Lots o’ new ‘professional’ blogs
January 31, 2005
From MediaBistro (which just redesigned its site, plus TVNewswer and Galleycat):
Unbeige: Design blog
MBToolbox: Tips on writing and editing
FishbowlNY: NY media gossip
FishbowlLA: LA media gossip
FishbowlDC: DC media gossip
From Nick Denton’s gang at Gawker Media:
Lifehacker: Tech tips
Gridskipper: Travel blog
(Both of which launched with big advertisers on board)
Free multmedia reporting seminar
January 31, 2005
The Western Knight Center for Specialized Journalism is accepting applications for an expenses-paid “Multimedia Reporting and Convergence Seminar” seminar that combines practical instruction in multimedia reporting with in-depth exploration of media convergence and other critical issues for online news operations. It will be held March 20 - 25 at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California, Berkeley.
TakeBackTheNews.com
January 31, 2005
Another participatory journalism attempt, TakeBackTheNews.com, has launched. (Yes, it’s getting hard to keep track of all of them…)
This one so far seems to be mostly a blog summarizing mainstream media articles. But the site has more ambitious goals. Individuals are encouraged to participate in the following roles at TakeBackTheNews.com:
• General Content Contributors, who submit interesting news-of-the-day items covering various topics
• Topic-Specific Content Contributors, who focus on a particular topic or content area and submit news items relating to it
• Op-Ed Contributors, who submit original opinion pieces
Contributing Bloggers, who submit takes on the latest news and increase blog exposure
• Editors, established contributors who may apply for or be recruited to serve as volunteer editors
Editors will review all editorial submissions for purposes of appropriateness and clarity before publishing content online.
‘We’re all Web journalists’
January 31, 2005
I think most practicing journalists today are as Webby as any blogger you care to name. Journalists have had access to broadband connections for longer than most civilians, and nearly every story they tackle begins with a Web dump of essential information from Google or a proprietary database such as Nexis or Factiva. They conduct interviews via e-mail, download official documents from .gov sites, check facts, and monitor the competition-including blogs-the whole while. A few even store as a “favorite” the URL from Technorati that takes them directly to what the blogs are saying about them (here’s mine) and talk back. When every story starts on the Web, and every story can be stripped to its digital bits and pumped through wires and over the air, we’re all Web journalists.
The premature triumphalism of some bloggers indicates that they haven’t paid attention to how Webified journalists have become. They also ignore media history. New media technologies almost never replace old media technologies, they merely force old technologies to adapt and find new ways to connect with their audiences.
Blogs covering Iraq election
January 29, 2005
One of the best blogs covering the Iraq elections is Friends of Democracy, which is offering excellent “ground-level election news from the people of Iraq,” including photos and even a Webcast.
(Note: Check back as this post will be updated)
Other blogs on news sites:
• NBC’s David Shuster Baghdad Diary and Webcast
• BBC journalists
• BBC Iraqis’ blog
Other independent bloggers of note:
• A Family in Baghdad
• Iraq Dispatches from an independent journalist in Baghdad
• Life in Baghdad
• Citizen Burning
• Report from London voting on London Kurd blog
• More reports from voting in England on Kurdistan Bloggers Union
• Kurdo
• Iraq Photos blog
• Lance in Iraq, a U.S. medical platoon leader serving in northern Iraq
• Democracy in Iraq (is Coming)
• Neurotic Iraqi Wife
• A star from Mosul
• Life from Baghdad
• Iraqi Girl hnk’s blog
• A citizen of Mosul
• Free Iraqi
More good Iraq blog roundup lists:
• Interactive map of Iraqi bloggers
• Future of Iraq
• From Jeff Jarvis on Buzzmachine
• From Will Femia on MSNBC.com
• The Iraq Files
• Words from Iraq
Know of others? Post them here.
NJ.com’s citizen journalist army
January 29, 2005
NJ.com editor Dean Betz writes in to point out that the site not only has a number of blogs written by “professional journalists”…
• The Jersey Side
• Transit Blog
• Liss Is More
• The Women’s Game
• Reality TV
… but MORE THAN 40 Weblogs written by “citizen journalists” on topics from local events news to “The Sopranos.”
National Geographic: Tsunami Blogs Help Redefine News and Relief Effort
January 28, 2005
National Geographic:
As the world struggled to comprehend the scale of the tsunami devastation, first person accounts, images, and video quickly appeared. Bloggers became an information source both for the public and for mainstream media outlets.
“This is journalism. Raw, unedited, but still journalism,” said Jonathan Dube, MSNBC.com managing producer and publisher of CyberJournalist.net, a site that tracks the impact of Web logs on journalism.
“Hearing about individual experiences directly from the people who survived the tsunami offered readers a different, more personal perspective on the human side of the tragedy than most of the articles published by news organizations.”
….Reportage was not the only function of blogs nor perhaps the most important.
“The more interesting and useful way the Internet has been used is to share information about relief efforts and to help people connect with missing family members,” Dube said.
“For example, a dozen Indian bloggers launched an excellent group blog called The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Blog, posting news tidbits and information about resources, aid, donations, and volunteer efforts. It has attracted readers from around the world?people in the region who need help, people elsewhere interested in helping out, and journalists.”
….Newspapers and broadcasters in India, the United Kingdom, Canada, and South Africa were among the media that published or aired images that they had been duped into thinking were of the actual tsunami. The images?showing a colossal wave looming over people?were actually photographs of a tidal bore (a wall of water that travels up some rivers during high tide). The pictures were apparently taken in China in 2002.
The incidents illustrate a growing problem for traditional media outlets trying to match the speed and immediacy of the “blogosphere.”
“Running photos and information from citizen journalists on news sites, in a newspaper, or on air is a great idea, as long as the news organizations can verify the information,” Dube said. “But so far, few news organizations have figured out how to handle photos and information from citizen journalists on a large scale while still applying the same level of verification news organizations traditionally apply to information before publishing.”
Great reader photos from Iraq
January 28, 2005
In December, The Washington Post and washingtonpost.com solicited images from U.S. soldiers and their family members and friends about life in Iraq. The Post has culled through the photos and published the best ones. You can view the submissions they published here — or use the search box to find specific photographs.
What’s notable about this gallery is that, unlike most photo galleries of reader-submitted photos you see on news sites, these photos are professional quality — from composition to lighting.
This demonstrates how the combination of citizen journalists and professional editing can produce high-quality, publishable content on par with professional work, giving audiences new perspectives without losing quality or credibility.
Join online news chat
January 27, 2005
News to aMUSE
January 27, 2005
Washingtonpost.com has launched a new feature, News to aMUSE, inviting readers to submit odes relating to recent news events. Each Friday the site will post the best poems. “Judging is based on a complex algorithm utilizing whim, star alignment and portions of the Olympic ice-skating point system (please, no lead pipes).”
Week’s end approaches, but let us weep not
Though the work week has ended, it won’t be forgot
So let’s celebrate the sublime and perverse
Of these past few days, through poetic verseGive us your limericks, your haikus and sonnets
Your Seussian babble and off-rhyming couplets
Submit your odes by Friday at 4
We’ll post all the best (the rest we’ll ignore)But first a few rules to lend us some cred
If not news-related, your ode won’t be read
So study the headlines, columns and briefs
Newsmakers, pundits, commanders-in-chief
Get the idea? Relate to the news…
Make your rhyme sing and we’ll be sure to use