10 Things News Organizations Don't Understand About NewsCloud - The NewsCloud Blog. How the New York 'Times' Came Back From the Brink. Two weeks ago, I went to the New York Times’ gleaming, modernist, Renzo Piano–designed headquarters on Eighth Avenue in Manhattan to discuss some good financial news with Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the paper’s publisher and the chairman of the New York Times Company.
Good news has been in short supply in the world of dead-tree media, and for the Times in particular. For much of Sulzberger’s nineteen-year tenure, the paper that his family has controlled for more than a century has been embroiled in one crisis or another, ranging from the Jayson Blair fiasco, which led to the overthrow of Howell Raines, the hard-charging editor who had been handpicked by Sulzberger, to the paper’s reporting on the phantom WMDs in Iraq, which some believed had even helped propel the U.S. into war.
Then there were the paper’s financial troubles, which appeared to have pushed it to the brink of extinction. For well over a decade, the Internet had been relentlessly consuming the paper’s business model. The seven steps to a successful aggregation strategy for your news organization. Media have changed in ways that now make aggregation essential to the mission of almost any news organization. Readers face an abundant and growing volume of news and news sources. Most cities now have independent news websites, forums and blogs covering neighborhoods and particular topics. Other professional news outlets are stepping up their output. Someone has to make sense of it.
Someone has to look beyond his own newsroom and give readers a comprehensive digest. This does not diminish the great value of your own original journalism. Here are the seven things you’ll need to decide in order to design a smart aggregation strategy and make your website a central hub of community information and discussion. 1. The easiest way to get into aggregation may simply be to create an automated feed of the latest headlines from other news sources. But it’s far more useful to involve human editors if you can.
Techmeme is powered by algorithms and software, but also human editors. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Gapers Block - Slow down & check out Chicago! In a hamster-wheel world, is there room for journalistic creativity? Evidence from The New York Times. The essential question facing newsrooms today is this one: Does more speed and more content come at the cost of creativity? Does the “hamster wheel,” as described by Dean Starkman in this month’s Columbia Journalism Review cover story, reduce journalists’ capacity to move stories forward instead of playing catch-up online? And does the demand for speed and the hunger for clicks come at the cost of thoughtful editing and crafting of stories? This question is at the core of my (almost written) dissertation — when news is made in an online newsroom, what happens to the invention process?
But it is my contention, after having the privilege to spend five months, day-in and day-out at Business Day at The New York Times, is that even though many journalists there often feel like wire reporters, many also feel that writing a story five times actually makes their work better. But that division in sentiment is not the heart of the argument. Take, for instance, a Goldman Sachs earnings report. An Anaylsis of Six Journalism Startups.
In the last few weeks there has been some interesting and exciting news in the journalism startup world. I wanted to take some time to highlight new players and provide my own personal analysis. Collaborative Storytelling: Three New Startups Kommons.com Kommons was founded by the young Cody Brown who busted into the conversation with some epic blog posts last fall. Similar to 10questions.com, Kommons is playing in a very interesting intellectual space. Kommons reminds me a bit of Yoosk.com, a site I came across when I was editor at NewAssignment.net. Another key point about this startup is that, unlike some of the others, the emphasis is not, in my interpretation, “journalism.” My biggest complaint — nobody has asked me a question on Kommons yet Storyful It’s hard to offer analysis about Storyful.
My hope is that they break new ground with a compelling feature and test a new method of collaborative storytelling. The Local: East Village Let’s start with a big disclaimer. Emphas.is Ebyline. Good journalism will thrive, whatever the format | Technology | The Observer. If I've learned one thing from watching the internet over two decades, it's this: prediction is futile. The reason is laughably simple: the network's architecture and lack of central control effectively make it a global surprise-generation machine. And since its inception, it has enabled disruptive innovation at a blistering pace. This doesn't stop people making predictions, though. In fact, ever since the web went mainstream in 1993 there has been a constant stream of what computer scientist John Seely Brown calls "endism" – assertions that some new technology presages the termination of some revered practice, not to mention the end of civilisation as we know it.
The problem with endism is that it's intrinsically simplistic. This confusion of format with function also applies to the debate about the future of journalism. The implicit assumption behind this charge is that the only way for journalism to thrive is by squirting its inked output on to processed wood pulp. Is Murdoch preparing to launch two 'tablet newspapers'? | Media. I'm not certain what we're to make of the hush-hush unit being set up for News Corporation under the aegis of the Wall Street Journal's managing editor Robert Thomson, as revealed in a memo posted by Romenesko (well done again, Jim). I say hush-hush, but the so-called "WSJ/DJ Special Project" was hardly going to remain secret after Thomson circulated the memo to WSJ staff. But, unless he is trying to provoke rivals by laying a false trail, it must be big because he refers to it being "crucial to our success as a company.
" Thomson apologises for being "necessarily vague" in announcing only that the project will be led by Jim Pensiero, a Journal deputy managing editor who has been appointed editor-in-chief, and Gabriella Stern, of Dow Jones Newswire, as managing editor. An editor-in-chief and a managing editor? Perhaps we should link this news to the departure from Wapping of Pete Picton, editor of The Sun's various websites. That sounds feasible. Apple Said to Negotiate With Publishers Over Digital Newsstand For IPad.
Apple Inc. is developing a digital newsstand for publishers that would let them sell magazines and newspapers to consumers for use on Apple devices, said two people familiar with the matter. The newsstand, designed particularly for the iPad, would be similar to Apple’s iBook store for electronic books, said the people, who declined to be identified because the negotiations are private. The newsstand would be separate from Apple’s App Store, where people can buy some publications now, they said. Apple’s effort is aimed at luring more consumers to the iPad and helping publishers sell subscriptions, rather than single issues. The main hang-ups between Apple and publishers including Time Warner Inc., Conde Nast, Hearst Corp. and News Corp. are who controls data about users and how to split subscription revenue, the people said.
Pricing for subscriptions also hasn’t been worked out. Apple’s Aims Publisher Resistance It’s unclear if any publishers have signed on yet, one person said. Print + Video. The digital divide in newsrooms | Garrett Downing - Multimedia Journalist. Garrett Downing | August 24, 2010 I’m about two months into my new gig with WEWS-TV/newsnet5.com in Cleveland, and I’m getting plenty of on the job training.
The experience has been great, and I’ve spent much of my time learning the dynamics of a television newsroom. I have enjoyed watching and listening as the newsroom continues to go through an evolution to get more in line with today’s era of digital journalism. The newsroom has a wide range of personnel, from employees who have worked at the station for over 40 years, to me, who is 22 years old and has been there a couple of months. Everyone brings something different.
Like all media companies (and most companies, in general), there is some level of a generational divide in the newsroom. I’ve considered blogging about this for a while, and I thought now was a good time after I read a recent post from Steve Buttry, the Director of Community Engagement at DC’s new news outlet TBD.com.
Age alone is definitely not the key issue. Reporter. BlockByBlock. Finalists for the 2010 Online Journalism Awards announced.