How two digital journalists approach their jobs. Digiday | Fast Company Don’t let the two screens running TweetDeck, the 40 Reuters accounts he oversees, or his ability to root out cringe-inducing screenshots fool you: Reuters social media editor Anthony De Rosa, writes Saya Weissman in a profile, is no mere Twitter monkey. “Social media is where everyone gets their news now,” he says. “Honestly, as years go by, all editors, as many already are, will be using it as a place to gather information just like anywhere else. I simply focus much of my attention on this medium, but I see it as nothing particularly novel as time goes by.” For all this multiplatforming, De Rosa’s focused on growing audience, not traffic: “I think traffic is probably one of the least important metrics of what we’re gaining from social media.”
David D. Burstein writes about how Gabriel Dance, the Guardian’s interactive editor, went from computer science to journalism. So: Videos. Do reporters undermine their employers’ scoops by tweeting them first? New York | Overheard on Twitter An Associated Press memo chiding reporters who tweeted that AP journalists had been arrested at the Occupy Wall Street protests spurred a discussion about whether journalists compete with their news outlets by tweeting news first.
The AP’s social media guidelines state, “Don’t break news that we haven’t published, no matter the format.” The New York Times’ Brian Stelter, a prolific Twitter user who was praised for tweeting what he saw while reporting on the aftermath of the Joplin, Mo., tornado, asked, “Shouldn’t the wire speed up?” That spurred a response from @nytfridge, an anonymous account normally focused on food: “Well which is it @brianstelter? Should journos serve and tend their brand or their institution’s? Can’t have it both ways.” Stelter’s answer: “Many of us have it both ways every day.” Before Twitter, this is the sort of conversation that would have stayed in the newsroom: Heron’s full statement on the issue: From the field to the office. Before the last slice of cake is eaten from the Reader's 40th birthday, I wanted to offer a personal reflection about the paper. Our editorial team has always consisted of two kinds of workers: the office staff (editors, proofers, designers), and the field hands (writers).
Freelancers have also contributed greatly, but I'm talking now about the regular employees. I joined the Reader in 1981 as a field hand. That meant I only stepped into the office to drop off a story. This arrangement was part of the Reader's all-around clever financial plan. Why provide space for writers who could work just as well from their homes—and who would then pay their own phone bills, and buy their own supplies?
Not that we field hands were complaining. The system worked just fine when the Reader prospered. In 2007 the Reader was sold, and the new owners decided to tinker with the fieldwork arrangement. At least we didn't have to clean out our desks. The commute, usually on the el and a bus, has been a delight. How the Print-Digital Divide Endures at The New York Times. Flickr user wallyg On Thursday, Jill Abramson, executive editor of The New York Times, announced that the paper sought to eliminate up to 20 newsroom positions through voluntary buyouts. Unlike the round of 100 buyouts that occurred in 2009, she said in an internal memo, these would not be followed by layoffs.
The story was broken from within The Times, by media reporter Brian Stelter. Additionally, he reported that a number of buyouts will soon be offered to business-side employees, according to an anonymous company executive. “For this story, I treated The New York Times like any other company,” Mr. (Such bravado has its rewards: At the time of the report, Mr. The report specified that Times buyouts are limited to employees under the print contract, a strange vestige of the ’90s, when digital jobs at the Times rarely overlapped with journalists’ jobs (the two teams were even housed in different buildings).
In other words, you’re all bloggers now. Social Media Icon @JayRosen_NYU on his Twitter strategy. Jay Rosen teaches journalism at NYU and is a leading media critic. He blogs at Press Think and produces a weekly podcast on news and technology called Rebooting The News. He has almost 50,000 followers on Twitter. We recently spoke via email about Jay’s personal twitter strategy and the platform’s impact on the media. You waited to join Twitter. I became aware of Twitter in mid-2007 when I started to see it pop up more and more in my referral logs for PressThink. It was the same with blogging. When you did join Twitter, what was your goal? To learn about it by participating in it. In August, you told Atlantic.com that you use Twitter in place of an RSS feeder and news alerts.
I never liked using an RSS reader. You spend a lot of time crafting your tweets. You really want to know? After that it’s genre, economy, beauty and continuity. By genre I mean I have several forms I use over and over. * There’s the flat descriptor. . * There’s description, plus. Yes, NPR. Twitter is a lot like radio. Life, I wrote.: How to use Twitter for journalism.