of digitally based journalism the US commercial market is likely to support, and how.
The definition of digital journalism is broad: it includes online phenomenon (the Internet and computers) as well as mobile devices like phones and tablets.
Amongst much interesting analysis - the report is 146 pages long and is divided in 9 chapters - one part is devoted to the relationship between the news industry and the advertising market.
Felix Salmon pointed this out on his Reuters' blog. He quotes a passage of the report saying:
"For decades, there has been a connection between the journalism that news organizations provide and the advertisements that generate most of their revenue. Whether it's a glossy spread that runs before the table of contents in a fashion magazine, or the anchor-man's "more after this message" assurance on the local Eyewitness News, ads and content have always been closely linked in the stream that appears before the consumer."
"That linkage is breaking down, and news organizations are scrambling to re- place it with something else. That may mean selling ads on sites they don't own or control."
Salmon argued that during his career he came across people with fantastic ideas for a website, relying as a business model on banner ads and of course, as a statistical inevitability, some of them will make money. But the ad-adjacency model can't be the business model to rely on. News organizations - he suggested referring to the report - should find ways to monetize the credibility they build within their communities.
One way could be to sell ad space not just on their own site but to use their brand for other ventures. Just to cite some examples: Wired has pop-up stores, New York Magazine has a bridal show, the Atlantic has a big events business which already brings in $6 million a year and which is growing fast.
The relationship between digital journalism and advertisers must be re-thinked, the New York Times summarized.
"That does not mean yielding editorial control to sponsors, but it might mean coming up with alternatives to impression-based pricing, creating higher-value content for the Web by tapping into page view data, and helping to ensure that Web ads have value on their own", the article wrote.
The article also quoted Bill Grueskin, the academic dean for the journalism school and a co-author of the report, who said: "We're not suggesting that journalists get marching orders from advertisers. We are suggesting that journalists get a much better understanding of why so many advertising dollars have left the traditional news media business."
The report ends with these considerations:
"We believe the public needs independent journalists who seek out facts, explain complex issues and present their work in compelling ways. We also believe that while philanthropic or government support can help, it is ultimately up to the commercial market to provide the economic basis for journalism. The industry has realized many of the losses from the digital era. It is time to start reaping some of the benefits."
Source: CJR, Felix Salmon's blog, New York Times
The main aim of Columbia's research was to find out what kinds of digitally based journalism the US commercial market is likely to support, and how.
The definition of digital journalism is broad: it includes online phenomenon (the Internet and computers) as well as mobile devices like phones and tablets.
Amongst much interesting analysis - the report is 146 pages long and is divided in 9 chapters - one part is devoted to the relationship between the news industry and the advertising market.
Felix Salmon pointed this out on his Reuters' blog. He quotes a passage of the report saying:
"For decades, there has been a connection between the journalism that news organizations provide and the advertisements that generate most of their revenue. Whether it's a glossy spread that runs before the table of contents in a fashion magazine, or the anchor-man's "more after this message" assurance on the local Eyewitness News, ads and content have always been closely linked in the stream that appears before the consumer."
"That linkage is breaking down, and news organizations are scrambling to re- place it with something else. That may mean selling ads on sites they don't own or control."
Salmon argued that during his career he came across people with fantastic ideas for a website, relying as a business model on banner ads and of course, as a statistical inevitability, some of them will make money. But the ad-adjacency model can't be the business model to rely on. News organizations - he suggested referring to the report - should find ways to monetize the credibility they build within their communities.
One way could be to sell ad space not just on their own site but to use their brand for other ventures. Just to cite some examples: Wired has pop-up stores, New York Magazine has a bridal show, the Atlantic has a big events business which already brings in $6 million a year and which is growing fast.
The relationship between digital journalism and advertisers must be re-thinked, the New York Times summarized.
"That does not mean yielding editorial control to sponsors, but it might mean coming up with alternatives to impression-based pricing, creating higher-value content for the Web by tapping into page view data, and helping to ensure that Web ads have value on their own", the article wrote.
The article also quoted Bill Grueskin, the academic dean for the journalism school and a co-author of the report, who said: "We're not suggesting that journalists get marching orders from advertisers. We are suggesting that journalists get a much better understanding of why so many advertising dollars have left the traditional news media business."
The report ends with these considerations:
"We believe the public needs independent journalists who seek out facts, explain complex issues and present their work in compelling ways. We also believe that while philanthropic or government support can help, it is ultimately up to the commercial market to provide the economic basis for journalism. The industry has realized many of the losses from the digital era. It is time to start reaping some of the benefits."
Source: CJR, Felix Salmon's blog, New York Times
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
‘Hyperlocal’ Web Sites Deliver News Without Newspapers
If your local newspaper shuts down, what will take the place of its coverage? Perhaps a package of information about your neighborhood, or even your block, assembled by a computer.
A number of Web start-up companies are creating so-called hyperlocal news sites that let people zoom in on what is happening closest to them, often without involving traditional journalists.
The sites, like EveryBlock, Outside.in, Placeblogger and Patch, collect links to articles and blogs and often supplement them with data from local governments and other sources. They might let a visitor know about an arrest a block away, the sale of a home down the street and reviews of nearby restaurants.
Internet companies have been trying to develop such sites for more than a decade, in part as a way to lure local advertisers to the Web. But the notion of customized news has taken on greater urgency as some newspapers, like The Rocky Mountain News and The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, have stopped printing.
The news business “is in a difficult time period right now, between what was and what will be,” said Gary Kebbel, the journalism program director for the Knight Foundation, which has backed 35 local Web experiments. “Our democracy is based upon geography, and we believe local information is such a core need for our democracy to survive.”
Of course, like traditional media, the hyperlocal sites have to find a way to bring in sufficient revenue to support their business. And so far, they have had only limited success selling ads. Some have shouldered the cost of fielding a sales force to reach mom-and-pop businesses that may know nothing about online advertising.
One problem is that the number of readers for each neighborhood-focused news page is inherently small. “When you slice further and further down, you get smaller and smaller audiences,” said Greg Sterling, an analyst who has followed the hyperlocal market for a decade. “Advertisers want that kind of targeting, but they also want to reach more people, so there’s a paradox.”
Still, said Peter Krasilovsky, a program director at the Kelsey Group, which studies local media, many small businesses have never advertised outside the local Yellow Pages and are an untapped online ad market whose worth his firm expects to double to $32 billion by 2013.
One of the most ambitious hyperlocal sites is EveryBlock, a six-person start-up in an office building in Chicago overlooking noisy El tracks, which is stitching together this hyperlocal future one city at a time. Backed by a $1.1 million grant from the Knight Foundation, it has created sites for 11 American cities, including New York, Seattle, Chicago and San Francisco.
It fills those sites with links to news articles and posts from local bloggers, along with data feeds from city governments, with crime reports, restaurant inspections, and notices of road construction and film shoots. (The New York Times has a partnership with EveryBlock to help New York City readers find news about their elected officials.)
One day last week, the EveryBlock page for Adrian Holovaty, the company’s founder, showed that the police had answered a domestic battery call two blocks from his home and that a gourmet sandwich shop four blocks away had failed a city health inspection.
“We have a very liberal definition of what is news. We think it’s something that happens in your neighborhood,” said Mr. Holovaty, 28, who worked at The Washington Post before creating EveryBlock two years ago.
In some ways the environment is right for these start-ups. In the last several years, neighborhood blogs have sprouted across the country, providing the sites with free, ready-made content they can link to. And new tools, like advanced search techniques and cellphones with GPS capability, help the sites figure out which articles to show to which readers in which neighborhoods.
Unlike most hyperlocal start-ups, Patch, based in New York, hires reporters. It was conceived of and bankrolled by Tim Armstrong, the new chief of AOL, after he found a dearth of information online about Riverside, Conn., where he lives. Patch has created sites for three towns in New Jersey and plans to be in dozens by the end of the year.
One journalist in each town travels to school board meetings and coffee shops with a laptop and camera. Patch also solicits content from readers, pulls in articles from other sites and augments it all with event listings, volunteer opportunities, business directories and lists of local information like recycling laws.
“We believe there’s currently a void in the amount, quality and access to information at the community level, a function, unfortunately, of all the major metros suffering and pulling back daily coverage of a lot of communities,” said Jon Brod, co-founder and chief executive of Patch. This month, the home page of The Star-Ledger’s Web site, based in Newark, twice referred to articles first reported by Patch.
Outside.in publishes no original content. The company gathers articles and blog posts and scans them for geographical cues like the name of a restaurant or indicative words like “at” or “near.” An iPhone application lets users read articles about events within a thousand of feet of where they are standing. Outside.in, which is based in Brooklyn, licenses feeds of links to big news sites that want to deepen their local coverage, like that of NBC’s Chicago affiliate.
Venture capital firms have invested $7.5 million in the company, partly on the bet that it can cut deals with newspapers to have their sales forces sell neighborhood-focused ads for print and the Web.
One hurdle is the need for reliable, quality content. The information on many of these sites can still appear woefully incomplete. Crime reports on EveryBlock, for example, are short on details of what happened. Links to professionally written news articles on Outside.in are mixed with trivial and sometimes irrelevant blog posts.
That raises the question of what these hyperlocal sites will do if newspapers, a main source of credible information, go out of business. “They rely on pulling data from other sources, so they really can’t function if news organizations disappear,” said Steve Outing, who writes about online media for Editor & Publisher Online.
But many hyperlocal entrepreneurs say they are counting on a proliferation of blogs and small local journalism start-ups to keep providing content.
“In many cities, the local blog scene is so rich and deep that even if a newspaper goes away, there would be still be plenty of stuff for us to publish,” said Mr. Holovaty of EveryBlock.
Source: nytimes.com
A number of Web start-up companies are creating so-called hyperlocal news sites that let people zoom in on what is happening closest to them, often without involving traditional journalists.
The sites, like EveryBlock, Outside.in, Placeblogger and Patch, collect links to articles and blogs and often supplement them with data from local governments and other sources. They might let a visitor know about an arrest a block away, the sale of a home down the street and reviews of nearby restaurants.
Internet companies have been trying to develop such sites for more than a decade, in part as a way to lure local advertisers to the Web. But the notion of customized news has taken on greater urgency as some newspapers, like The Rocky Mountain News and The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, have stopped printing.
The news business “is in a difficult time period right now, between what was and what will be,” said Gary Kebbel, the journalism program director for the Knight Foundation, which has backed 35 local Web experiments. “Our democracy is based upon geography, and we believe local information is such a core need for our democracy to survive.”
Of course, like traditional media, the hyperlocal sites have to find a way to bring in sufficient revenue to support their business. And so far, they have had only limited success selling ads. Some have shouldered the cost of fielding a sales force to reach mom-and-pop businesses that may know nothing about online advertising.
One problem is that the number of readers for each neighborhood-focused news page is inherently small. “When you slice further and further down, you get smaller and smaller audiences,” said Greg Sterling, an analyst who has followed the hyperlocal market for a decade. “Advertisers want that kind of targeting, but they also want to reach more people, so there’s a paradox.”
Still, said Peter Krasilovsky, a program director at the Kelsey Group, which studies local media, many small businesses have never advertised outside the local Yellow Pages and are an untapped online ad market whose worth his firm expects to double to $32 billion by 2013.
One of the most ambitious hyperlocal sites is EveryBlock, a six-person start-up in an office building in Chicago overlooking noisy El tracks, which is stitching together this hyperlocal future one city at a time. Backed by a $1.1 million grant from the Knight Foundation, it has created sites for 11 American cities, including New York, Seattle, Chicago and San Francisco.
It fills those sites with links to news articles and posts from local bloggers, along with data feeds from city governments, with crime reports, restaurant inspections, and notices of road construction and film shoots. (The New York Times has a partnership with EveryBlock to help New York City readers find news about their elected officials.)
One day last week, the EveryBlock page for Adrian Holovaty, the company’s founder, showed that the police had answered a domestic battery call two blocks from his home and that a gourmet sandwich shop four blocks away had failed a city health inspection.
“We have a very liberal definition of what is news. We think it’s something that happens in your neighborhood,” said Mr. Holovaty, 28, who worked at The Washington Post before creating EveryBlock two years ago.
In some ways the environment is right for these start-ups. In the last several years, neighborhood blogs have sprouted across the country, providing the sites with free, ready-made content they can link to. And new tools, like advanced search techniques and cellphones with GPS capability, help the sites figure out which articles to show to which readers in which neighborhoods.
Unlike most hyperlocal start-ups, Patch, based in New York, hires reporters. It was conceived of and bankrolled by Tim Armstrong, the new chief of AOL, after he found a dearth of information online about Riverside, Conn., where he lives. Patch has created sites for three towns in New Jersey and plans to be in dozens by the end of the year.
One journalist in each town travels to school board meetings and coffee shops with a laptop and camera. Patch also solicits content from readers, pulls in articles from other sites and augments it all with event listings, volunteer opportunities, business directories and lists of local information like recycling laws.
“We believe there’s currently a void in the amount, quality and access to information at the community level, a function, unfortunately, of all the major metros suffering and pulling back daily coverage of a lot of communities,” said Jon Brod, co-founder and chief executive of Patch. This month, the home page of The Star-Ledger’s Web site, based in Newark, twice referred to articles first reported by Patch.
Outside.in publishes no original content. The company gathers articles and blog posts and scans them for geographical cues like the name of a restaurant or indicative words like “at” or “near.” An iPhone application lets users read articles about events within a thousand of feet of where they are standing. Outside.in, which is based in Brooklyn, licenses feeds of links to big news sites that want to deepen their local coverage, like that of NBC’s Chicago affiliate.
Venture capital firms have invested $7.5 million in the company, partly on the bet that it can cut deals with newspapers to have their sales forces sell neighborhood-focused ads for print and the Web.
One hurdle is the need for reliable, quality content. The information on many of these sites can still appear woefully incomplete. Crime reports on EveryBlock, for example, are short on details of what happened. Links to professionally written news articles on Outside.in are mixed with trivial and sometimes irrelevant blog posts.
That raises the question of what these hyperlocal sites will do if newspapers, a main source of credible information, go out of business. “They rely on pulling data from other sources, so they really can’t function if news organizations disappear,” said Steve Outing, who writes about online media for Editor & Publisher Online.
But many hyperlocal entrepreneurs say they are counting on a proliferation of blogs and small local journalism start-ups to keep providing content.
“In many cities, the local blog scene is so rich and deep that even if a newspaper goes away, there would be still be plenty of stuff for us to publish,” said Mr. Holovaty of EveryBlock.
Source: nytimes.com
Monday, March 23, 2009
New media laws to shield journalists over sources
JUDGES will be given discretion not to jail journalists who refuse to divulge their sources under new laws to be introduced today by federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland.
THE laws will force judges to consider the public interest in a free press and the impact on a journalist's reputation of revealing their source, when deciding whether to order a journalist to take the witness stand.
This will be weighed against other factors, including proper administration of justice.
But media experts said the changes were a "Clayton's protection" that would do little to stop journalists from being jailed for refusing to reveal a source.
This is because the law will not create a presumption in favour of protecting a journalist's source.
Foreshadowing the changes yesterday, Mr McClelland said the laws would protect journalists.
"It's going to be a matter for the discretion of the court," he told Sky News. "Certainly it will be far more likely that journalists will be able to protect their source."
The Australian can reveal that the protection will be extended to all cases in which a person has been charged with a commonwealth offence, even if it is being heard in a state court.
The protection will be available even if the information was leaked illegally by a public servant.
Previously, if information was obtained illegally, all protection was removed automatically. Now this will be just one factor for a judge to consider.
In addition, national security will be one factor for a judge to consider, rather than the most important factor.
Media lawyer Justin Quill, from Melbourne firm Kelly Hazell Quill, said he was disappointed with the changes. "Any step forward is a good step, but there needs to be a presumption in favour of the protection of journalists' sources," he said.
"Without that presumption, the protection is really no protection at all - it's a Clayton's protection."
He said this was because the onus was on journalists to prove their source should be protected - rather than putting the person seeking the information to prove it was necessary in the interests of justice.
"In any area of law, the person who bears the onus has a tough hurdle to get over," he said.
Mr Quill acted for Herald Sun journalists Gerard McManus and Michael Harvey, who were fined $7000 each by the County Court after pleading guilty to contempt charges.
They had declined to name the source of a story during a hearing for public servant Desmond Kelly, accused of leaking information. Mr Kelly was eventually acquitted.
Press Council chairman Ken McKinnon said the new shield laws would give little comfort to people such as McManus and Harvey.
"It is so weak that it won't have any positive effect at all," Professor McKinnon said. "The presumption of the court should be that journalists are not called upon or put in the dock in a vulnerable position in which they're required to reveal their sources unless it is absolutely essential in the interests of justice."
But News Limited, publisher of The Australian, welcomed the changes.
"The proposed reforms will give judges the flexibility they need to make sensible decisions about whether revealing the identity of a source is or isn't in the public interest," a spokeswoman said.
Source: The Australian
THE laws will force judges to consider the public interest in a free press and the impact on a journalist's reputation of revealing their source, when deciding whether to order a journalist to take the witness stand.
This will be weighed against other factors, including proper administration of justice.
But media experts said the changes were a "Clayton's protection" that would do little to stop journalists from being jailed for refusing to reveal a source.
This is because the law will not create a presumption in favour of protecting a journalist's source.
Foreshadowing the changes yesterday, Mr McClelland said the laws would protect journalists.
"It's going to be a matter for the discretion of the court," he told Sky News. "Certainly it will be far more likely that journalists will be able to protect their source."
The Australian can reveal that the protection will be extended to all cases in which a person has been charged with a commonwealth offence, even if it is being heard in a state court.
The protection will be available even if the information was leaked illegally by a public servant.
Previously, if information was obtained illegally, all protection was removed automatically. Now this will be just one factor for a judge to consider.
In addition, national security will be one factor for a judge to consider, rather than the most important factor.
Media lawyer Justin Quill, from Melbourne firm Kelly Hazell Quill, said he was disappointed with the changes. "Any step forward is a good step, but there needs to be a presumption in favour of the protection of journalists' sources," he said.
"Without that presumption, the protection is really no protection at all - it's a Clayton's protection."
He said this was because the onus was on journalists to prove their source should be protected - rather than putting the person seeking the information to prove it was necessary in the interests of justice.
"In any area of law, the person who bears the onus has a tough hurdle to get over," he said.
Mr Quill acted for Herald Sun journalists Gerard McManus and Michael Harvey, who were fined $7000 each by the County Court after pleading guilty to contempt charges.
They had declined to name the source of a story during a hearing for public servant Desmond Kelly, accused of leaking information. Mr Kelly was eventually acquitted.
Press Council chairman Ken McKinnon said the new shield laws would give little comfort to people such as McManus and Harvey.
"It is so weak that it won't have any positive effect at all," Professor McKinnon said. "The presumption of the court should be that journalists are not called upon or put in the dock in a vulnerable position in which they're required to reveal their sources unless it is absolutely essential in the interests of justice."
But News Limited, publisher of The Australian, welcomed the changes.
"The proposed reforms will give judges the flexibility they need to make sensible decisions about whether revealing the identity of a source is or isn't in the public interest," a spokeswoman said.
Source: The Australian
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Where the hell do we go now?
More than 900 regional journalists have been made redundant since July - with further cuts to come. What does the future hold for them, those still in work and the next generation of journalists
IT has been a cruel six months for regional newspaper journalists, and the last two weeks have been tougher than most. Last Wednesday, Surrey and Berkshire Media, part of Guardian Media Group's regional division, said it was to axe up to 95 jobs, 35 of which are from editorial. Two of its weeklies will close, along with four district offices, and the Reading Evening Post will move from a five-day to twice-weekly publication. Also on Wednesday, the chief executive of Johnston Press, publisher of the Scotsman and the Yorkshire Post, warned of further job losses and title closures over the next 12 months, despite cuts of 15% in its workforce last year.
The day before, GMG's MEN Media, the publisher of the Manchester Evening News and 22 weeklies based in the north-west, announced it was closing all editorial offices of its weekly newspapers and axing 150 jobs, including 78 journalists. On the Manchester Evening News, the editorial staff of 90 will lose 39 posts. It was also revealed that up to 150 jobs, up to 30 in editorial, were under threat at the West Midlands-based Observer Standard Media Group, which has called in the administrators.
The previous week was little better. Staff at the Kent Messenger Group were told there would be a further 159 redundancies, including around 32 journalists. Archant in Norfolk announced plans to cut 54 out of 179 editorial staff as it introduces an integrated editorial system across its Eastern Daily Press and Norwich Evening News titles, and Northcliffe Media said it was to cut up to 95 jobs, around 20 in editorial, and close or merge a number of its weekly papers in Essex, Kent and Surrey.
According to figures just compiled by the National Union of Journalists, there have been 903 confirmed editorial redundancies in the regional press since last July, although if non-replacement of posts were included the union believes that the figures could be much higher. "New definition of optimism," one journalist posted on an industry website. "A newspaper journalist ironing five shirts on a Sunday night."
Regional journalists are angry, frustrated and fearful for the future. A seismic shift is taking place: local paper circulations and ad revenues are suffering unsustainable double-digit falls due to the recession and the rise of the internet, which is not yet generating enough money to employ journalists on the same salaries, or in the same numbers.
"The industry is being butchered by some international newspaper conglomerates in a vain bid to maintain unrealistic profit levels," says one ex-regional editor. "The last time we went through a recession, we made the cost savings, but we left enough of the business to come back to when things improved. This time around I fear it's gone too far for that.
"One newspaper editor tells me how he has to pause on his doorstep on the way home every night and compose his features into a smile. If he goes into the house looking glum, his wife immediately panics that he's lost his job and the daytime stress then carries on into the night."
And what happens when these journalists do actually lose their jobs? There is nowhere to turn, he says: "There's simply nothing out there. Six weeks ago they were an editor, a man of significant substance in their community; today they're signing on."
It is not just editors who are worried about finding more work. "Journalists losing their jobs are wondering 'Where the hell do I go?'. The jobs just aren't there. There may be an explosion in internet jobs in the future but it isn't happening yet," says long-standing Yorkshire Post reporter Chris Benfield, who last week picketed the offices of a London PR firm, where Johnston Press chiefs were briefing analysts on the company's financial results, over compulsory redundancies and 18 job cuts at Johnston-owned titles.
Benfield's colleague, Yorkshire Post City editor Ros Snowdon, believes like many regional journalists that there is a lack of online investment in their papers, and that publications were milked for profits in good times. "Last year YPN made £25m," says Snowdon. "We need continuing investment in the papers to develop in other areas. They are throwing the baby out with the bath water."
The frustration is felt keenly by regional journalists trying to get involved in the web. "If our editor had come to us and said, 'We're restructuring the business, these are the products we want to produce, this is how many people we need to produce them, this is our strategy for growing the audience, this is the standard we expect, this is what our newspaper stands for,' we could accept that the cuts had a purpose," says one reporter on a southern daily paper.
"But we seem to have no strategy. They can't agree about social media. They have no idea who their audience should be or how to reach them. They ghettoise web teams. Advertising staff are chasing their tails trying to persuade companies who got their web ads for free last year that this year they're worth paying for - while at the same time having to heavily discount paper ads because of the recession. There's no joined-up thinking about how to make the web pay."
Regional newspaper managements dispute this. They say it is proving difficult to recoup advertising revenues lost from print titles on the web, and that the current business model for regional press is not delivering the financial backing to support its journalism. The future, they say, is publishers that are smaller in terms of costs and the number of journalists.
But where does that leave those judged surplus to requirements - or forced to cover the work of ex-colleagues? According to one 24-year-old reporter who left a top daily in the north to go into magazines: "It was appalling. There seemed to be cuts every few minutes, which would set off another round of grumbling which was very demoralising. There was a feeling that the bean counters didn't understand the paper. All the young journalists wanted to get out and work as council PRs."
The scale of redundancies among regional journalists has left many chasing those jobs. "The best jobs in the regions are now in council PR. They pay well, are professional and no one's shouting at you," says another ex-regional editor. But despite the trend for local authorities to set up their own newspaper-style publications, not all redundant journalists will be able - or want - to secure jobs with the council.
Those who can't, often find themselves applying - against their better judgment - for other PR jobs. One journalist sent me this email: "I love the news industry. Journalism is all I ever wanted to do. But today I applied for a PR job because I don't believe the news business today has a career for me. Can I aspire to being an editor one day? Not any more. My dream job doesn't exist any more. The papers are all closed or merged or subbed off-site. So what are the choices? Hope you don't get made redundant before a job comes up at a company that has got it right? Take your ideas and set up by yourself? Or leave a job you love because you can't bear to see it devalued any more?"
Certainly, alternative jobs in journalism are becoming harder to find. The BBC is cutting back, and plans to expand its local websites were blocked by the BBC Trust after objections by regional publishers. Journalists are having to set up by themselves or look outside the sector.
Jonathan Bartholomew, a photographer for 16 years, was made redundant from the Stoke Sentinel last month. He has taken a job as a support worker for people with special needs. "I am pleased to have the job but it pays less than half what I earned at the Sentinel," he says. "I was made redundant before in the 1990s but found a job. What is happening is quite extraordinary. It is impossible to get another job in newspapers."
Those going freelance are finding that nationals are cutting pagination and rates. "It is not easy. I've had to be very resourceful," says Mike Donovan, who worked for the Argus in Brighton for 17 years writing and subediting before taking voluntary redundancy in August. "It was a very hard decision and one I took with trepidation given the economic climate. But I felt things would get worse at the paper."
For journalists committed to reporting for their local community, launching their own publications - usually on the web - could be the only answer. David Jackman, editor of the Epping Forest Guardian, Harlow and Bishop's Stortford Citizen and Epping Forest Independent, was made redundant in October after 21 years with the titles. He took a job in NHS communications, but also runs a community website. "A reorganisation meant there was no local newspaper office left in Epping," he says. "If redundant local journalists want to stay in local news and on their patch then starting local websites like mine could be the future."
But even as regional journalists are forced to find jobs outside the industry, demand for journalism courses is booming. "No sane person involved in journalism education can feel anything but uneasy about preparing students for an industry where so many senior jobs are disappearing and so few entry-level positions are becoming available," says Ian Reeves, director of learning and teaching at the Centre for Journalism, University of Kent - although he adds that he hopes the situation will change within the next few years.
But even for those who did manage to find a traineeship before the cuts started, things are tough. Just before Christmas, two years into her career, trainee journalist Lucy Reynolds was made redundant from the Stourbridge News. She is now working as an admin temp at a local hospital. "I've tried to get another job but it is really bleak." she says. "I loved my job and worked really hard to get it doing work experience. I left before I had the chance to do my NCE qualification."
Alternative business models to sustain the regional press - endowments for journalists, start-up grants, trusts, partnerships with public service broadcasting, state aid and local consortiums - are being discussed. But the industry is going to need some really big ideas to plug the gap between a failing print model and an undeveloped digital model that regional journalists are currently falling through.
Source: jonslattery.blogspot.com
IT has been a cruel six months for regional newspaper journalists, and the last two weeks have been tougher than most. Last Wednesday, Surrey and Berkshire Media, part of Guardian Media Group's regional division, said it was to axe up to 95 jobs, 35 of which are from editorial. Two of its weeklies will close, along with four district offices, and the Reading Evening Post will move from a five-day to twice-weekly publication. Also on Wednesday, the chief executive of Johnston Press, publisher of the Scotsman and the Yorkshire Post, warned of further job losses and title closures over the next 12 months, despite cuts of 15% in its workforce last year.
The day before, GMG's MEN Media, the publisher of the Manchester Evening News and 22 weeklies based in the north-west, announced it was closing all editorial offices of its weekly newspapers and axing 150 jobs, including 78 journalists. On the Manchester Evening News, the editorial staff of 90 will lose 39 posts. It was also revealed that up to 150 jobs, up to 30 in editorial, were under threat at the West Midlands-based Observer Standard Media Group, which has called in the administrators.
The previous week was little better. Staff at the Kent Messenger Group were told there would be a further 159 redundancies, including around 32 journalists. Archant in Norfolk announced plans to cut 54 out of 179 editorial staff as it introduces an integrated editorial system across its Eastern Daily Press and Norwich Evening News titles, and Northcliffe Media said it was to cut up to 95 jobs, around 20 in editorial, and close or merge a number of its weekly papers in Essex, Kent and Surrey.
According to figures just compiled by the National Union of Journalists, there have been 903 confirmed editorial redundancies in the regional press since last July, although if non-replacement of posts were included the union believes that the figures could be much higher. "New definition of optimism," one journalist posted on an industry website. "A newspaper journalist ironing five shirts on a Sunday night."
Regional journalists are angry, frustrated and fearful for the future. A seismic shift is taking place: local paper circulations and ad revenues are suffering unsustainable double-digit falls due to the recession and the rise of the internet, which is not yet generating enough money to employ journalists on the same salaries, or in the same numbers.
"The industry is being butchered by some international newspaper conglomerates in a vain bid to maintain unrealistic profit levels," says one ex-regional editor. "The last time we went through a recession, we made the cost savings, but we left enough of the business to come back to when things improved. This time around I fear it's gone too far for that.
"One newspaper editor tells me how he has to pause on his doorstep on the way home every night and compose his features into a smile. If he goes into the house looking glum, his wife immediately panics that he's lost his job and the daytime stress then carries on into the night."
And what happens when these journalists do actually lose their jobs? There is nowhere to turn, he says: "There's simply nothing out there. Six weeks ago they were an editor, a man of significant substance in their community; today they're signing on."
It is not just editors who are worried about finding more work. "Journalists losing their jobs are wondering 'Where the hell do I go?'. The jobs just aren't there. There may be an explosion in internet jobs in the future but it isn't happening yet," says long-standing Yorkshire Post reporter Chris Benfield, who last week picketed the offices of a London PR firm, where Johnston Press chiefs were briefing analysts on the company's financial results, over compulsory redundancies and 18 job cuts at Johnston-owned titles.
Benfield's colleague, Yorkshire Post City editor Ros Snowdon, believes like many regional journalists that there is a lack of online investment in their papers, and that publications were milked for profits in good times. "Last year YPN made £25m," says Snowdon. "We need continuing investment in the papers to develop in other areas. They are throwing the baby out with the bath water."
The frustration is felt keenly by regional journalists trying to get involved in the web. "If our editor had come to us and said, 'We're restructuring the business, these are the products we want to produce, this is how many people we need to produce them, this is our strategy for growing the audience, this is the standard we expect, this is what our newspaper stands for,' we could accept that the cuts had a purpose," says one reporter on a southern daily paper.
"But we seem to have no strategy. They can't agree about social media. They have no idea who their audience should be or how to reach them. They ghettoise web teams. Advertising staff are chasing their tails trying to persuade companies who got their web ads for free last year that this year they're worth paying for - while at the same time having to heavily discount paper ads because of the recession. There's no joined-up thinking about how to make the web pay."
Regional newspaper managements dispute this. They say it is proving difficult to recoup advertising revenues lost from print titles on the web, and that the current business model for regional press is not delivering the financial backing to support its journalism. The future, they say, is publishers that are smaller in terms of costs and the number of journalists.
But where does that leave those judged surplus to requirements - or forced to cover the work of ex-colleagues? According to one 24-year-old reporter who left a top daily in the north to go into magazines: "It was appalling. There seemed to be cuts every few minutes, which would set off another round of grumbling which was very demoralising. There was a feeling that the bean counters didn't understand the paper. All the young journalists wanted to get out and work as council PRs."
The scale of redundancies among regional journalists has left many chasing those jobs. "The best jobs in the regions are now in council PR. They pay well, are professional and no one's shouting at you," says another ex-regional editor. But despite the trend for local authorities to set up their own newspaper-style publications, not all redundant journalists will be able - or want - to secure jobs with the council.
Those who can't, often find themselves applying - against their better judgment - for other PR jobs. One journalist sent me this email: "I love the news industry. Journalism is all I ever wanted to do. But today I applied for a PR job because I don't believe the news business today has a career for me. Can I aspire to being an editor one day? Not any more. My dream job doesn't exist any more. The papers are all closed or merged or subbed off-site. So what are the choices? Hope you don't get made redundant before a job comes up at a company that has got it right? Take your ideas and set up by yourself? Or leave a job you love because you can't bear to see it devalued any more?"
Certainly, alternative jobs in journalism are becoming harder to find. The BBC is cutting back, and plans to expand its local websites were blocked by the BBC Trust after objections by regional publishers. Journalists are having to set up by themselves or look outside the sector.
Jonathan Bartholomew, a photographer for 16 years, was made redundant from the Stoke Sentinel last month. He has taken a job as a support worker for people with special needs. "I am pleased to have the job but it pays less than half what I earned at the Sentinel," he says. "I was made redundant before in the 1990s but found a job. What is happening is quite extraordinary. It is impossible to get another job in newspapers."
Those going freelance are finding that nationals are cutting pagination and rates. "It is not easy. I've had to be very resourceful," says Mike Donovan, who worked for the Argus in Brighton for 17 years writing and subediting before taking voluntary redundancy in August. "It was a very hard decision and one I took with trepidation given the economic climate. But I felt things would get worse at the paper."
For journalists committed to reporting for their local community, launching their own publications - usually on the web - could be the only answer. David Jackman, editor of the Epping Forest Guardian, Harlow and Bishop's Stortford Citizen and Epping Forest Independent, was made redundant in October after 21 years with the titles. He took a job in NHS communications, but also runs a community website. "A reorganisation meant there was no local newspaper office left in Epping," he says. "If redundant local journalists want to stay in local news and on their patch then starting local websites like mine could be the future."
But even as regional journalists are forced to find jobs outside the industry, demand for journalism courses is booming. "No sane person involved in journalism education can feel anything but uneasy about preparing students for an industry where so many senior jobs are disappearing and so few entry-level positions are becoming available," says Ian Reeves, director of learning and teaching at the Centre for Journalism, University of Kent - although he adds that he hopes the situation will change within the next few years.
But even for those who did manage to find a traineeship before the cuts started, things are tough. Just before Christmas, two years into her career, trainee journalist Lucy Reynolds was made redundant from the Stourbridge News. She is now working as an admin temp at a local hospital. "I've tried to get another job but it is really bleak." she says. "I loved my job and worked really hard to get it doing work experience. I left before I had the chance to do my NCE qualification."
Alternative business models to sustain the regional press - endowments for journalists, start-up grants, trusts, partnerships with public service broadcasting, state aid and local consortiums - are being discussed. But the industry is going to need some really big ideas to plug the gap between a failing print model and an undeveloped digital model that regional journalists are currently falling through.
Source: jonslattery.blogspot.com
Monday, March 16, 2009
Papers that adapt will survive
A newly-appointed regional editor has told students his paper faces a "fight for survival" from the twin challenges of the recession and the internet.
Coventry Telegraph editor David Brookes was speaking to journalism students at Coventry University yesterday in the latest in a series of lectures by industry figures.
Since taking over from Alan Kirby in January, Mr Brookes has overseen a huge restructuring operation at the Trinity Mirror owned title with the move to a multimedia newsroom.
While insisting that there's "a place for the Coventry Telegraph in the new digital age," he acknowledges that "local publications have to adapt and change to new methods in order to stay alive."
"The future of journalism is not exclusively on the web, and the notion that the internet will abolish newspapers is far too simplistic to be true," stated the former Sunday Mercury editor.
"But times are changing at a rapid pace, and whilst it would be lovely to stop the decline of sales in the short-term, it's a harder prospect to uphold in practice.
"I'm a firm believer that print and online content should compliment each other. It's all about how we as a publication adapt, maybe placing breaking stories online before we cover them with an in-depth analysis in print.
"The newspapers that are quick to change their philosophy and move with the times are the ones who will pull through this difficult economic period and come out the other side all the better for it in years to come."
Mr Brookes remains positive about managing the decline in sales of printed editions whilst using the digital revolution to the paper's advantage.
"I'm supremely confident that the Coventry Telegraph will survive these times, thanks largely to the re-structuring and re-invention of our newsroom," he said.
"Our journalists are now multimedia journalists, with the skills to get the story, write copy, publish to the web, take photos and shoot videos.
"We have a new website to be launched in April which signals our intent to entice a larger audience and encourage the public to either get involved with, read or watch our experts at work, while at the same time attracting potential investors to come on board for commercial opportunities.
"The content we provide our consumers with is king, and if we continue to provide the quality of copy that we do at present, then I have no doubts that the Coventry Telegraph will shrug off the recession and prosper once again."
Source: HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk
Coventry Telegraph editor David Brookes was speaking to journalism students at Coventry University yesterday in the latest in a series of lectures by industry figures.
Since taking over from Alan Kirby in January, Mr Brookes has overseen a huge restructuring operation at the Trinity Mirror owned title with the move to a multimedia newsroom.
While insisting that there's "a place for the Coventry Telegraph in the new digital age," he acknowledges that "local publications have to adapt and change to new methods in order to stay alive."
"The future of journalism is not exclusively on the web, and the notion that the internet will abolish newspapers is far too simplistic to be true," stated the former Sunday Mercury editor.
"But times are changing at a rapid pace, and whilst it would be lovely to stop the decline of sales in the short-term, it's a harder prospect to uphold in practice.
"I'm a firm believer that print and online content should compliment each other. It's all about how we as a publication adapt, maybe placing breaking stories online before we cover them with an in-depth analysis in print.
"The newspapers that are quick to change their philosophy and move with the times are the ones who will pull through this difficult economic period and come out the other side all the better for it in years to come."
Mr Brookes remains positive about managing the decline in sales of printed editions whilst using the digital revolution to the paper's advantage.
"I'm supremely confident that the Coventry Telegraph will survive these times, thanks largely to the re-structuring and re-invention of our newsroom," he said.
"Our journalists are now multimedia journalists, with the skills to get the story, write copy, publish to the web, take photos and shoot videos.
"We have a new website to be launched in April which signals our intent to entice a larger audience and encourage the public to either get involved with, read or watch our experts at work, while at the same time attracting potential investors to come on board for commercial opportunities.
"The content we provide our consumers with is king, and if we continue to provide the quality of copy that we do at present, then I have no doubts that the Coventry Telegraph will shrug off the recession and prosper once again."
Source: HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk
Friday, February 20, 2009
Skills training is not enough for the digital journalist
AS an academic, I've been given a front row seat to the unraveling of the news industry without having to worry about my job. But if I were a journalist, the first thing I would be thinking about is what kind of skills I might need in order to retool for the digital age.
However, my 500-foot view from the ivory towers urges caution: it's not the skills that you get that will save your job, or repurpose you for the future, it's whether you can learn how to think like a journalist in the Web 2.0, or what some are even calling the Web 3.0 world.
I make this observation after working with newsrooms who have tried to implement broad training initiatives, as well as after interviews with many journalists who have attempted to gain new skills themselves. Here I get to take some license in that the journalists I've worked with cannot be named, as they are given anonymity for human subjects research protocol by the university.
But I can say that one of my major discoveries has been that training – learning to take a digital photo, the writing for the Web, the digital audio and video editing, the flash, and the social media, to name a few – is not for everyone, nor should it be the answer for everyone.
I don't mean to disparage the excellent training that is occurring. Not to toot our own horn, but the Knight Digital Media Center's Berkeley outfit has become somewhat of a standard bearer in multimedia training for journalists. Poynter's News U offers courses in online and multimedia training. In November 2008, in addition to its News U offerings, Poynter nobly piloted Standing Up for Journalism workshop to retool and reenergize laid off journalists.
The skills, though, aren't the answer. As one news executive said, "We need to take staff to Web 2.0 and beyond – to make learning more nimble and flexible." This executive, after putting staff through training pilots, realized that multimedia literacy and a basic understanding of what it meant to work in a Web environment was what people needed – before they could go about learning the hardware.
What is this multimedia thinking that should be happening in these training sessions? Here are a few suggestions for journalists and their news organizations.
1. Journalists need to understand how the Web and multimedia goals will work within their own organizations. News organizations need to clearly communicate how these Web goals will influence the work production cycle.
2. Journalists at all levels of the news organization should believe that they can contribute to the multimedia vision of their organization. The future of the newsroom is also in your hands, and thinking like this forces journalists to think multi-dimensionally.
3. Journalists are not alone in the newsroom. Even if journalists themselves cannot think about how to make their work relevant to multiplatform content, someone else in the news organization can. Most of your organizations have people on staff that can help you brainstorm, even if you can't. Multimedia training is also about making new connections across your organization.
4. Silos, departmental rivalries, and departments that don't communicate with each other cannot exist if multimedia initiatives are to succeed.
5. Journalists no longer control the distribution of the content they produce. This is a very scary thought for many journalists, but the reality is that once something is published (usually on Web sites), it belongs to the audience of readers and becomes part of a conversation about the news.
6. Journalists need to rethink and reposition themselves the leader of this new conversation, which includes everyone from the traditional water cooler chat to bloggers.
Of all of these ways to think about multimedia in news organizations, perhaps the most important point to emphasize is that Web journalism means a journalism of conversation. London School of Economics professor and former broadcast journalist Charlie Beckett has come up with the term "networked journalist" or "networked journalism," and explains the idea in his new book, Supermedia: Saving Journalism So it Can Save the World.
The idea is to take the best parts of the civic journalism and public journalism movements and sync these up with the possibilities of the Web. Through networked journalism, Beckett urges legacy journalists to think of themselves as participating in somewhat of a pro-am kind of relationship, where mainstream journalists share the process of production with everyday citizens.
Multimedia training doesn't need to incorporate new skills if journalists can find ways to think about including in their work opportunities for conversation through citizen journalism, crowd-sourcing, interactivity, wikis, blogging, and social network, as Beckett points out, "not as ad-ons, but as an essential part of news production and distribution."
Journalists don't have to learn how to take photos, though maybe they should, but they need to think about new ways to connect to an audience that is increasingly connected to them.
The truth is that most skills boot camps don't turn the majority of the journalists who attend them into professional quality video editors or graphic designers; in fact, many of the projects they turn out in training sessions would not be fit for the Web.
But the value of these training sessions is that they do help journalists learn to see the potential of what these new tools can bring to the work they do – so instead of making multimedia experts, journalists can learn how to think like them. But we ought to reconsider the goals of these training sessions and align them to change thinking to change practice, rather than use them to change practice and hope it will change thinking.
Source: Knight Digital Media Center
However, my 500-foot view from the ivory towers urges caution: it's not the skills that you get that will save your job, or repurpose you for the future, it's whether you can learn how to think like a journalist in the Web 2.0, or what some are even calling the Web 3.0 world.
I make this observation after working with newsrooms who have tried to implement broad training initiatives, as well as after interviews with many journalists who have attempted to gain new skills themselves. Here I get to take some license in that the journalists I've worked with cannot be named, as they are given anonymity for human subjects research protocol by the university.
But I can say that one of my major discoveries has been that training – learning to take a digital photo, the writing for the Web, the digital audio and video editing, the flash, and the social media, to name a few – is not for everyone, nor should it be the answer for everyone.
I don't mean to disparage the excellent training that is occurring. Not to toot our own horn, but the Knight Digital Media Center's Berkeley outfit has become somewhat of a standard bearer in multimedia training for journalists. Poynter's News U offers courses in online and multimedia training. In November 2008, in addition to its News U offerings, Poynter nobly piloted Standing Up for Journalism workshop to retool and reenergize laid off journalists.
The skills, though, aren't the answer. As one news executive said, "We need to take staff to Web 2.0 and beyond – to make learning more nimble and flexible." This executive, after putting staff through training pilots, realized that multimedia literacy and a basic understanding of what it meant to work in a Web environment was what people needed – before they could go about learning the hardware.
What is this multimedia thinking that should be happening in these training sessions? Here are a few suggestions for journalists and their news organizations.
1. Journalists need to understand how the Web and multimedia goals will work within their own organizations. News organizations need to clearly communicate how these Web goals will influence the work production cycle.
2. Journalists at all levels of the news organization should believe that they can contribute to the multimedia vision of their organization. The future of the newsroom is also in your hands, and thinking like this forces journalists to think multi-dimensionally.
3. Journalists are not alone in the newsroom. Even if journalists themselves cannot think about how to make their work relevant to multiplatform content, someone else in the news organization can. Most of your organizations have people on staff that can help you brainstorm, even if you can't. Multimedia training is also about making new connections across your organization.
4. Silos, departmental rivalries, and departments that don't communicate with each other cannot exist if multimedia initiatives are to succeed.
5. Journalists no longer control the distribution of the content they produce. This is a very scary thought for many journalists, but the reality is that once something is published (usually on Web sites), it belongs to the audience of readers and becomes part of a conversation about the news.
6. Journalists need to rethink and reposition themselves the leader of this new conversation, which includes everyone from the traditional water cooler chat to bloggers.
Of all of these ways to think about multimedia in news organizations, perhaps the most important point to emphasize is that Web journalism means a journalism of conversation. London School of Economics professor and former broadcast journalist Charlie Beckett has come up with the term "networked journalist" or "networked journalism," and explains the idea in his new book, Supermedia: Saving Journalism So it Can Save the World.
The idea is to take the best parts of the civic journalism and public journalism movements and sync these up with the possibilities of the Web. Through networked journalism, Beckett urges legacy journalists to think of themselves as participating in somewhat of a pro-am kind of relationship, where mainstream journalists share the process of production with everyday citizens.
Multimedia training doesn't need to incorporate new skills if journalists can find ways to think about including in their work opportunities for conversation through citizen journalism, crowd-sourcing, interactivity, wikis, blogging, and social network, as Beckett points out, "not as ad-ons, but as an essential part of news production and distribution."
Journalists don't have to learn how to take photos, though maybe they should, but they need to think about new ways to connect to an audience that is increasingly connected to them.
The truth is that most skills boot camps don't turn the majority of the journalists who attend them into professional quality video editors or graphic designers; in fact, many of the projects they turn out in training sessions would not be fit for the Web.
But the value of these training sessions is that they do help journalists learn to see the potential of what these new tools can bring to the work they do – so instead of making multimedia experts, journalists can learn how to think like them. But we ought to reconsider the goals of these training sessions and align them to change thinking to change practice, rather than use them to change practice and hope it will change thinking.
Source: Knight Digital Media Center
Thursday, February 12, 2009
A local Twitter tool for local journalists
Twitterlocal allows you to follow posts on Twitter made by people from a geographical location of your choice.
Now a downloadable AIR desktop application, this is a must-have tool for local newspaper or broadcast journalists who want to monitor Twitter chat in their local beat.
For national journalists, it could be a useful tool to monitor chat around a breaking news event in a specific location, anywhere in the world.
Try, for example, entering Melbourne, Australia into the application with a 10-mile radius. You will see Tweets about the bush fires (if you are doing this around the date this post was published!)
Source: Journalism.co.uk
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Can Young Journalists Cope With An Uncertain Future?
I recently returned home from a long road trip that gave me a chance to catch up with media industry friends and mentors working in D.C., Philadelphia and Chicago. I welcomed the opportunity to talk about the trends that are affecting all of us and hear how they are coping, and strategically planning for their (uncertain) futures. Perhaps it’s my tendency to see optimism whenever possible, but it was refreshing to observe that my pals had not given up on our commitment to accurate news and thoughtful public discourse.
It was disappointing, however, to hear over and over again that as the economy continues to tank and that reflective (and expensive!) holiday time of year rears its ugly head, we’re all suffering from a feeling of paralysis, unsure of how to grow professionally when we’re anchored by financial realities and legitimate concerns about the substance of our chosen vocation.
With this on my mind, I began engaging a number of friends and colleagues on a subject that weighs on my thoughts constantly: Is what happened to classified advertising happening to editorial content, and if it is, are we building the skill sets we’ll need when an aggregator and revenue power house like Google jumps into the market and becomes a primary generator of original content?
What will the rules about ethics and transparency be in such a scenario, and in the meantime - as reporting beats are routinely eliminated - are we all really just becoming opining, mini-aggregators? (For the record: Decidedly I am, my MSM friends are not.)
“I don't think anyone in journalism today feels really good about their futures, whether they work at a small market paper or even if they've embraced new media,” says my 25-year-old friend who has worked for a major national daily and is now a content producer for a top political news site. “Everyone jokes, covering up real fears about how we'll all be laid off from old-school papers and about how professional online news won't actually take off like we hope it will.”
I’d feel less alarmed about prospects for the future if I felt that news organizations were safeguarding and evolving their core product: unbiased beat reporting. It’s one thing to lose a few excess Home & Garden reporters to streamline coverage and reduce production costs, but as companies like the Tribune prepare to consolidate something as essential as their Washington bureau, I see flashbacks to trying to sell recruitment ads at the L.A. Times while all my clients told me it was more effective to buy $25 ads on Craig’s list.
Instead, the profits associated with the valuable and expensive skill, and access, that separates reporters from Joe Schmoe (not to be confused with the Joe the Plumber), is being siphoned to Drudge, Talking Points Memo, Real Clear Politics and so on. Some of these sites do pay for their own content creation, but the arsenals are nowhere near as loaded as that of the still-functional newspaper industry, which retains the opportunity to be middle, if not early, adopters.
So, not only do young journalists have to ask whether their employers are innovative enough to compete even five years out with the complex user interfaces being designed by social media juggernauts who could easily enter the news content game, they also have to ask, simply, if they are wasting their time perfecting obsolete skills.
On Monday, I asked a variety of friends who’ve been journalists for anywhere from 2 – 12 years whether there is still value to the beat reporting skills that have been emphasized in our training at journalism school and in our first jobs. Most said it is incredibly important, but obviously on its way out the door or, at the very least, undergoing an extreme makeover: From riding with cops to vague, loosely-affiliated topics and keyword searches.
“Beat reporting is exceptional training from a fundamental perspective because it requires both intimacy and a hardened distance. The closer you are to a subject on a day-to-day basis, the harder it is to let your feelings not invade the work you are doing on that subject,” says my friend Chris Sprow, who has written for newspapers and now works for ESPN the magazine. “The demise of beat journalism to some extent will mirror the divided nature of actual journalism, where we are resigned to the notion that judgments invade every realm of coverage.”
I agree wholeheartedly, even though I have chosen to leave MSM-style journalism to write commentary for new media outlets. However, it’s a personal preference and not a reflection of my expectations for what constitutes adequate reporting, nor do I see what I do as the core value proposition of the news industry.
Chris continues: “The newspaper and the beat was nothing more than a local monopoly on the transfer of information, not the quality of the information itself. Now, news sources must use resources to bring the information better and more insightful than ever before, as opposed to just having it … Young people might believe that advocacy journalism is where they have to be, they believe there’s a fundamental right to pick a side, be clear about it, and report from that venue. It’s a modern belief in the loss of objectivity as okay as long as you’re honest about it, as if that’s a pillar of sainthood, but picking a side is the easiest thing we do. It’s instinctive. Somebody will still have to tell the stories, and the stories precede the sides.”
*
If you can wait it out to see who’ll sign your next paycheck, then hoorah. Some of my other friends, however, have opted to find practical applications for their existing skill sets. Justin Goldsborough, a copy-editing enthusiast who went to Medill with me and also studied millennial generation news consumption habits, has reinvented himself as a social media communications manager with Sprint in Kansas City, where he notes that the local KC Star beat reporter has launched a blog dedicated entirely to covering his company.
“The meaning of being ‘a journalist’ has changed a lot in the last 10 years,” says Justin, who is now an active blogger/Twitterer/social networker. “The journalist who used to report about Sprint is covering ‘traditional beats’ in a different way. Doesn't mean they should stop printing Sprint stories in the newspaper. But they should also provide people with an outlet to join the conversation, which adds a new chapter(s) to the story.”
I don’t worry that these big questions will sort themselves out, but I do worry about our collective well-being as we all make deeply personal choices about where to go from here. It is disconcerting when a young journalist seeks out guidance, but older colleagues, professors and friends can’t give any insight beyond “be a diversified storyteller” and “pay attention to business and revenue trends so you don’t get screwed” (which I, too, admittedly support at a basic level and espouse all the time). You walk away wondering if most of us are so resigned to the momentum shifts and so overextended that we no longer have energy for the endeavor we set out to pursue, or how we’re going to preserve it and establish unique contributions given a plethora of choices.
I believe the answer is to build your own vision for yourself, creating a clearly-defined niche or beat or whatever we label it, to own and be an expert in. (If your boss doesn’t get it, up-manage him.) I also think we must surround ourselves with veteran colleagues and mentors who recognize that our paths are not the same as theirs, who will not be affronted by our easy mastery of multi-media storytelling, but who will impart on us the nuances of the important trade of news gathering. It would also help if managers institutionalized this kind of mentorship and facilitated training opportunities that bridge this gap.
Please share your stories, coping mechanisms and professional development strategies with me at maegan.carberry@gmail.com. I’d also like to hear your thoughts on the questions I raised about the collapse of classified advertising, the likelihood that a company like Google will eventually bump the New York Times from its perch and concerns about ethics and transparency in an opinion-dominated news market. I will be addressing these topics in my next few columns.
Source: Editor & Publisher
It was disappointing, however, to hear over and over again that as the economy continues to tank and that reflective (and expensive!) holiday time of year rears its ugly head, we’re all suffering from a feeling of paralysis, unsure of how to grow professionally when we’re anchored by financial realities and legitimate concerns about the substance of our chosen vocation.
With this on my mind, I began engaging a number of friends and colleagues on a subject that weighs on my thoughts constantly: Is what happened to classified advertising happening to editorial content, and if it is, are we building the skill sets we’ll need when an aggregator and revenue power house like Google jumps into the market and becomes a primary generator of original content?
What will the rules about ethics and transparency be in such a scenario, and in the meantime - as reporting beats are routinely eliminated - are we all really just becoming opining, mini-aggregators? (For the record: Decidedly I am, my MSM friends are not.)
“I don't think anyone in journalism today feels really good about their futures, whether they work at a small market paper or even if they've embraced new media,” says my 25-year-old friend who has worked for a major national daily and is now a content producer for a top political news site. “Everyone jokes, covering up real fears about how we'll all be laid off from old-school papers and about how professional online news won't actually take off like we hope it will.”
I’d feel less alarmed about prospects for the future if I felt that news organizations were safeguarding and evolving their core product: unbiased beat reporting. It’s one thing to lose a few excess Home & Garden reporters to streamline coverage and reduce production costs, but as companies like the Tribune prepare to consolidate something as essential as their Washington bureau, I see flashbacks to trying to sell recruitment ads at the L.A. Times while all my clients told me it was more effective to buy $25 ads on Craig’s list.
Instead, the profits associated with the valuable and expensive skill, and access, that separates reporters from Joe Schmoe (not to be confused with the Joe the Plumber), is being siphoned to Drudge, Talking Points Memo, Real Clear Politics and so on. Some of these sites do pay for their own content creation, but the arsenals are nowhere near as loaded as that of the still-functional newspaper industry, which retains the opportunity to be middle, if not early, adopters.
So, not only do young journalists have to ask whether their employers are innovative enough to compete even five years out with the complex user interfaces being designed by social media juggernauts who could easily enter the news content game, they also have to ask, simply, if they are wasting their time perfecting obsolete skills.
On Monday, I asked a variety of friends who’ve been journalists for anywhere from 2 – 12 years whether there is still value to the beat reporting skills that have been emphasized in our training at journalism school and in our first jobs. Most said it is incredibly important, but obviously on its way out the door or, at the very least, undergoing an extreme makeover: From riding with cops to vague, loosely-affiliated topics and keyword searches.
“Beat reporting is exceptional training from a fundamental perspective because it requires both intimacy and a hardened distance. The closer you are to a subject on a day-to-day basis, the harder it is to let your feelings not invade the work you are doing on that subject,” says my friend Chris Sprow, who has written for newspapers and now works for ESPN the magazine. “The demise of beat journalism to some extent will mirror the divided nature of actual journalism, where we are resigned to the notion that judgments invade every realm of coverage.”
I agree wholeheartedly, even though I have chosen to leave MSM-style journalism to write commentary for new media outlets. However, it’s a personal preference and not a reflection of my expectations for what constitutes adequate reporting, nor do I see what I do as the core value proposition of the news industry.
Chris continues: “The newspaper and the beat was nothing more than a local monopoly on the transfer of information, not the quality of the information itself. Now, news sources must use resources to bring the information better and more insightful than ever before, as opposed to just having it … Young people might believe that advocacy journalism is where they have to be, they believe there’s a fundamental right to pick a side, be clear about it, and report from that venue. It’s a modern belief in the loss of objectivity as okay as long as you’re honest about it, as if that’s a pillar of sainthood, but picking a side is the easiest thing we do. It’s instinctive. Somebody will still have to tell the stories, and the stories precede the sides.”
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If you can wait it out to see who’ll sign your next paycheck, then hoorah. Some of my other friends, however, have opted to find practical applications for their existing skill sets. Justin Goldsborough, a copy-editing enthusiast who went to Medill with me and also studied millennial generation news consumption habits, has reinvented himself as a social media communications manager with Sprint in Kansas City, where he notes that the local KC Star beat reporter has launched a blog dedicated entirely to covering his company.
“The meaning of being ‘a journalist’ has changed a lot in the last 10 years,” says Justin, who is now an active blogger/Twitterer/social networker. “The journalist who used to report about Sprint is covering ‘traditional beats’ in a different way. Doesn't mean they should stop printing Sprint stories in the newspaper. But they should also provide people with an outlet to join the conversation, which adds a new chapter(s) to the story.”
I don’t worry that these big questions will sort themselves out, but I do worry about our collective well-being as we all make deeply personal choices about where to go from here. It is disconcerting when a young journalist seeks out guidance, but older colleagues, professors and friends can’t give any insight beyond “be a diversified storyteller” and “pay attention to business and revenue trends so you don’t get screwed” (which I, too, admittedly support at a basic level and espouse all the time). You walk away wondering if most of us are so resigned to the momentum shifts and so overextended that we no longer have energy for the endeavor we set out to pursue, or how we’re going to preserve it and establish unique contributions given a plethora of choices.
I believe the answer is to build your own vision for yourself, creating a clearly-defined niche or beat or whatever we label it, to own and be an expert in. (If your boss doesn’t get it, up-manage him.) I also think we must surround ourselves with veteran colleagues and mentors who recognize that our paths are not the same as theirs, who will not be affronted by our easy mastery of multi-media storytelling, but who will impart on us the nuances of the important trade of news gathering. It would also help if managers institutionalized this kind of mentorship and facilitated training opportunities that bridge this gap.
Please share your stories, coping mechanisms and professional development strategies with me at maegan.carberry@gmail.com. I’d also like to hear your thoughts on the questions I raised about the collapse of classified advertising, the likelihood that a company like Google will eventually bump the New York Times from its perch and concerns about ethics and transparency in an opinion-dominated news market. I will be addressing these topics in my next few columns.
Source: Editor & Publisher
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