L.A.Times shifts its focus to Web
The Los Angeles Times is going to combine the operations of the newspaper and its Internet site, and the top editor called on the paper's journalists to view latimes.com as the paper's primary vehicle for delivering news.
The paper is creating the position of editor for innovation and launching a crash course for journalists to push ahead the melding of the newspaper and its website.
Business Editor Russ Stanton was named to the innovation post.
The "Internet 101" course is going to teach reporters, editors and photographers to become savvy multimedia journalists, able to enhance their writing with audio and video reports.
Editor James E. O'Shea emphasized the need for speed in reforming an operation that he called "woefully behind" the competition.
A recent internal report done by Times staff found:
• Understaffing. The Web operation has 18 employees, a small fraction of the 200 employees at the Washington Post's website and the 50 at the New York Times' site.
• "Creaky" technology that has made it impossible for latimes.com to host live "chats" between readers and journalists or to let readers customize stock tables or weather reports.
• Failure to integrate the newspaper's large news staff with the website, contributing to delays in posting news.
"We are rarely first" to post news on the Internet, the report found.
The report cited an instance recently when a truck carrying hay caught fire on the Hollywood Freeway, sending up a plume of smoke that alarmed commuters. "We told readers nothing of the incident until the following morning," the committee said.
Jan 28, 2007 | E-MAIL | SAVE | PRINT | PERMALINK | DISCUSS(0)
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