Google system would measure news source quality, credibility
April 30, 2005
Google has filed for patents for a new system to improve Google News searches by comparing the track records and credibility of news sources and factoring them into the search results.
The New Scientist says Google will build a database of news source crediblity “by continually monitoring the number of stories from all news sources, along with average story length, number with bylines, and number of the bureaux cited, along with how long they have been in business. Google’s database will also keep track of the number of staff a news source employs, the volume of internet traffic to its website and the number of countries accessing the site.
“Google will take all these parameters, weight them according to formulae it is constructing, and distil them down to create a single value. This number will then be used to rank the results of any news search.”
Grants awarded for innovative new local media ventures
April 28, 2005
Ten “New Voices” award winners from across the United States will receive $12,000 grants to launch innovative local media ventures. The 10 were selected from 243 proposals seeking inaugural New Voices funding, said Jan Schaffer, director of J-Lab, which administers the program, funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
The winners, ranging from the Friends of the Deerfield Library in New Hampshire to the Mid-Columbia Centro Cultural in Hood River, Ore., demonstrated both the goal of applying the values of fact-based journalism in pursuit of news, and a realistic plan to find a way to keep the operation going after its launch.
Ten more ventures will be funded next year. The 2006 deadline will be next Feb. 8.
Number of adults who prefer online news over TV and newspapers grows
April 27, 2005
The number of online adults who prefer the Internet as their main source of news has grown over 35% in the last four years, at the expense of television and newspapers, according to a new report from JupiterResearch. Currently, over 26% of online adults prefer the Internet for national and international news, compared to 19% in 2001.
More interested data from JupiterResearch: “Consumer surveys show that the percentage of online adults using the Internet for daily news had been flat - hovering around 50% - for the last few years. Preference for online local news is growing, but hasn’t exceeded 10% among online adults. Young adults, ages 18 to 24, are helping drive the preference trend, especially in national news. Thirty-three percent of online young adults say they prefer the Internet as their primary source of news, while 40% prefer TV and 10% newspapers.”
David Card, VP and Senior Analyst for JupiterResearch, says, “In the face of relatively flat usage, this increasing preference for the Internet is intriguing. While traditional media companies like The New York Times and CNN are doing very well online, our analysis shows that brands like AOL and Yahoo! are increasingly important for online audiences.”
JupiterResearch’s analysis is based on surveys of over 10,750 online adults over the course of four years.
New multimedia site launches
April 27, 2005
A new site, the Open Media Network, has launched with the aim of letting users “easily access movies, music, video blogs, podcasts and public television and radio programming offered by producers for Internet distribution.”
Open Media Network (OMN) was founded by Netscape veteran Mike Homer and includes Marc Andreessen as an advisor and board member. The service offers users a broad selection of free public programs with a simple TV-style program guide and automatic background deliveries of favorite scheduled programming. Content producers can easily add their programming to the network, with unlimited free delivery of their shows and with digital rights protection. Consumer can view the content on multiple devices, including PCs and iPods today and televisions and cell phones by this summer.
Projo.com: Shooting of Det. Sgt. Allen
April 27, 2005
Projo.com has been offering readers great, continuing coverage of the shooting of a veteran detective, which projo.com editor Andrea Panciera says is made possible in part by new levels of cooperation between the Providence Journal and projo.com staff. Check out the video, audio, maps, slide shows, tribute messages and more.
Huffington Post: Celebrity blog site
April 26, 2005
More details about Arianna Huffington’s new celebrity blog site, The Huffington Post, scheduled to launch May 9:
“She has lined up more than 250 of what she calls ‘the most creative minds’ in the country to write a group blog that will range over topics from politics and entertainment to sports and religion,” The New York Times reports. “It is essentially a nonstop virtual talk show that will be part of a Web site that will also serve up breaking news around the clock.”
Contributors will include some big names: Walter Cronkite, David Mamet, Nora Ephron, Warren Beatty, James Fallows, Vernon E. Jordan Jr., Maggie Gyllenhaal, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., Diane Keaton, Norman Mailer and Mortimer B. Zuckerman. Because there are so many lined up, even if most of them only post occassionally, the site will always have fresh content.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the venture is that Tribune Media Services will syndicate parts of the blog to newspapers and their Web sites — which might be the first time a blog is being syndicated to newspapers.
The publication will have different editing standards online and off: bloggers’ posts will be published unedited online, but they will be fact-checked and copy edited for the syndicate.
Related: Huffington plans politics and culture webzine
Wikinews woes
April 26, 2005
“Operators of Wikinews are finding their mission rife with frustrations and challenges,” writes Wired’s Joanna Glasner. “The site, an offshoot of Wikipedia, the volunteer-maintained online encyclopedia, is facing pressures its parent organization rarely had to contend with, such as ferreting out fake posts, incorporating original sources and updating coverage to reflect rapidly changing current events.”
Downloadable guides for iPods
April 25, 2005
News companies need to keep thinking about new platforms. With iPods, it makes sense to tap into them. Dozens of news companies have already launched podcasts, but here’s another approach: The Seattle Weekly just launched a downloadable entertainment guide for iPods, and the Lawrence Journal-News borrowed the idea and launched its own downloadable iPod restaurant guide as well.
Editorial review processes for blogs
April 21, 2005
What’s the editorial review and approval process for blogs at news sites?
Lee Rozen, general manager of seattlepi.com, explained how his site manages blog in a post to Poynter’s Online-News list:
Each entry in Todd Bishop’s Microsoft blog,
http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/microsoft/, is read by an assigning editor on the print business desk before being posted. I’m told very little editing takes place.We also have two blogs by online staffers Brian Chin,
http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/buzz/ and Mike Thompson,
http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/baseball/, which are posted and then edited by me. I know very little editing takes place on them; very little is needed.Comments are automatically posted, and the blogger reviews them. From time to time as necessary, we’ve deleted posts or developed some rules or added programming to stop spam. More often, Todd gets story ideas or Mariners fans engage in a spirited discussion of some arcane Sabremetric-sort of point.
What is your site’s editorial review process for blogs? What do you think is the best approach?
Current calls for video submissions
April 21, 2005
Current, the new cable network being launched by former Vice President Al Gore, has begun soliciting contributions and launched a contest that will award the winner a development deal, including $3,000, to produce three short-form segments for the station. More information at www.current.tv