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5Across
5Across: Social Media Marketing 101
There's a new series of demands being made in company meetings everywhere: "What is our social media strategy? What are we doing on Facebook and Twitter? I want followers and fans, and I want them now!" But before companies large and small -- as well as non-profits and charities -- jump into social media, they need to take a deep... more »
Section Authors
Mark Glaser
Alfred Hermida
Simon Owens
Roland Legrand
Sokari Ekine
Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Alana Taylor
Jeffrey D. Neuburger
Jaron Gilinsky
Mike Rosen-Molina
Bryan Murley
Mark Drapeau
Mark Hannah
Julie Posetti
Jason Feinberg
Cyrus Farivar
Steven Davy
Craig Silverman
Clothilde Le Coz
Jessica Clark
Stephen Ward
Rob Arcamona
Andria Krewson
Who We Are
MediaShift tracks how new media -- from weblogs to podcasts to citizen journalism -- are changing society and culture.
Social Media
Profiles in Courage: Social Media Editors at Big Media Outlets
During a recent trip to see an editor I work with at The Globe and Mail, a national newspaper in Canada, I passed by the newspaper's cafeteria. My editor looked in and pointed at a man who was sitting with his back to us. "There's Mathew Ingram, doing his office hours," he told me. Ingram is the Globe and Mail's...
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PoliticalShift
Young Political Candidates Confronted by Digital Past on Facebook
Last spring Emanuel Pleitez, 26, ran for California's 32nd Congressional seat in a special election to replace Hilda Solis, the new secretary of labor. During the campaign, one of Pleitez's opponents, California State Sen. Gil Cedillo, discovered photos from Pleitez's Facebook profile that showed Pleitez hanging around with various women at parties. The Cedillo campaign used the photos as the...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Murdoch-Google Spat; Ft. Hood Shooting on Twitter
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at recent comments by News Corp. honcho Rupert Murdoch about taking his content out of Google searches, and how many people reacted to it. Plus, many news organizations made Twitter Lists to cover the Ft. Hood shooting, but the Austin American-Statesman had an excellent Twitter feed...
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Social Networking
Media140 Brings Old and New Media Together, With Explosive Results
Over 300 people gathered under the Media140 banner in a concert hall at Australia's national public broadcaster ABC in Sydney last week to consider the future of journalism in the social media age. Media140 is a newly formed global collaboration of journalists, academics and social media practitioners that is staging conferences around the world. The goal is to examine the...
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AdvertisingShift
Can Salon's Revamp Help it Stop Bleeding Money?
Salon.com was a pioneering website launched in 1995 by former editors of the San Francisco Examiner, mixing opinion and investigative reporting with a sharply progressive slant. Although the company went public at the height of the dot-com boom in 1999, it had lost more than $80 million by 2003, and lost $4.6 million in the fiscal year ending March 31,...
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Legal Drama
Does Gawker's Publication of McSteamy Sex Tape Constitute Fair Use?
It probably seemed like a fun idea at the time. Last year, Eric Dane, known as "McSteamy" from the show "Grey's Anatomy," his wife Rebecca Gayheart, and former beauty queen Kari Ann Peniche decided to make a home movie. Yes, that type of home movie. The threesome recorded themselves nakedly fumbling around in bed, slurring words, and splashing in a...
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World View
President Obama Must Press China on Web Censorship
In China, Google is forced to censor its search engine, Facebook and Twitter are blocked, U.S. news agencies are barred from selling their services freely, and foreign investment in the media industry is closely watched. Yet when President Obama visits the country in a few days, it's unknown if he will publicly pressure the Chinese government on issues of censorship...
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World View
Hossein Derakhshan's Arrest: One Year Later
It's been over a year now since the arrest of Hossein Derakhshan, popularly known as Hoder. Ever since he wrote the first Persian-language blogging guide in November 2001, he has helped pioneer the Iranian blogging community while living in his adopted home of Toronto. (Derakhshan is a dual citizen of Iran and Canada.) However, beginning in 2006, Derakhshan's views started...
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NewspaperShift
FT's Long Room Uses Velvet Rope Approach to Online Community
What determines a successful community? The number of unique visitors or page views? The number of comments? Those metrics can be important, but there are also qualitative aspects to consider. Are the discussions on your site respectful and insightful? Are members deriving value from the community? Or are you hosting flame wars that lack intelligence and decorum? In order to...
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Digging Deeper
@FakeAPStylebook Editors Explain Their Overnight Success on Twitter
For anyone who has suffered through reading the entire AP Stylebook for a journalism class, there's a cathartic release when reading the dry wit of the @FakeAPStylebook feed on Twitter. It combines parody of the journalism usage bible with funny repartee and the absurd. That mix has brought amazing success to the people behind the feed: more than 40,000 followers...
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Hyper-Local
TheDigitel.com Brings Human Context to Local News Aggregation
Many news websites are working to refocus on local news, and often this means turning to automated aggregation. One hyper-local startup in Charleston, S.C., is blending links, community and visuals to try and redefine aggregation by giving it a human context. TheDigitel.com was launched by Ken Hawkins in June 2008, and recently received its first round of venture capital funding...
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PoliticalShift
Politicians Use Social Media to Bypass the Press Corps
Politicians are figuring out what social media technologies like blogs, Facebook, MySpace and Twitter have to offer: direct access to voters. More than ever before, they can bypass the professional press and deliver an uncensored, unfiltered -- and unchecked -- message. "[Social media] allows me to gives my thoughts on the events of the day and the complete text of...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Scoble on Twitter Lists; Time, Newsweek Hurting
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at Twitter Lists and how they allow people to group the people they follow on Twitter. Some say they might replace RSS feed readers. Robert Scoble answers Just One Question about how Twitter Lists have changed his life. Plus, magazines are hurting once again, with Time...
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Legal Drama
It's Now or Never For Citizen Journalists and Federal Shield Law
When Sen. Charles Schumer amended the Senate's bill to exclude unpaid reporters, bloggers, and citizen journalists from a proposed federal shield law, many in the Internet and journalism community were outraged. In the wake of the change, MediaShift published an article that argued Why Bloggers and Citizen Journalists Deserve a Shield Law. [Ed. note: please see update at the bottom...
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MagazineShift
Did the Web Kill Gourmet Magazine?
The murder happened in the kitchen with a laptop. That possible explanation for the death of Gourmet magazine sounds like a solution from the game Clue. The 68-year-old food magazine met its end this month when publisher Condé Nast cut it and two other magazines. Some blamed Gourmet's demise on the Internet and its theft of the print audience. It's...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Twitter's Real-Time Search Deals; Bloomberg Rising
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at the deals Microsoft made recently with Twitter and Facebook to incorporate tweets and status updates into its Bing search engine. Google quickly announced a deal with Twitter too, but why should we care? Also, Bloomberg bought out BusinessWeek magazine, but the jewel might well be...
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Philosophy
The Right Way For Media Companies to Create Social Media Policies
Swimming in the roiling sea of online journalism, increasing numbers of newsrooms have decided to take up the challenge of articulating editorial policies for social media. Over the past year, news organizations from the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times to the BBC have issued protocols for staff on Facebook, Twitter, and personal blogs and websites. Recently, the...
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Public MediaShift
PubCamp Examines New Models, Philosophy for Public Media
"Public Broadcasting has a future and its all about YOU," tweeted Jonathan Coffman at the close of this weekend's bustling Public Media Camp. Coffman, the product manager for PBS Engage, was a key organizer of the event, along with Andy Carvin, a senior strategist at NPR's Social Media Desk, and Joe and Peter Corbett, two brothers who run iStrategy...
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AdvertisingShift
8 Tips to Make Sponsored Tweets Work
If Twitter the company is not interested in putting advertising in its product right now, other companies have proven they can do it on their own. There has been an explosion of startup companies that place "sponsored tweets" into Twitter feeds and split the ad revenue with Twitterers. The first one to sell ads into Twitter feeds, Magpie, says...
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Weblogs
Why Bloggers and Citizen Journalists Deserve A Shield Law
Today in the United States, there is no legislation that allows bloggers to protect their sources. Yet bloggers have become a great way for the public -- and journalists in particular -- to keep informed about important topics. A survey from Middleberg Communications and the Society for New Communications Research released on September 22 found that 66 percent of journalists...
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Online Forums
7 Keys to Hosting Successful Chats With High-Profile People
In recent weeks we at De Tijd, a Belgian newspaper, have been experimenting with chat sessions where members of the Belgian government are brought in to discuss politics with our community. I'm very enthusiastic about this because I feel that our newspaper has enabled its community to have a direct, high-quality conversation with policy makers. I reported in a previous...
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World View
How Webcasting Helps Exclusive Conferences Be More Inclusive
For four days last month, Bill Clinton convened an elite group of heads of state, business leaders and celebrity activists for the annual meeting of his Clinton Global Initiative (CGI). Each year CGI picks a theme, and the focus of this year's gathering was the empowerment of women and girls in developing countries. The impact of the gathering was considerable,...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: FTC's Blogger Rules; Charging for iPhone Apps
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at the new FTC rules for blogger disclosure, when they are reviewing a product or service. They are now required to disclose if they are being paid by the company or if they get a freebie. And what's up with all the new paid news apps...
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Public MediaShift
Eight Public Media 2.0 Projects That Are Doing it Right
It's official: "Public Media 2.0" has graduated from theory into practice. "We believe that a successful broadband policy and implementation requires Public Media 2.0," said Ernest Wilson, the new chair of the board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, at Friday's unveiling of the Knight Commission's new report, Informing Communities: Sustaining Democracy in the Digital Age. Echoing the report's...
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World View
Online Reporters in Malaysia Struggle Against Jail, Fines and Filters
Malaysia ranked No. 132 out of 173 countries on last year's edition of Reporters Without Borders' World Press Freedom Index, which means it's already a hostile place for reporters. Thanks to recent initiatives aimed at controlling the flow of online information, the country appears ready to tighten its grip on the Internet, too. But bloggers and web journalists continue to...
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PoliticalShift
Local Politicians Use Social Media to Connect with Voters
When television cameras panned across the room full of senators and representatives during the recent presidential address to a joint session of Congress, the audience at home caught a glimpse of several political leaders tweeting away on their BlackBerry phones. At the national level, social media has been embraced by many politicians. Even the White House has a Twitter account...
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Social Media
Using 'Socratic Conversation' to Unlock a Community's Insight
How can you unlock the creativity and insights of your community? Well, you can give community members a blank canvas and hope they are inspired to paint it with ideas and contributions. You can also provide them with access to experts such as journalists or external sources for chats, discussions and other interactions. Both methods have their merits, but they...
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Citizen Journalism
Mainstream Media Miss the Point of Participatory Journalism
The ability of anyone to play an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and sharing news and information is seen as one of the big shifts in journalism over the past 10 years. But a growing body of research suggests that the advent of participatory journalism, or user-generated content (UGC), has done little to change the way...
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World View
Environmental Reporting Becomes Hazardous Work in Egypt, China
Since May 2009, Tamer Mabrouk has held one of the saddest records regarding human rights abuses in Egypt. He is the first blogger to receive a fine after a company sued him for having criticized its activities in Lake Manzala, which is connected to the Suez Canal. Mabrouk was fined $8,700, lost his job, and was forced to move out...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Examiner Buys NowPublic; CIMM Wants Better Metrics
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at the recent buyout of NowPublic by Examiner.com for a reported $25 million. The citizen media site will combine with Examiner.com's low-pay "Examiners," who write about niche topics for the newspaper chain. Also, major TV networks, ad agencies and advertisers teamed up to form the Coalition...
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Citizen Journalism
Can Allvoices Succeed as Citizen Journalism Platform?
With Examiner.com recently buying out citizen media site NowPublic for a reported $25 million, the attention turned to similar independent sites such as Allvoices. Would it now become buyout fodder for a mainstream media company, or would it suffer the fate of so many citizen journalism sites that came before it, shutting down before finding a successful business model? To...
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Weblogs
Can Health Care Blogs Fill the Gap Left by Mainstream News Coverage?
Paul Testa recently checked his voicemail and listened to a message from a hospice worker who lives in a conservative district of Ohio. He'd never met or spoken to this person before, but the worker reached out because Testa seemed like the right person to receive some important, inside information about the health care system. Testa doesn't work for a...
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NewspaperShift
The Five Habits of Highly Successful Community Managers
Talking about communities, and newspaper communities in particular, often leaves people with a warm and fuzzy feeling. It's true that being a community manager enables you to meet wonderful people, but the reality of daily community management can be difficult and unsettling. Every community manager has to deal with community politics (the online equivalent of office politics), disillusionment and a...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Editorial Layer at Wikipedia; NYT-ProPublica Story
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at the recent move by Wikipedia to add an editorial layer to some entries, the so-called "Flagged Revisions" that will only allow changes that are approved by certain editors. Plus, the New York Times Magazine will be running a story co-produced with ProPublica that cost $400,000...
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NewspaperShift
Newspaper Editors Want Clear Credit When Bloggers Link to Them
If only every blogger could link to stories the way Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit does. The libertarian blogger, with his hundreds of thousands of readers, offers up dozens of daily snippets that typically consist of a single sentence and a link. Sometimes it's a headline or even a single word -- "Heh." As a result, those being linked by Reynolds...
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Legal Drama
Was Twitter Document Theft, and Publication by TechCrunch, Legal?
In June of this year, the personal email account of a Twitter employee was accessed, apparently as a result of an insecure password. By Twitter's own account, the unauthorized access to that account was the first in a series of actions that ultimately gained the hacker (who calls himself "Hacker Croll") access to Twitter corporate documents that were maintained...
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Culture
Gnomedex 9.0: Tech Conference Looks Deeper at Social Media
SEATTLE -- I am here attending the geekfest of geekfests called Gnomedex. Its name is a play on the old tech conference Comdex, which ironically doesn't exist anymore. Coming here is a throwback to my time as a pure tech journalist going to conferences such as Macworld and the Consumer Electronics Show. But what's interesting is that even in...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Facebook Takes on Twitter; iPhone Backlash
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I look at all the recent moves Facebook has made to take on Twitter, including revamping its search, coming out with slimmed-down "Facebook Lite" and buying out FriendFeed. Plus, various high-profile tech pundits have come out against the iPhone after Apple rejected Google Voice from its App Store....
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PoliticalShift
How U.S. Departments of Defense and State Differ in Social Media Approach
The Defense Department's new head of public affairs says there is no more powerful communication tool in reaching supporters and critics alike then with a personally delivered message. What's the suggestion? Social media technologies like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter must be thoroughly engaged by civilian and military personnel at DoD in a new era of personal communication. That's what Price...
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Weblogs
Using the 'Steal-O-Meter' to Gauge if Stories Steal or Promote
In the recent dust-up between the Washington Post and Gawker, Post reporter Ian Shapira was upset when his story was excerpted on the media gossip blog Gawker. While blogs and even mainstream news articles have been quoting, excerpting and summarizing other stories and blog posts for years, there's never been accepted etiquette on how to do so. According to Shapira,...
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NewspaperShift
Five Ways to Use Mind-Mapping Tools in the Newsroom
About a week ago, I was in a meeting with some colleagues, preparing our coverage of an upcoming news event. We were jotting down ideas in long lists; it was quite literally linear thinking. But linear thinking isn't always the most helpful way of looking at a problem, because it restricts the way that you associate ideas together and limits...
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Social Media
URL Shorteners Help Track Links, Take Heat for Framing
If there's any doubt that an online titan can be easily overthrown, look no further than the URL shortener Tinyurl.com. For years, it was the most popular of its kind and the dominant (and default) URL shortener for Twitter. Then a few months ago I began to notice that it had all but disappeared from my own Twitter feed. With...
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TVShift
Blogs, Twitter Become Force at TV Critics Press Tour
In January 2006 when I launched MediaShift, I sat on a panel at the TV Critics Association (TCA) press tour in Pasadena, Calif., and saw an audience of aging TV critics working at newspapers, largely keeping notes on pen and paper, writing up stories that would run weeks and months later in print. When I returned to the press tour...
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PhotoShift
Can Citizen Photo Agency Demotix Succeed Where Scoopt Failed?
Recently, the "citizen photo agency" Demotix has had reason to celebrate. The site gained fame by selling front-page photos to the New York Times taken by Iranians who captured shots of protests after the disputed presidential election in Iran. Then came another seminal moment when the site got the only shot of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. in handcuffs...
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PoliticalShift
The Highs (and Lows) of Public Officials on Twitter
Are high profile public officials using Twitter as a noble tool to bypass the proverbial "mainstream media filter" and communicate directly with constituencies? Or do they just see it as yet one more wall in the online echo chamber, something merely to influence and/or amplify mainstream media stories? The answer probably lies somewhere in between as I found from examining...
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Virtual Worlds
Virtual Worlds Show Promise for Newspaper Communities
In my previous post, I talked about the browser-based virtual environment Metaplace, which I think may provide a way to boost interaction with our community on newspaper website Mediafin. To test how well virtual worlds could be used to build a community, I undertook some experiments in organizing "conferences" in worlds like Metaplace and Second Life. And the results turned...
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Public Relations
How PR People Can Tactfully Locate, Pitch Influential Bloggers
Many PR agencies are hesitant to issue any guarantees on whether a particular piece of content or advertisement will "go viral," leading millions of users to toss it around through their various social media platforms. One way that they try to achieve this is by approaching the people often most responsible for the viral spread of content online -- big-name...
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MarketingShift
Personal Branding Becomes a Necessity in Digital Age
In 2007, Atlantic Media's director of digital strategy Scott Karp was named one of the 40 most influential people in publishing by Folio magazine. But Folio wasn't honoring Karp for his work at Atlantic, which publishes the Atlantic Monthly magazine, but was instead fawning over the work Karp did at his personal blog, Publishing 2.0, which covered how technology is...
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Weblogs
Some Bloggers Welcome FTC Scrutiny for Paid Reviews
When it was reported in 2006 that the FTC would begin forcing word-of-mouth companies -- which paid people to hype products to their peers -- to disclose their marketing campaigns, Brian Clark predicted at the time that these rules would apply to bloggers as well. Now it looks like his prediction is coming true -- and bloggers are taking the...
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NewspaperShift
5 Ideas to Transform Newspaper Sites
I sometimes wonder whether we are held captive by old school thinking. At our newspapers at Mediafin, we are in the process of integrating web operations with the print publication, a move which I fully endorse. There's one major risk to this: that we might end up seeing the web as just another way to distribute newspaper articles rather than...
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Thought Leader Q&A
Edelman's Steve Rubel Switches from Blog to Lifestream
I spoke with Rubel a couple months ago when he was visiting San Francisco for the Ad:tech conference. We met at B Restaurant near Moscone Center and I interviewed him with my Flip camera. We talked about his balancing act as a blogger/journalist/PR person, how PR is shifting with the advent of social media, and what lessons Edelman and Edelman's client Wal-Mart have learned from previous missteps online.
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Weblogs
Newspapers Try Again with Local Blog Networks
Recently, those who visited the front page of the Miami Herald's website began seeing a sidebar item labeled simply "Your Blogs." If you clicked on the link it would take you to a page containing a series of headlines and little snippets of opening paragraphs in a news feed format. If you clicked on one of the links, it would...
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World View
Brave Citizen Journalists Provide New Images of Iranian Life
Like many people, I have been watching this so-called "Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, [Insert New Media Application] Revolution" unfold in Iran from the comfort of my own home. Watching the dizzying and horrifying images that have emerged on the Internet has triggered a whirlwind of emotions and thoughts. I was shocked and outraged by the death of Neda. I felt a...
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Weblogs
Zombie Bloggers Create Communal Horror Stories
On June 13, bloggers around the world imagined they were under attack by the living dead, writing short horror narratives for the annual Blog Like It's the End of the World Day (which was especially appropriate for me since it fell on my birthday). But there are some bloggers who blog as if everyday were the end of the world:...
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World View
How Will Iranian Protests Change Twitter?
There's been much ado about Twitter's role in the political protests in Iran, and for good reason. With the Iranian government expelling foreign journalists, outlets like CNN scrambled to uncover sources where they could. They found these sources among the din of unverifiable messages surfacing on Twitter. It's been fun reading mainstream media accounts of how Twitter is, in a...
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Guides
Your Guide to Iran Election News Online
From time to time, I'll give an overview of one broad MediaShift topic, annotated with online resources and plenty of tips. The idea is to help you understand the topic, learn the jargon, and take action. I've already covered Twitter, citizen journalism, alternative models for newspapers and other topics. This week I'll look at Iran election news online. Background...
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AdvertisingShift
Will Digg Users Bury New Digg Ads System?
Since its launch in late 2004, Digg has tried its hand with several outside advertising networks, going from an off-the-shelf Google AdSense arrangement to working with Federated Media before finally signing a deal for Microsoft to deliver its display advertisements. But in April of this year, Digg announced it would end its deal with the software giant in favor of...
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Social Media
Rules of Engagement for Journalists on Twitter
Twitter's role in the Iranian election aftermath leaves no doubt about its power as a global, real time, citizen-journalism style news wire service, along with a tool for facilitating dissent, while countering the view of Twitter as simply a zone for egotistical banality. But it also highlighted Twitter's role as a platform and content generator for traditional media outlets,...
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EducationShift
Why is American University Becoming Center for New Journalism?
I visited American University last month to try to answer a burning question for me: Why was the School of Communications there becoming such a hotbed for new forms of journalism? The Center for Social Media is there. The J-Lab, the Institute for Interactive Journalism, moved to American from the University of Maryland. And Charles Lewis, the founder of...
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Legal Drama
Criminal Cases Push Newspapers to Identify Anonymous Commenters
Anonymous comments on newspapers blogs are drawing attention from prosecutors seeking information about criminal matters, once again raising the issue of whether newspaper blog comments are protected under state press shield laws. Last fall, I wrote about two civil cases involving claims of defamation, where two separate courts refused to order newspapers to disclose information that would lead to the...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Special Iran Election Edition
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's special edition, I look at the way that social media have played a vital role in the breaking news happening in Iran after their contested presidential election. Though the government has cracked down on the opposition, censored the media and blocked websites and even text messaging, the news has...
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NewspaperShift
5 Ways a Community Manager Can Help Your Media Outlet
Recently, the New York Times appointed its first ever community manager, someone to "concentrate full-time on expanding the use of social media networks and publishing platforms to improve New York Times journalism and deliver it to readers." Of course, the New York Times is a huge operation, and has an enormous community of print and online readers/users. Do we at...
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NewspaperShift
Being in the hospital on an I.V. for a number of days put me in touch with the suffering of newspapers. I was down but not out. I have polycystic kidney disease (PKD) and one of my cysts had ruptured, causing severe pain and the temporary loss of kidney functioning in my right kidney. Not fun. But while I was...
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Social Media
How Journalists Balance Work, Personal Lives on Twitter
Twitter is continuing to make headlines around the world as it amasses followers. But it's also making an impact on the newsmakers themselves. Journalists are invading the space at a rapid pace and learning to report live, crowdsource stories and engage with a whole new audience...in 140 characters or less. It may not be revolutionary -- many journalists view the...
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Social Networking
Journalists Should Customize Social Networks to Maximize Experience
Online social networks are essential tools for journalists. They make it possible to build extended networks, search for story ideas, build contacts and dig up information. But even more important, they help to shake up the relationship between the individual journalist and the people formerly known as the audience. But many journalists don't know how to get the full benefit...
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Legacy Media
WSJ's D Conference Fumbles Transition to Web 3.0
CARLSBAD, CALIF. -- The organizers of the tony, high-priced tech conference known as D All Things Digital, included a manifesto of sorts in the program guide titled "Welcome to Web 3.0." In that treatise, organizers Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher define Web 3.0 as "the real arrival, after years of false predictions, of the thin client, running clean, simple...
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Social Media
How Journalists Are Using Twitter in Australia
Twitter became big news once journalists realized its power as a tool for breaking stories during the Mumbai Massacre in 2008. In the aftermath of the micro-blogging platform hitting the headlines, there was an explosion of professional journalists in the Twittersphere. This growth has been fueled by increasing mainstream awareness of the importance of social media to the future of...
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Weblogs
Media Criticism Flourishes Online, Putting Legacy Media Under Microscope
In November 2007, Time Magazine columnist Joe Klein wrote a piece for the magazine chastising House Democrats for wording in their version of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Not long after the column hit the web, Salon columnist Glenn Greenwald wrote a piece arguing that "for the sake of its own credibility, Time Magazine needs immediately to prohibit Joe Klein...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: WSJ's Social Media Guidelines; NYT's Pay Plans
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. This week I look at the Wall Street Journal's code of conduct for reporters and editors, with guidelines for using Twitter and social media sites. Plus, the New York Times is considering two different plans for charging for online content -- a metering system and subscription system -- according to a report...
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MobileShift
Live-Blogging EconSM Gathering About Social Networking on Mobiles
SAN FRANCISCO -- I am at the UCSF Mission Bay Conference Center right down the hill from where I live in Potrero Hill. Yes, it is "Bike to Work Day" today in San Francisco, but I couldn't bike down in nice clothes. So I split the difference and walked most of the way here. The topic is how social...
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5Across
Twitter Mania: Will Twitter Change the World?
Twitter has become a multi-headed phenomenon since MediaShift devoted a week to covering micro-blogging two years ago. Twitter is now established as a new form of communication, an early warning system for breaking news, and a startup company in San Francisco that has no discernable income. And with the power of Oprah, CNN and Ashton Kutcher, it has become...
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Wikis
Wikipedia Art: Vandalism or Performance Art?
Artists Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern developed the idea to create a self-referencing Wikipedia article late last year. The plan was to write a new article, titled Wikipedia Art that was wholly devoted to the fact that the page had been created -- an article that was completely meta and self-referential. The axiom that all press is good press is...
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NewspaperShift
Journalists Can Embrace Emotions and Remain Neutral
Very recently I did something weird. Normally, when moderating our online community at Mediafin, I first read the news articles before I read the comments left by community members. Feeling a bit bored, I reversed this. I started by reading the comments and tried to figure out what the articles were about. It was a weird (but rather subversive) sensation...
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MagazineShift
Vanity Fair, New Yorker Fan Blogs Give Free PR to Conde Nast
The Twitter user who writes under the handle Vanityfairer would not tell me her real name. She began following me in December after I mentioned the magazine Vanity Fair in a tweet, and for the next few months we exchanged replies and direct messages about the magazine's content and its writers. Though she made no claims to be associated...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Swine Flu Online; Disney Joins Hulu
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. This week I look at the positive -- and negative -- way the Internet, blogs and Twitter have spread information about the swine flu. There are great resources, maps and tracking sites, but it's easy to get in a panic as well. Also, Disney joined up in the video site Hulu, putting...
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EducationShift
Advice from the Pros to Journalism Graduates
It's an anxious time to be graduating from journalism school. The economy is in the tank and newsrooms are being decimated. But yet, it is also a great time to be a journalist, with more news and information available than ever before and more ways than ever to reach audiences. At the recent International Symposium on Online Journalism at...
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Culture
How Charities Harness Social Media to Raise Awareness, Money
On April 14, actor Hugh Jackman pledged to give AUS $100,000 to the charity that could best convince him, via Twitter, that it was deserving of the award. On Friday, Jackman announced that, unable to decide, he had chosen two winners to split the prize: Operation of Hope, a medical foundation that donates surgical procedures to children in developing countries...
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4MR
4 Minute Roundup: Pirate Bay Case; Oprah-geddon on Twitter
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. This week I look at the recent ruling in the Pirate Bay case, where four men at the file-sharing site were found guilty and sentenced to a year in prison -- but are asking for a retrial due to a conflict of interest by the judge. I also mention @Oprah's entry to...
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Legal Drama
Coalinga Newspaper Not Liable for Running MySpace Rant
A post on a social networking site like MySpace could end up anywhere, and depending upon where it ends up, the result could be catastrophic. We've covered that territory before on MediaShift, discussing a case involving discipline of a teacher for conduct shown on a MySpace page. In Moreno v. Hanford Sentinel, a California appeals court considered a case...
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PoliticalShift
Live-Blogging Netroots Nation's New Media Summit
SAN FRANCISCO -- I am in the swanky Bently Reserve building in downtown San Francisco for the Netroots Nation's New Media Summit, affliated with the liberal blog Daily Kos. On the agenda today are panels on the evolution of journalism and new media, the wisdom of crowds, social media for social good, and using video to expand your audience....
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4MR
4-Minute Roundup: #AmazonFail; Journalism Online; Ashton Kutcher Speaks!
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. This week I look at the controversy surrounding #AmazonFail, a protest that formed on Twitter when the giant bookseller delisted thousands of gay-themed books from its bestseller lists. Amazon eventually said it was a mistake by an employee in France, but the PR damage was done. I also look at the unveiling...
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Public Relations
Amazon's Fail: Not Using Social Media to React to #AmazonFail Meme
In what some initially speculated to be a homophobic new expurgation policy, Amazon.com removed hundreds of gay and lesbian themed books from its sales rating system, effectively concealing these books from online shoppers. Some titles were completely delisted from Amazon's search engine. The controversy may never have provoked such widespread media attention -- or an official company response -- if...
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EducationShift
How to Teach Yourself About Social Media When J-Schools Fail
Journalism is changing rapidly due to social media, and these changes can be bewildering as people wonder how to keep up. I recently gave a social media workshop for journalism students, and I soon realized that many students were still unaware of social media other than Facebook. They were shocked to hear about feed readers, blogs, or micro-blogging and asked...
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EducationShift
Turning a College Lecture into a Conversation with CoverItLive
Journalists who also teach will know that one of the challenges of teaching a large, undergraduate class is the sheer number of students. It can be hard to foster a discussion in a lecture hall, where many students may be too intimidated to speak up. So instead the lesson often becomes a lecture, as the professor stands up in front...
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4MR
4-Minute Roundup: HuffPost Investigative Fund; AP on Mobile Apps
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. This week I look at the new Huffington Post Investigative Journalism Fund, which has $1.75 million to start a new non-partisan site that will do investigative work and then give it away to any news organization. I also look at the latest moves by Disney, distributing video on YouTube and possibly on...
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AdvertisingShift
Political Blogs' Double Whammy: Post-Election, Deep Recession
This week several major bloggers -- most politically right-of-center -- will see the shuttering of their blog ad network. Pajamas Media, which launched in 2004 and provided advertising for conservative bloggers like Glenn Reynolds and Michelle Malkin, announced earlier this year that it would close down its display advertising for blogs in order to put more focus on its online...
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MusicShift
Maximizing the SXSW Experience with Social Media
Every year, thousands of bands, music industry professionals, and hardcore fans flock to Austin, Texas for the mighty South By Southwest (SXSW) music festival. Over the course of nine days, three distinct but interwoven conferences take place -- Interactive, Music, and Film. For the uninitiated, SXSW can be an overwhelming, daunting experience. But for tech-savvy patrons, technology has made the...
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Legal Drama
'Fox & Friends' Hosts Not Liable for Repeating Associated Content Parody
As newspapers are closing or abandoning their print editions, online news sources are growing in importance -- as are sites that rely on user-submitted news stories. But with so much unfiltered news content available online, how do you separate the accurate from the inaccurate and truth from parody? You might think that traditional news sources would be better able...
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NewspaperShift
Newspaper Cartoonists Engage Audiences (Including Haters) Online
I once worked for a daily newspaper, where there were two things guaranteed to generate letters to the editor: articles about cats and the comics section. Readers didn't have much to say about our coverage of local elections or big trials, but we were sure to receive letters if someone disagreed with the slant of an editorial cartoon or didn't...
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4MR
4-Minute Roundup: All Things Twitter!
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. This week is a special edition devoted almost entirely to Twitter. I talk about the huge popularity of Twitter now -- with 9.8 million unique visitors to its website alone in February, according to comScore -- and how the startup is now bringing in revenues thanks to a deal with Federated Media...
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MarketingShift
'Cluetrain Manifesto' Still Relevant 10 Years Later
When The Cluetrain Manifesto appeared on the web in 1999, neither its supporters nor its authors believed it was trying to say anything particularly new. Rather, the 95 theses and the following chapters -- written in almost a stream of consciousness, psychoanalytic style befitting of something labeled a "manifesto" -- were thought to merely point out the obvious to the...
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Digging Deeper
New Gatekeepers Twitter, Apple, YouTube Need Transparency in Editorial Picks
There was a time when all you needed was a good record review in Rolling Stone or a stellar book review in the New York Times to get a boost in sales and popularity. But as those old gatekeepers lose their cachet in the digital age, a new set of gatekeepers has sprung up and they don't have bylines. These...
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Philosophy
Farewell to the Tyranny of Reporters
When I give lectures about the future of journalism, recently I have been making reference to the weakening, if not the entire overthrow, of what I term The Dictatorship of the Writer. What I mean is simply that in the pre-Internet past reporters and writers of various sorts would nose about a subject and after a certain amount of research...
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4MR
4-Minute Roundup: State of the Media; Jurors' Itchy Twitter Finger
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I talk about the new gloomy State of the Media report from the Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ), and the positive side for online media. I ask "Just One Question" to PEJ director Tom Rosensteil, and cover the latest news about jurors going online, Twittering and Facebooking...
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MagazineShift
Mother Jones Boosts Community in Site Revamp
As digital technology wreaks havoc on the business models of legacy media such as newspapers and magazines, they are now turning more often to the non-profit model. Can they raise donations, micropayments, or get grants? They might want to check out a magazine that's been a pioneer with the non-profit model, and first went online in 1993: Mother Jones. The...
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NewspaperShift
How Print Publications Can Help Hyper-Local Sites
The New York Times is going into the hyper-local news business, as reported by Zachary Seward at the NiemanJournalismLab. It is just one example of hyper-local -- also called community journalism, beat reporting, or representative journalism -- in action. Other instances include Kennesee State university Professor Leonard Witt's Representative Journalism in Georgia and community news site Patch.com. It's not clear...
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Thought Leader Q&A
BlogTalkRadio Lets Anyone (Including the Pentagon) Start Talk Shows
BlogTalkRadio CEO Alan Levy: "Three or four months into doing this, we started broadcasting live from Afghanistan, with an embed there named Scott Kesterson. Every Friday morning he would be live from Kabul or from Kandahar, and people could listen in and ask him questions. And the soldiers were listening to what was going on...Now, the Pentagon has a network on BlogTalkRadio. Now you know the medium has arrived when the Pentagon is embracing it."
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MusicShift
Five Tips for Musicians to Engage Their Fans Digitally
There was a time when celebrity musicians were positioned as unreachable idols. Those days are long gone; in today's wired marketplace, musicians have to forge a personal relationship with their audience to keep their fans' interest. And for many, that means creating opportunities for fans to have an inside look into all aspects of an artist's life.
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4MR
4-Minute Roundup: Hearst E-Reader; Boxee vs. Hulu
Here's the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week's edition, I talk about how the New York Times launches hyper-local sites right as Google's Tim Armstrong launches Patch.com hyper-local sites -- both in New Jersey. Plus, Hearst says it will develop a new e-reader device like a Kindle, but with a larger, flexible screen, likely coming from E-Ink,...
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5Across
Lively Roundtable Discussion on Making Compelling Online Video
When I launched MediaShift in early 2006, I wanted to go beyond writing about all the trends in online media -- blogging, podcasting, online video, etc. -- and actually do those things myself. Walk my talk. I recently launched the 4-Minute Roundup audio podcast, and today I'm launching a new monthly video roundtable called 5Across that will include 5...
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Embedded Report
Developing Social Media Workshops for Journalists
For the last few weeks, my colleague Raphael and I have been organizing a series of social media workshops for our fellow journalists at the Belgian business newspapers and websites De Tijd and L'Echo. I'd like to open this up to reader suggestions, so let me tell you what we intend to cover in this course -- and I hope...
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Weblogs
Diet Bloggers Deal in Brutal Honesty in Quest for Weight Loss
On February 11, Scott Schroeder fell. He'd eaten at a McDonald's for supper and gorged himself on a Big Mac, fries, regular Coke, and a dollar chicken sandwich. And though he managed to pull out of the trenches the next morning, he fell from grace later that day when he stopped at a Taco Bell and ate two soft tacos,...
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Legal Drama
How Animal Rights Activists Beat the Rodeos in Videotaping Events
As cell phone cameras and palm-sized videocams have become cheap and ubiquitous, there is little if anything that is immune from being documented and displayed on the web, as numerous celebrities and sports stars have learned to their regret. In the realm of hard news, the result is that citizen journalists are able to bypass big media news organizations and...
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PoliticalShift
How Obama Inspired Israeli Politicians' Online Campaigns
Just as television changed the way political campaigns were run in the 1960s, the Internet has changed the way political campaigns are run in the 2000s. Upwards of 70 million people watched the more aesthetically-pleasing JFK debating the more radio-suited Nixon on the tube in 1960. Nearly 50 years later, the YouTube debates of 2008 allowed people to ask their...
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Thought Leader Q&A
Productivity Guru Gina Trapani Balances Blogging, Coding, Community
This is one in an occasional series on MediaShift where I discuss issues in-depth with thought leaders in online media. The format has changed to give you a profile of the person, as well as more of our dialogue -- including audio clips. If you have suggestions for future Q&As or want to participate yourself, drop me a line via...
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Social Networking
How Celebrity Imposters Hurt Twitter's Credibility
By the time the news spread that the Dalai Lama had opened a Twitter account it no longer seemed such a novelty that a high profile individual would join the micro-blogging service, even if he was a divine being. The account gathered nearly 20,000 followers before Twitter pulled the plug two days later when representatives of the Tibetan leader informed...
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Digging Deeper
Reuters Closes Second Life Bureau, but (Virtual) Life Goes On
The sun shines brightly as I stroll along the curving pier above the water, looking out toward a beautiful island with trees swaying in the wind. There's a looming ampitheater festooned with signs for Thomson Reuters, and a series of concrete buildings that appear ready to hold important meetings. I stride in confidently through the doorway... You might think...
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EducationShift
5 Challenges for Small College Media and How to Overcome Them
When people talk about online innovation in college media, they tend to start big and stay there. And it's true that large circulation college newspapers (and big name journalism programs) have been doing some impressive things online, but the need to innovate extends to smaller journalism programs as well. And for them, the challenges can be daunting. So what are...
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World View
Monarchs Use 'Lese Majeste' Laws to Silence Online Critics
"When it comes to a monarchy, all reason goes away," according to a Thai reporter quoted in a Reporters Without Borders report on free expression in Thailand published this week. He was commenting on the multiple charges of lese majeste -- injury or insult to the king -- brought against journalists and writers in his country, where speaking negatively about...
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World View
How Social Media War Was Waged in Gaza-Israel Conflict
Both sides deployed dangerous new media weapons during this latest round of fighting in Gaza. Armed with Facebook profiles, Twitter accounts, and Lavazza espresso, warriors fearlessly and tirelessly scoured the cyber battlefield searching for enemy (blog) outposts. Outfitted with high-tech ammunition like HD videocameras, firewire 800s, and white phosphorescent keyboards, they attacked one-sided videos, slanted essays, and enemy propaganda with...
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EducationShift
Budding Journalists Use Twitter, Blogs to Open Doors
One of my students landed her first A1 story on Monday. Amanda Ash's story on auditions for the sequel to the teen vampire blockbuster "Twilight" was splashed across the front page of the Vancouver Sun. But she first alerted me, and her 130 other followers on Twitter, to the tears and tantrums at the event on Sunday evening when it...
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Weblogs
Can 'The Printed Blog' Succeed with Blogs in Newspaper Form?
If the entire media industry is a river that is slowly but persistently moving toward the Internet, then one could picture Joshua Karp as a canoeist paddling against the current, trying to take the online realm and solidify it into print. I first heard of his new business venture, The Printed Blog, from a colleague of mine who runs a...
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Public Relations
In Hudson River Landing, PR Pros Were Not First Responders
In times of crisis, communications professionals have an important -- and increasingly complicated -- role to play. We used to be the first to offer public responses to catastrophes, able to develop elucidating messages before much of the news media was on the scene. Nowadays, the type of media that will report on a crisis is often as unforeseen as...
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Thought Leader Q&A
Rufus Griscom Mixes High, Low Brow on Babble Parenting Site
Rufus Griscom: "Online content, if it's not user-aggregated or user-generated, is seen as rather old and creaky. But I would argue that there are lots of shades of gray. All of the online content sites are becoming a hybrid of user-aggregated, user-generated and edited content, because feedback and citizen journalism and ratings and suggestions are becoming part of these sites."
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Social Media
Journalists Still a-Twitter About Social Media
Journalists are obsessed with Twitter. Obsessed. They use it, talk about it, analyze it, deconstruct it, reconstruct it, love it, hate it, capitalize on it, become experts on it, monetize it, argue about it, and become micro-famous on it. They are mesmerized with what it is and they are as giddy as Tom Cruise on Oprah just thinking about what...
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EducationShift
How Journalism Students Used Twitter to Report on Australian Elections
The micro-blogging platform Twitter was the breakthrough social media tool for journalists in 2008. It became a pipeline for breaking news for both professional reporters and citizen journalists, with the massacre in Mumbai, the Hudson River plane crash and Obama's inauguration highlighting its effectiveness as a source of live, user-generated online content. Journalists increasingly used it to cross-promote their own...
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NewspaperShift
How Niche Bloggers Fill Gaps Left by Local Newspapers, Alt-Weeklies
On December 11, Ben Tribbett checked his phone messages and found two waiting for him from Virginia gubernatorial candidates Terry McAuliffe and Creigh Deeds. And when he opened his inbox that same day he had received an email sent by another candidate, Brian Moran. All three messages were to wish him a happy birthday. The fact that three high-level politicians...
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Digging Deeper
Warning: Dependence on Facebook, Twitter Could Be Hazardous to Your Business
You've probably heard how much the micro-blogging service Twitter can help your business, or that being on social networking site Facebook can boost your company's profile. But what you might not have considered is the potential danger in over-relying on these startups that could go out of business, get bought out, or close your account if you aren't familiar with...
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Legal Drama
U.S. Supreme Court (Finally) Kills Online Age Verification Law
In 1998, the U.S. Congress enacted the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), a law intended to control child access to sexually explicit material on the Internet. The law was immediately challenged on free speech and other grounds and its enforcement was delayed. After ten years of litigation, on January 22 the U.S. Supreme Court dealt the final blow to...
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PoliticalShift
Obama, Congress Enlist 'Direct to Constituent' Communications
Professional communicators are paying close attention to the rise of "direct to consumer" (DTC) communications. This is a phenomenon largely enabled by the rapid proliferation and adoption of online technologies, whereby organizations can communicate directly to the public without filters or mediation from the press. Corporate blogs or advocacy groups' online "action alerts" are just a couple examples. As a...
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Media Usage
How Forwarded Email Jokes, Hoaxes Evolved with Social Media
When I first ventured online in the late '90s, my in-box was constantly flooded with email forwards. Friends and co-workers alike tossed around lists of jokes, hoaxes and cautionary urban legends, pleas about a dying child in Idaho that needed your prayers or horror stories about human fingers discovered in fast food hamburgers. Today it seems that there are fewer...
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Embedded Report
The Big Video Debate: Rough or Slick?
Video is one of those new practices we have to get used to as newspaper journalists now working in a Web 2.0 world. One of the key issues is the quality of the video. Do we always need slick, television-style video, which require more specialized skills, or will our community accept "rougher" video, made by amateurs using less sophisticated cameras?...
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Online Video
YouTube Helps Video Journalists Get a Start
When discussing the travails of major news outlets online, it's not uncommon for someone to mention the effect that companies like Google and Craigslist have had. But seemingly overlooked in this debate is Google's own YouTube, which has become a breeding ground for unknown and upcoming filmmakers and broadcast journalists. In what way could the online video giant use its...
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Education
Experimentation (Not Stagnation) Should Flourish at J-Schools
Some journalism academics may be even more scared of new technology and more resistant to change than the worst print "dinosaurs" working in media today. But Web 2.0 has made getting online so simple that there are no more excuses for being disconnected. While some reporters see journalism education as a potential refuge from the rapid pace of change in...
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Embedded Report
More Time for Blogging! The Future Is Already Behind Us
At Mediafin, we started the year with some ambitious plans for our blogging activities. We want to create new blogs to involve more people, but we also want to become more active on our existing blogs. I'll tell you about what we're doing, the reasons behind it and how things seem to be working out at this early stage, as...
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Weblogs
Can Blog Awards Identify Quality Online Content?
I met the news that my blog, Bloggasm, had been nominated for a 2008 Weblog Award with a mixture of amusement and apathy. I had watched last year as my RSS feeds became clogged with the incestuous link trolling common with such contests. The Weblog Awards, like others of its kind, are based on a popular vote, guaranteeing that most...
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Citizen Journalism
Ushahidi Platform Used to Document Congo, Gaza Crises
Bloggers have always been timely in their response to local, regional and international crises and Kenyan bloggers were no different when violence broke out following the December 2007 elections. Within nine days Ushahidi, "a platform that crowdsources crisis information," was born. But that open source platform is now being "localized" to cover conflicts in other global hotspots, including in the...
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PoliticalShift
Government 2.0: How Social Media Could Transform Gov PR
It's easy to see governments as nameless, faceless monoliths, something impersonal or, even worse, untrustworthy. Much of that is because government culture remains steeped in traditional ideas about public relations and outreach work, notions that have become archaic in an Internet-enabled, hyper-connected world. Just as private companies are learning to embrace social media to manage brand reputations, governments must adapt...
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Weblogs
Can Technorati Beat Google at Blog Search?
"It doesn't matter what Internet business you're in," Richard Jalichandra, the CEO of blog search engine Technorati told me recently. "You're either going to have direct or indirect competition with Google and that's just the way it is...[Google is] not the 800 pound gorilla, it's the 80,000 pound gorilla." But unlike most competitors to Google, Technorati still seems to have...
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EducationShift
The Place of Blogs in Journalism Education
Blogs have become part of the editorial furniture of most news sites. In the U.S., 95% of the top 100 newspapers feature reporter blogs. So it seems appropriate to include blogging in the curriculum of journalism schools. For the past couple of years, my students at the UBC Graduate School of Journalism have written blogs as part of their course...
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TVShift
Public-Access TV Fights for Relevance in the YouTube Age
Public-access television is a sometimes bizarre world where anyone with the time and inclination can appear on television. It's where you find the rants of Colombus, Ohio, goth Damon Zex and the strange instructional videos of Let's Paint TV, where Los Angeles host John Kilduff taught viewers how to paint and make blended drinks all while exercising on a treadmill....
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World View
Innovative Web Video Series Shows Real Life in Gaza, Israel
One sense of fear, two armies, and three rows of electrical fences separate Israel and the Gaza Strip. For the past 10 years, it has been difficult for residents of these two places to ever imagine meeting one another in person. Now, thanks to a new documentary project produced by French/German television station Arte TV and a handful of Israeli...
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World View
Vietnam Cracks Down on Dissident Blogger Dieu Cay
In Vietnam, speaking out against the government can come with a hefty price. Blogger Dieu Cay ("the Peasant Water Pipe") -- or Nguyen Van Haias in real life -- is learning this the hard way. The 56-year-old man is serving a 30-month jail sentence on a trumped-up charge of tax fraud, a poor excuse for the government to try to...
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NewspaperShift
Pulitzers Open to Online-Only Entrants -- But Who Qualifies?
When it was announced earlier this year that Joshua Marshall, founder of TalkingPointsMemo, had become the first blogger to win a George Polk Award for his coverage of the attorney firing scandal, many recognized the news as a milestone for online journalism. A somewhat condescending New York Times headline read, "Blogger, Sans Pajamas, Rakes Muck and a Prize." Earlier this...
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Embedded Report
Wikis Still Slow to Catch on Internally, Externally
Our newsroom at Mediafin is transforming into an integrated multimedia operation. To prepare for this, we recently decided to create two wikis to stimulate talk and facilitate media training programs. At the same time we also created another wiki to encourage discussion amongst our readers. In this very early phase of the experiments, I learned that wikis are still an...
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Social Networking
Dealing with Friend Inflation on Twitter, Digg
It happens several times a day now. Ever since I opened my Twitter account approximately three months ago, the follow alerts have been gradually increasing in frequency to the point that they clutter up my email inbox if I don't clean them out often enough. "Jessica Kositz (jkositz) is now following your updates on Twitter" my latest alert tells me,...
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Digging Deeper
Video Report from the Czech Online Media World
A funny thing happened on my way to Eastern Europe last week. I sent out a Twitter message saying I was heading to Prague and Berlin and wondered if there were any bloggers or online media people I could meet. I got a reply from Robert Cox of the Media Bloggers Association (MBA), telling me that Radim Hasalik in Prague...
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NewspaperShift
A Newspaper's Role in Bringing the Community Together
Modern newsrooms have to engage in a never-ending conversation with their community. This may sound self-evident, but it can be a tough sell in a newsroom working under high pressure. So how do you get reporters to buy into the proposition that they need to listen to their audience? They need to see for themselves the enthusiasm that the community...
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AdvertisingShift
Is Six Apart's 'TypePad Journalist Bailout Program' a Gimmick?
The vultures are circling. What was once a small trickle of layoffs at major newspapers has become a waterfall of lost jobs within the media business. One can almost picture the Poynter Institute's widely read journalism industry blog Romenesko sauntering up to Time Inc. and Conde Nast and screaming, "Bring out your dead!" But one advertising and blogging company is...
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AdvertisingShift
Project Wonderful, Blogads, FM Go Beyond Click-Through Ads
For new bloggers looking to build up their reader base, it's not always enough just to write well; you need to advertise, to get the word out. And what better way to advertise than with ads? Unfortunately, most advertising online still leaves much to be desired, both for advertisers trying to get noticed and for host sites trying to earn...
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MagazineShift
Pulp Magazines Struggle to Survive in Wired World
Every year Locus Magazine, "The Magazine Of The Science Fiction & Fantasy Field," publishes a year-in-review of the genre. This summation always includes a rundown of the circulation of the remaining speculative fiction magazines, sometimes referred to as the "pulps" because of the cheap wood pulp paper on which they used to be printed. In their heyday there were dozens...
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World View
Burmese Blogger Sentenced to 20 Years For Reporting on Protests
In many countries, you have to commit a serious crime to be sentenced to 20 years in jail, but in Burma this can happen just for using the Internet. There are almost 69 cyber-dissidents in jail worldwide, yet Burma's Nay Phone Latt has become the first blogger to receive such a lengthy prison term. His crime? To have informed the...
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Digging Deeper
Can Crowdfunding Help Save the Journalism Business?
Bands do it. Filmmakers do it. President-elect Barack Obama made an artform out of it. "It" is crowdfunding, getting micro-donations through the Internet to help fund a venture. The question is whether crowdfunding can work on a larger scale to help fund traditional journalism, which is being hit by the twin storms of readership and ad declines at newspapers and...
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World View
Nigeria Joins List of Countries Harassing Bloggers
On October 19, U.S.-based Nigerian blogger and journalist Jonathan Elendu of Elendu Reports was arrested by the Nigerian State Security Services (SSS) upon his arrival at Abuja airport. It was some days before the SSS announced that Elendu had been charged, first with money laundering and then sedition. Yet another report claimed he was charged with sponsoring a guerilla news...
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World View
Video Report from Jeff Pulver's Tel Aviv Breakfast Meetup
I thought I was going to a breakfast where people actually ate food. But food is hardly the top priority at a Jeff Pulver breakfast, where people are too busy pitching their latest ideas to investors, scoping out the competition, or scoping out the eligible singles on the market. Jeff is known for being one of leading innovators in voice-over-IP...
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Weblogs
Poll Crashers Tilt Unscientific Polls Their Way
During the Republican National Convention, NOW, a PBS weekly TV news magazine, posted an unscientific poll on its website asking viewers to vote on whether they thought vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin was qualified for the position. Like most polls the show posts every week, it was taken down from the front page and replaced by a new one after...
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Embeds
FriendFeed Widget Motivates Reporters to Use Social Media
Blogs should be conversations. At least, that is how we think about blogging at Mediafin, Belgium's leading publisher of business newspapers and websites. This last week, I have been busy reorganizing our major financial blog, Bear&Bull, adding FriendFeed widgets in hopes of encouraging more audience interaction. The results have been surprising -- although the audience has been slow to react,...
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Embeds
NYU Local Blog Connects a School with No Campus
The idea for NYU Local, the newest addition to New York University's list of publications, was born last year when founder and editor Cody Brown, 20, came up with the idea for a survey to be conducted by the Foundations of Journalism class. The survey question asked other NYU students: "Would you trade your right to vote for an iPod...
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PoliticalShift
Citizens, Media Use Social Media to Monitor Election
In a YouTube video uploaded on October 24, a husband and wife couple from Oregon sit at their kitchen table and fill out their mail-in voting ballots for the 2008 election. The wife explains to the camera that Oregon has had mail-in voting for "about the last 10 years," and the two walk the viewer through the entire voting process,...
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Legal Drama
Judges Rule Anonymous Commenters Protected by State Shield Laws
Political campaigns often produce a blizzard of ancillary election-related litigation -- for an example, just look to the 2000 presidential campaign. When the press reports anonymous accusations during an election campaign, sometimes that litigation involves lawsuits by candidates or public officials seeking to learn the identity of those anonymous sources. In many states, newspapers and other media can protect such...
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Weblogs
Econ Bloggers Gain Clout in Financial Crisis
Late last month Dean Starkman, a writer for the Columbia Journalism Review, penned a scathing piece titled "Ouryay Eatbay Just Ewblay Upyay." The essay is addressed to members of the mainstream business press and proclaims dramatically in the opening paragraphs that their beat "just blew up." Starkman wags his finger at economic reporters, chastising the business beat as a group...
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EducationShift
Learning How to Make Multimedia Story Decisions
Multimedia journalism is one of those terms often used to refer to a wide range of online content. Recently, I began a discussion with my students at the UBC Graduate School of Journalism to define exactly what the term means and how we can harness the many forms of online media to produce quality journalism. We started by first asking...
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Digging Deeper
How 'Follower Spam' Infiltrated Twitter -- and How to Stop It
When using the micro-blogging service Twitter, by default you get email notices whenever anyone signs up to "follow" you (when you follow someone on Twitter, their Twitter posts, or "tweets," display on your main Twitter page, along with Tweets from everyone else you follow). A few weeks back, I noticed that I was getting inundated with new followers with names...
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World View
China Blocks Blogs, Search Results on Tainted Milk Scandal
The evidence is accumulating. The censorship imposed on the Chinese media about the contaminated milk scandal has had disastrous consequences according to Reporters Without Borders. Last July, a journalist working for the investigative weekly Nanfang Zhoumo (Southern Weekend) gathered reliable information regarding a wave of hospitalizations of new-born babies, with four killed and 53,000 sickened. These illnesses were linked to...
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Citizen Journalism
How Political Diarists Power RedState, Daily Kos
In October of last year, a man named Leon H Wolf published a post on the front page of influential conservative blogging community RedState titled, "Attention, Ron Paul Supporters (Life is REALLY Not Fair)." One of a handful of bloggers who run the site, Wolf and his blogging colleagues decided to virtually ban all promotion for then-presidential candidate Ron Paul...
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Legal Drama
Teacher Fired for Inappropriate Behavior on MySpace Page
It's not just students who can get into difficulty for school-related blogging. In a recent case, a federal court rejected a challenge brought by a non-tenured teacher when the public school at which he taught decided not to renew his contract. The school had accused the teacher of overly familiar contacts with students via his MySpace page that were deemed...
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EducationShift
J-Schools Use Geo-tagging, Wikis, iPhones to Teach
Professors are commonly stereotyped as people who know more about books than technology. But as classrooms are now filled with a generation who grew up with computers, iPods and the Internet, more and more professors are starting to experiment with new digital learning tools. At last week's Convergence and Society conference at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, academics...
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World View
Africa News Empowers Citizens to Report Online
Over the past couple of months I have been following a new African news portal, Africa News, the latest in the 12-year history of African online news media. Africa News goes much further than previous attempts to create online news communities serving Africa; the site includes content submitted by locally based citizen journalists who use mobile phones and the Internet...
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Weblogs
Journalists Consider Risks, Conflicts of Running Personal Blogs
Implementing strategies developed by millions of office workers who have honed the practice of flipping from computer solitaire to spreadsheets at the first sign of a lurking supervisor, I hid my blog from my co-workers. I had been a blogger for nearly four years by the time I entered the newspaper industry in 2006, and when I later accepted a...
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Online Video
Can Pulitzer Contest Boost Serious Journalism on YouTube?
Whenever news breaks, the first people on the ground, before reporters arrive, are ordinary folks with cameras. Citizen journalists have played an important role in getting us the first glimpses of developing news, from the London transit bombings to the Southeast Asian tsunami to the Virginia Tech massacre. With the advent of YouTube as a hub for video-sharing, there's finally...
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Weblogs
Scott Rosenberg Traces the Blogosphere's Origins
In July of last year, the Wall Street Journal published an article titled "Happy Blogiversary," claiming that it had officially been 10 years since the blog was born. The writer cited Jorn Barger, owner of a site called Robot Wisdom, as the first blogger. After all, it was Barger who first coined the term weblog in 1997, a word that...
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Digging Deeper
NYU Professor Stifles Blogging, Twittering by Journalism Student
After New York University journalism student Alana Taylor wrote her first embed report for MediaShift on September 5, it didn't take long for her scathing criticism of NYU to spread around the web and stir conversations. Taylor thought that her professor, Mary Quigley, was not up to speed on social media and podcasting -- even though the class she...
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PoliticalShift
How Greenwald's Brave New Films Spreads Its Political Message Online
Last month, Politico's Mike Allen asked presidential hopeful John McCain the seemingly innocent question of how many houses he owned. McCain's response -- "I'll have my staff get to you" -- became a major focus for both the media and Obama's campaign, who repeated it in just about every speech to illustrate that the Republican candidate was "out of...
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World View
Activists Face Obstacles Online in Winning Women's Rights in Iran
Women in Iran have learned to unleash the Internet's potential to promote freedom. In the country that has, according to the OpenNet Initiative, experienced the most explosive online growth in the Middle East, the Internet has become a battleground between a repressive regime and the increasingly active feminists demanding the end of legal discrimination against women. Women activists, who...
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World View
Arab Bloggers Meet to Discuss Free Speech, Reject 'Journalist' Label
BEIRUT -- A quick look at the Regions sidebar on DigiActive, a nine-month old blog that catalogs how activists use digital tools, reveals something unexpected. The site details case studies of online activists from around the world, but by far the largest number of stories involve bloggers from the Middle East and North Africa -- 39 -- compared with...
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Embedded Report
How Synchronous Communication Helped Engage Our Community
Most forums and websites are "asynchronous media" -- meaning that the people you see participating in an online conversation aren't all necessarily online at the same time. One person posts a comment in a forum on Monday, a second poster might reply on Tuesday, the original poster returns again on Thursday, and so on. People move at their own...
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Embedded Report
Blogger Conditions Worsen as Many Defend Palin Pick
Shame on us, the media, for thinking the Republican National Convention would pale in comparison to the Democrats' show in Denver last week. For bloggers on both sides of the aisle here in St. Paul, what the RNC has lacked in strawberry-lemonade smoothies, it has more than made up for with juicy stories. While Hurricane Gustav may have stopped...
more »Digging Deeper
Lessons from Katrina Help Media, Volunteer Efforts in Gustav Coverage
When Hurricane Gustav hit the Gulf Coast, the evacuation of the area went much more smoothly than during Hurricane Katrina three years ago. This time, the local, state and national agencies were more prepared for a potential disaster. Similarly, online media outlets and volunteer efforts were also better prepared for this hurricane, having learned their lessons from the Katrina...
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PoliticalShift
Digg Puts Focus on Politics, Bringing Charges of Liberal Bias
Last week, Digg CEO Jay Adelson sat in a crowded room in Denver holding a stack of papers while facing a camera and trying to project his voice over the cacophony around him. Next to him sat a tired-looking U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who had taken a break from the Democratic National Convention to meet with Adelson....
more »Embeds
Blogs Help Humanize, Demystify Life in the Middle East
JERUSALEM -- Blogs exemplify the best and worst attributes of the Internet (and human nature). At their worst, blogs can be untruthful, bad sources of news and gossip. But without the profit motive, the need for immediacy, and the thirst for conflict, blogs can also help show a more complete picture of the Middle East. At their best, they can be a great source of anti-news and help demystify this murky region.
more »PoliticalShift
Bloggers Make Progress Covering Convention at DNC
DENVER -- Even for members of the traditional media here in Denver, access to floor seating at the convention has been scarce, and talk time with politicians and celebrities at the Democratic National Convention is a game of persistence and luck. Some days you see all the newsmakers, other days you're stuck on the outside with the gawkers, watching...
more »Digging Deeper
The Best 2008 Political Convention Coverage Online
In 2004, the major political conventions gave a few dozen bloggers press credentials, a historic moment for the new media outsiders. And this year, the political conventions have tried to be even more open to bloggers, video reporters, podcasters and new media. The Democratic convention credentialed 120 bloggers, and the GOP has credentialed 200 bloggers, according to Forbes. And the...
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NewspaperShift
Newspapers Can Do Online Video on a Modest Budget
I was as excited as anybody to be able to post video on our website. Our newspaper readers were turning more and more to their computer screen to read our news and it seemed logical that they would appreciate and enjoy seeing video enhancements for the print edition. My excitement soon turned to frustration as I started to run into hurdles.
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PoliticalShift
Will the Big Tent in Denver Help Bloggers Break Through?
As the 2008 Democratic Convention quickly approaches, thousands of journalists will begin swarming into Denver for what is sure to be an around-the-clock media event. Reporters will interview throngs of convention goers to examine every facet of the political landscape and the implications it has for the upcoming election.
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EducationShift
Teaching the Technical Without Losing Sight of Journalism
Classic Hollywood movies tend to idealize the job of the reporter, from Cary Grant in "His Girl Friday" to Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman in "All the President's Men." All they needed was a pen and a notebook. Fast-forward to the 21st century and the picture changes dramatically. Not only would they need to have strong research, reporting and writing skills, the journalists would also be expected to file for the website, upload some photos, shoot video and, of course, write for next day's paper.
more »Thought Leader Q&A
Locative Media Project Aims to Collect Stories of Atlanta
The technology and journalism fields have long been dominated by men, especially in the upper management of big companies. But the J-Lab and McCormick Foundation want to shine the light on new ideas from women who work at mainstream media outlets but want to start something up on the side. That's why they started giving out grants in their...
more »Legal Drama
Should Copyright Law Change in the Digital Age?
This is the final part of my three-part email roundtable discussion looking at the new Code of Best Practices in Fair Use of Online Video created at the behest of the Center for Social Media at American University. In the first part, the respondents in this email roundtable talked about what the Code means, how they might put it...
more »World View
African LGBTI Communities Come Out of the Closet Online
"The closet I have come out of -- it is similar to the wardrobe my relieved parents stepped out of when I unlocked the wardrobe after the police had left. If you're black in South Africa, the inhuman laws of apartheid closet you, if you're gay in South Africa, the homophobic customs of this society closet you. If you...
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Digging Deeper
Commenters Mix Conversation, Self-Promoting Links to Defeat Filters
There was a time not too long ago when you could spot spam comments on a blog from a mile away. There were too many links, the comment was off-topic, and they were trying to promote a pyramid scheme website. But as human and automated filters started catching problematic posters, their techniques became more sneaky. Soon, there were comments...
more »Embedded Report
How Outside Firms Like TownNews.com Can Help Small Newspaper Sites
I decided early on that the best strategy for our newspaper to grow its web presence was to not to hire people, but to find other firms to partner with.
This took us from working with a guy with a server is his apartment to working with a phone company and finally a newspaper-specific host/content management system. We gave up control over many aspects of our website in order to remain flexible.
more »Online Video
Creating a Video to Help Educate People on Fair Use
Last week, I ran the first part of a special three-part series on fair use in online video. With the release of the new Code of Best Practices in Fair Use of Online Video, the question was how this Code might help video producers, remixers and mash-up artists use copyrighted works legally under "fair use" rules. In the first...
more »MediaShift
MediaShift Looking for Embeds, Correspondents, Managing Editor
I just wanted to update readers on changes that are happening here at PBS MediaShift and Idea Lab. In early June, I put out a call for new correspondents and "embeds" to write for MediaShift. I want to add more voices to this blog besides mine, open it up to more ideas and diverse opinions, and get better coverage...
more »Digging Deeper
Will Code of Best Practices Help Video Mash-Up Artists Stay Legal?
You just created the best video mash-up ever, taking a speech given by John McCain broadcast on Fox News, remixing it with the song "Ol' Man River," and quick-cutting in clips from gangsta rappers. You upload it to YouTube and other video-sharing sites, and watch the views pile up. But have you run afoul of copyright law? Do you...
more »Embedded Report
NBC's Penguin Story Goes from Web to 'Nightly News'
It was a seemingly prosaic moment at the end of the "Weekend NBC Nightly News" program Saturday, July 5: Lester Holt wrapped up the show with one of those ever-popular cute animal stories. The piece was about a baby penguin rejected by its mother and now being raised by a zoo worker in Boston. But there was a lot more to this story than met the eye, as Holt hinted at with his introduction: "It's a story we first reported on our website. It got a lot of traffic there, so much in fact that we thought maybe we'd air it right here. So here's NBC's Clare Duffy with our report."
more »Weblogs
EU Member's Plan for 'Blogger Registry' Is Wrong-Headed
When blogs were born over 10 years ago as a way to share the details of one's life with a limited number of people online as a sort of journal, no one could have imagined the importance that this type of D.I.Y. publishing would later take on. Today, bloggers who started out just writing for themselves have empires. Bloggers these days have larger spheres of influence, attracting the eyes of more people -- even presidential candidates. -- and they enjoy the freedom to write whatever they want (within reason) on their blogs.
more »Your Take Roundup
Keep Video Ads Brief, Contextual
Online video usage is exploding online, as people watch everything from YouTube to TV shows to sporting events -- but mainly, YouTube. But the question is how sites will be able to pay for all that usage. Most video viewers would prefer not to pay for them, nor watch any advertising either.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Quick Video Services Spark Conversations, Boredom
Online video has moved way beyond simple video-sharing on YouTube. A growing number of services are allowing users to make video on the fly and stream their material live or near live to the web or from mobile devices. Instant video content, often just conversations between the producer and his or her audience, or video comments back and forth, is much different from content that is recorded, edited and posted onto video-sharing sites like YouTube.
more »Digging Deeper
Online Video Ads Finally Find Their Niche
The numbers tell the story of the disconnect between online videos watched and online video ads sold: In December 2007, Americans watched 10 billion online videos, according to comScore. For the entire year of 2007, advertisers spent just $554 million on online video ads, according to Jupiter, while they spent $21 billion on all online ads. So many people are watching online videos, but so few advertisers are trying to reach them.
more »Open Source Reporting
Educational Centers for Journalism Experiments
Will print newspapers exist in 10 years? How will we fund investigative journalism in the future? How can journalists learn to do reporting, moderating communities, filtering content, building Google Maps and all the other technical and online duties they will need to know?
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
4 Reasons I Don't Use Personalized Start Pages (And 3 Reasons Others Do)
When you open up your Internet browser, what's the first thing you see? Many people opt for personalized start pages, portal-like websites that let you pick and choose the content you want, such as news, weather or updates from social networking sites like Facebook. You can add widgets to your start page, and even create widgets for others to use on their pages.
more »Legal Drama
AP Badly Mistaken on Drudge Retort
Last week, the Associated Press decided that the Drudge Retort was in violation of copyright laws because it excerpted parts of AP stories and linked to them. The AP legal team sent a cease-and-desist letter to Drudge Retort's owner, the technology book author Rogers Cadenhead.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Spain's National Obsession with Mobiles, Texting
A few weeks ago I told you about the perpetuation of print newspapers here in Spain, and in that post I mentioned the fact that you don't see a whole lot of laptops being used on the streets of Barcelona or Madrid. One might think that this is an indication of a lack of love for gadgets. Quite the contrary: You may not see laptops, but what you do see are cell phones -- and tons of them.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Slingbox Lets Me Take Live TV Abroad
Last month, I moved to Spain, and I took my TV with me. Not the actual TV set, but my shows. As I write this, I'm watching a live episode of "Larry King Live," where politicians and pundits are discussing the implications of the Obama victory. It's 9:00 in the morning here in Spain, and even though I'm having breakfast, late-night Larry King and everyone else is truly live, thanks to Slingbox.
more »Digging Deeper
'Technology Sabbath' Offers One Day to Unplug
Lately, I've been experimenting with taking one day each week away from work completely. You might think this would be an easy task as there's a "weekend" each week that allegedly offers up two full days of rest. And yet, as I work at home, the shiny big screen of the iMac beckons at all hours, and I am often in front of its white glow the first thing every morning and the last thing at night.
more »Your Take Roundup
People Get Picky on Adding Friends on Social Media Sites
There comes a time in every person's online life when they have to make a decision: to add or not to add a "friend." I put friend in quotations because that's usually the problem. Is the person a friend, a real friend, or someone who wants to be a friend? Should I add them as a friend because it's polite, or ignore them because I want to protect my personal information?
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
3 Reasons FriendFeed Is Great -- and 3 Ways It Scares Me
Ask me what my mother is doing right now and I couldn't tell you. Or what my best friend has been up to lately...no idea. But with a quick look at my computer screen, I can see what a staggering number of people I barely know are doing right now, 10 minutes ago, or last night. What they are reading, what they are posting and what they are commenting on -- all in one place.
more »Digging Deeper
Newspaper Vet Malcolm Finds Blog Religion with 'Top of the Ticket'
If you have preconceived notions about political blogging, Andrew Malcolm is here to shatter them. Malcolm, 64, has decades of experience as a foreign correspondent and bureau chief at the New York Times, and later as an editorial board member and feature writer for the Los Angeles Times. He has ink in his blood, but when he was tapped by the L.A. Times to help write the new political blog, Top of the Ticket, Malcolm became a quick convert to the online religion.
more »NewspaperShift
Post-Mortem on the Multimedia Boot Camp
For five and a half days, a group of mostly newspaper journalists (with a few broadcasters and non-profit folks thrown in) took an intensive boot camp multimedia training at UC Berkeley through the Knight Digital Media Center. The idea was to learn as much as possible about shooting and editing video, capturing and editing audio, building Flash animations, doing...
more »NewspaperShift
Flash Techniques, and the Participatory Push by Current TV
BERKELEY, CALIF. -- The week-long training at UC Berkeley in multimedia has now moved to a new phase. After getting basic background on audio, video and photographic equipment, we went out into the field on our group's assignment. My group, Team Gecko, went to visit Professor Robert Full to learn about the work he's done in biomechanics. Full's lab...
more »NewspaperShift
Photography Training and Doing More with Less in El Paso
It's now Day 3 in the marathon week-long multimedia boot camp at UC Berkeley run by the Knight Digital Media Center. We have broken into groups to create various multimedia stories, and later today we'll go out to do our primary interviews and video shoots. My group will be meeting with Robert Full, a professor who studies robotics based on animal movements.
more »NewspaperShift
Hands-On Training with Videocameras and Shooting for the Web
BERKELEY, CALIF. -- After our long storyboarding sessions, it's now time to move into more hands-on training and seminars on doing video shooting, audio recording, digital photography and using Macintosh computers. So far, there's been a good mix of lectures, discussions and collaborative work on storyboards for our projects. The group is very inquisitive, and the instructors have done...
more »NewspaperShift
Storyboarding Basics and Finding Your Dream Job
BERKELEY, CALIF. -- It's Day 2 at the Knight Digital Media Center's week-long boot camp for journalists learning to do multimedia reports. On the agenda for the day is learning about doing "storyboarding," or laying out how a multimedia report will work. And there will also be some basic tutorials on using videocameras and techniques in video shooting. (Some...
more »NewspaperShift
Live-Blogging the Multimedia Boot Camp for Newspaper Journalists
BERKELEY, CALIF. -- With MediaShift, I've always had a plan to add video and audio along with all the text reports I do here. As I want to "walk my talk" about media outlets using multimedia, I felt it made sense to do them myself. This week, I'll be auditing a week-long boot camp in multimedia training at the...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Are Print Newspapers Alive and Well in Spain?
From a picture window in an office from where I am writing in the Gracia neighborhood of Barcelona, I can see the same sights I could see from a similar window in my former neighborhood in San Francisco: pedestrians, taxis, cafes and bookstores. But there is something different about my view here: I can spot three different storefronts specializing in newspapers and magazines, all on one block and on one side of the street. A couple of yards away, there are more newsstands. A visit to the corner cafe reveals something else that's rather curious: the room full of coffee drinkers is full of people reading the news -- not on laptops or iPhones -- but on good old-fashioned pulp.
more »NewspaperShift
Fear and Loathing (and Bad Hooker Jokes) at the Old Media Corral
LAS VEGAS -- When Editor & Publisher and MediaWeek magazines presented the recent Interactive Media conference, it seemed like the perfect time for traditional media execs and managers to examine the interactive landscape and consider innovative approaches to the web. The idea was a good one, and timely, but the execution was sorely lacking. Everything about the conference had...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Twitter Helps with Reporting, Filtering the News
Last May on MediaShift, we wrote a series of articles about a new microblogging tool called Twitter, which was just beginning to gain visibility among the digerati. At that time, many bloggers were still on the fence as to how useful the service really was. Many thought it was a waste of time. Others just didn't understand if it...
more »Thought Leader Q&A
NPR Considers Convergence for Next Generation of Radio Reporters
The younger generation will be our future leaders. We hear that a lot in politics, but it also applies to media companies wondering who will be leading them into a digital future. National Public Radio has two programs -- Next Generation Radio (NextGen) and Intern Edition -- aimed at training young folks to do quality radio reporting the NPR...
more »Your Take
How do you decide on friend requests?
If you belong to social media sites such as MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn Twitter, Flickr, et al, you probably face this question each day: Should I add this person as a friend? Most services will send you an email alert that someone has requested that you become their friend. Now it's up to you to decide to accept or ignore it....
more »Citizen Journalism
This Reporter Becomes a Participant at an Unconference
Are you going to be part of the problem or part of the solution? That's a question you hear a lot when people complain about something that's gone wrong in our modern world. And there's a lot of hand-wringing about the future of journalism and whether it will survive its painful transition in the digital age. But the conference...
more »Digging Deeper
9 Tips to Improve Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
With search engines ranking as a top traffic driver for many blogs and content sites, optimizing a site for search engine exposure is an increasingly critical component of any online marketing effort. Search engine optimization, or "SEO," means using technical and not-so-technical techniques to make sure that people searching for topics you write about will find your site. Over...
more »NewspaperShift
Are Veteran Media Execs the Ones Who'll See the Future?
BERKELEY -- We are midway through the first day at the conference, "Crisis in News: Is There a Future for Investigative Reporting?" [You can read my earlier post from the conference here.] One thing that struck me here is that we have some serious bigwigs and executives at major media companies, like the New York Times, Washington Post, NPR,...
more »NewspaperShift
State of Investigative Reporting at Newspapers, Broadcasting
BERKELEY, CA -- I am blogging live from the conference, "Crisis in News: Symposium on Investgative Reporting," at UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism. It is perhaps the most beautiful day outside here, with glorious blue skies, but investigative journalists are like vampires, hiding out in dark spaces when it's warm and sunny outside. So here we are in...
more »NewspaperShift
Examples of Online Investigative Journalism
This weekend I'll be attending "The Crisis in News: Is There a Future for Investigative Journalism?" hosted at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley. There will be a lot of old school journalism types who have been plying the trade of investigative work for decades. Most of these folks work at big news...
more »Thought Leader Q&A
Public Documents + Shoe Leather Reporting = The Smoking Gun's Staying Power
In a world of social network widgets, videoblogs and Web 2.0 gewgaws, sometimes it's the simple things that work best. That's the lesson of Web 1.0 startup The Smoking Gun, a simply designed site that relies on public documents and criminal mugshots to bring in boatloads of traffic. If a prominent politician or celebrity has run afoul of the...
more »TVShift
CBS Considers 'Loyalty Index' Over Pay for Page Views
With so many ways to track a writer's popularity online, should that popularity be tied to a journalist's or blogger's pay? That is a question that's come up quite a few times over the years, and last week I took Gawker Media to task for paying writers based on page views. My basic point was that there should be...
more »AdvertisingShift
Why Paying People by Page Views is Wrong
Recently, Gawker Media, the blog empire run by Nick Denton, made two moves that were curious. One was spinning off three sites that weren't making the cut: Gridskipper (travel), Idolator (music), and Wonkette (politics). The other was slashing the pay-per-page-view rate for Gawker Media writers by 33%. In Denton's go-ahead-and-leak-it email memo, which showed up on Silicon Alley Insider,...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
'Blog Till You Drop' Phenomenon Overblown; Disconnecting Is Key
The New York Times recently published a story , "In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop," that created a lot of buzz. The story told about bloggers who were literally working themselves to death. As if it were a quickly advancing trend, the Times' Matt Richtel declared, "a growing work force of home-office laborers and entrepreneurs,...
more »Digging Deeper
The Social Press Release: Multimedia, Two-Way, Direct to the Public
Silicon Valley journalist/blogger Tom Foremski had had enough. Two years ago, he wrote a poison pen letter to the PR industry in a blog post titled Die! Press release! Die! Die! Die!, in which he exhorted publicists to break down press releases into sections, tag the information and provide links to more sources. "Press releases are nearly useless," he...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Web Serials Find Their Niche vs. TV
Everyone's a producer -- or so it seems with the availability of video-making tools for just about anyone these days. With the arrival of cheaper, more compact equipment and the rapid of advance of technology in this area, it's possible to shoot a pretty good quality video with a small digital camera or even a high-end cell phone. Plus,...
more »Thought Leader Q&A
Front Porch Forum Makes Friends & Neighbors, But Can It Make Money?
We are a society that lives more and more in our technology-induced bubbles. When we go outside, we wear an iPod; we talk on cell phones while driving. In urban areas, we might never meet our neighbors unless there's a fire or earthquake. But can technology also help bring us together in our physical communities, and help us get...
more »Social Networking
Africa's Social Media Conundrum
"Web 2.0 [is] a venture capitalist's paradise where investors pocket the value produced by unpaid users, ride on the technical innovations of the free software movement and kill off the decentralizing potential of peer-to-peer production."
more »Weblogs
How Bloggers Covered Kenya Violence, Deal with Racism, Sexism
Within 24 hours of the outbreak of the post election violence in Kenya, Kenyan blogs were posting hour by hour reports. On December 31st there was a complete shutdown of the mainstream media.
more »Wikis
How to Be a Model Wikipedia Contributor
Wikipedia -- like Google or CNN -- is a name we recognize immediately when mentioned in conversation. The collaborative online encyclopedia currently ranks 8th on the Alexa list of top web destinations. Ask anyone sitting in front of a computer to find information for you on any topic. While most might turn first to Google, many others will turn...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
The Blessing and Curse of the iPod Touch
Here at MediaShift, we have had some less than perfect experiences with mobile devices and the Internet. Earlier this year, Mark wrote "a manifesto about what would make for a smarter smartphone." And last summer "I grumbled about the bad time I was having with my new smartphone." The Treo 680 was under-delivering in the one area that had convinced me to purchase the phone in the first place: surfing the web.
more »Digging Deeper
Semi-Pro Journalism Teams Give Alternative View of U.S. Elections
Elizabeth Gotsdiner got Joe Biden's errant spittle in her mouth. Shantel Middleton got to ride on a Ron Paul blimp. Mayhill Fowler was following Obama canvassers and ended up helping them carry brochures for the candidate. Each of these folks represents a new class of semi-pro journalist tasked with covering the U.S. presidential election in innovative, more personal ways....
more »Digging Deeper
Politico 2.0: Ruffini Blogs, Twitters, Crowdsources Obama Donations
Patrick Ruffini is the epitome of the new breed of political consultant. He's a numbers wonk who swears by Microsoft Excel. He's a tech geek who's had his own political website since the mid-'90s, and he writes for various big-name group blogs such as TechPresident and TownHall.com -- as well as his own blog. And though he has worked...
more »Philosophy
I struggle nearly every week with an identity problem: Am I a blogger or a journalist? Most times, I can take the easy way out and think of myself as the nouveau blogger/journalist or journalist/blogger -- but which one comes first? nags my inner pigeon-holer. Last week's blog post (or was it a long-form piece of journalism?) on MediaShift...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Citizen Journalism Spreads in Spanish-Speaking World
Traditional media has always drawn a line between the reporter and the "reported to." But citizen journalism is a phenomenon that looks to bridge the gap between the news and the people, with average folks being able to use digital technology and the Internet to create and distribute their own news. But most stories about citizen journalism in the...
more »Digging Deeper
Distinction Between Bloggers, Journalists Blurring More Than Ever
The time-worn debate of Bloggers vs. Journalists has finally run its course. For years, traditional journalists scoffed at bloggers as pajama-wearing screamers, while bloggers have pointed to MSM (mainstream media) as secretly biased and obsolete. While the extremists in this argument have had the stage shouting at each other loudly (and it continues to this day), what has happened...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Facebook Becomes Catalyst for Causes, Colombian FARC Protest
This morning, I received a notification on my Facebook profile that said if I sent a virtual plant to some of my friends, I'd help them "save the Earth." If you're a Facebook user, you probably wonder how much the incessant pleas by certain applications on the site might actually "change the world." Modules built to help you attack...
more »Open Source Reporting
How Our Next President Should Use Participatory Media
Today is President's Day in the U.S., celebrating the February birthdays of past presidents Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. But rather than looking back, I'd like to look forward to the next president of the United States -- whoever he or she will be -- and consider how they might use technology and new media to be more responsive...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Lately, it seems everybody's a video producer. From YouTube to BlogTV to Seesmic –- it's as if everyone's doing something with a videocamera. Last year, I wondered if the transition from blogger to video producer and host might not be the best route for everyone. It seemed that bloggers were eager to jump formats and just "do video," and the...
more »Digging Deeper
With the advent of the Internet and a growing number of security breaches, people worry that their personal information can be seen and exploited around the world in an instant. If you have incriminating photos online, a potential employer or love interest might find them and make snap judgments. If you shop online with a credit card, a merchant might steal your information and run up charges on your card. If you surf online around major media sites, publishers might use your "data trail" to target advertising to you.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
5 Reasons I Won't Give Up Books
Last month at the highly anticipated MacWorld conference here in San Francisco, Apple honcho Steve Jobs said some words that left many agape. Those words weren't "Macbook Air" but "people don't read anymore." He was predicting a doomed future for Amazon's new Kindle e-reader. Shocked, I've been going over this for weeks now, trying to cut through the punditry...
more »Citizen Journalism
Social Media, Google-Twitter Mashup and More on Super Duper Tuesday
11:02 am Pacific Time I'll be live-blogging the Super Tuesday election day here in the U.S. and will be highlighting all the efforts online to cover the day's events and results. I'm especially interested in finding the best social media sites, mainstream news sites and blogs and video coverage -- and am asking for your input on any innovative efforts...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Why I Left Print Media for Digital
In new media circles, one of the hottest topics of recent years has been the print-to-digital shift. People pundit about it, shout "print is dead" and wallow in the sadness sparked by nostalgia for a day when this wasn't a question. We've also begun speculating on whether a device like the Kindle will really ever take our attention away...
more »Digging Deeper
In Digital Age, Journalism Students Need Business, Entrepreneurial Skills
The traditional path of a journalism career has clearly shifted. In the past, a journalism student would learn about being a newspaper reporter, then take a job at a small-town paper, eventually moving up to a medium and then larger paper. Now, the reporter might launch a blog, an audio podcast or video reports as a one-person operation, handling editorial and business duties simultaneously.
more »Your Take Roundup
Facebook Has a Problem with Trust
In the not-too-distant past, I remember fondly getting an email notification from Facebook that one of my friends had sent me a message or "poked" me virtually. I happily clicked over to Facebook to see what someone had said or done, and responded in kind. Now, my reaction to getting the same kinds of notifications has changed, and I...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
How Google, Wikipedia Have Changed Our Lives -- For Better and Worse
A lecturer in the U.K. made headlines this month when she banned her students from using Wikipedia and Google for research assignments in her classes. The professor, Dr. Tara Brabazon, said that students "don't come to university to learn how to Google." I'm sure they don't, but I can imagine the fear that the ban struck in the hearts...
more »Digging Deeper
BusinessWeek.com Pushes into Aggregation, Video, Participation to Stand Out
Business news is often about numbers. And when you check the audience numbers on the various top financial news sites online, the portals such as Yahoo Finance and MSN Money come out on top, followed by a jumble of online magazines such as Forbes.com, wire services such as Reuters, and online-only pubs like TheStreet.com. As of last August, BusinessWeek.com...
more »Media Usage
The Efficiency (and Shame) of Long-Distance Reporting
My writer friend Marlene once had a dot-com job that seemed odd. She wrote for a travel site about various countries but never traveled to those countries. She simply aggregated information from other websites and did extensive online research before writing about them and putting together guides. But strange as it seemed at the time, I was destined to...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
The Benefits and Pitfalls of Using Social Media for Reporting
Because we live in an age when social media sites are our daily bread, it seems natural to turn to them as resources for writing a story. When I wrote a piece about the popularity of Facebook all over the world, I went straight to Facebook to get the user interviews I needed. And when I wrote about the...
more »Digging Deeper
Traditional Media Ready to Elevate the Conversation Online -- with Moderation
Major media sites have started to get the religion of audience participation, but there's been one big hitch: How do you harness the audience's knowledge and participation without the forums devolving into a messy online brawl that requires time-intensive moderation? Over the years, traditional media sites have tried forums, killed them, and tried them again, this time with more...
more »Weblogs
Blog Pundits Certain About Steve Jobs' Keynote
After the stunningly bad predictions by pollsters, pundits, commentators and anyone who graced a cable TV news studio before the New Hampshire Democratic primary, we decided to turn a fake news source, the fictional Online News Network (ONN), to tell us what Apple CEO Steve Jobs will tell everyone in his much anticipated speech tomorrow morning. The following is...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
5 Places to Watch Movies Online Legally -- and Free
The spread of broadband Internet access has made online video a much better experience, allowing movie fans to catch a flick on the Net without having to rent a DVD. Depending on the kind of system and monitor you have, watching films on a computer can become almost as enjoyable as watching them on your television. For instance, with...
more »Digging Deeper
Anti-Piracy Dragnet Could Hurt 'Fair Use' of Copyrighted Video
All the lawsuits and rhetoric around people uploading copyrighted material on video-sharing sites such as YouTube make it seem like a black-and-white situation: either you're shooting your own original video or stealing it from someone else. But what's lost in that simple either-or interpretation is the more gray area in copyright law known as fair use, which protects people...
more »PoliticalShift
Iowa Caucuses Blanketed by Twitter, Blogs, Video
If you were anywhere in Iowa yesterday, you might as well assume that anyone around you could report on what you were saying, even in what you thought was a private moment at a restaurant. That's the hard lesson learned by veteran GOP political strategist Ed Rollins, who was repeatedly flummoxed in a Fox News interview with Chris Wallace,...
more »MediaShift
10 MediaShifting Moments of 2007
As the year 2007 sets in the distance, we can take some time to consider the year that was. I'm not a huge fan of year-end lists, but sometimes they help us get a grip on what transpired -- and ponder what's to come. What's perhaps most amazing about 2007 is that two distinct phenomena -- the iPhone and...
more »Digging Deeper
When Will Google's 'Big Project' YouTube Bring in Profits?
In its brief 22-month history, video-sharing site YouTube has become a cultural phenomenon. The Iraq War has been called the "YouTube War" because of the videos that are regularly uploaded by soldiers and insurgents. The upcoming U.S. presidential race has been called the "YouTube Election" with its own "YouTube Debates" thanks to the questions for candidates uploaded by the...
more »Philosophy
Journalists, Bloggers Have a Sorry History at Startups
As a journalist covering a particular business, there is a temptation to believe that we know enough about that business to actually become a full participant in that business. We have been writing about it, we see what works and what fails, so we should know enough to try our hand at it too. But more often than not,...
more »Social Networking
The Universal Language of Facebook
It's been just four short years since a college student named Mark Zuckerberg launched a new social network with a very specific target demographic: American Ivy League college students. Since then, the Facebook phenomenon has exceeded everyone's expectations. After opening up accessibility to anyone interested in signing up late last year, growth in the U.S. for the social network has...
more »Digging Deeper
Your Guide to Hyper-Local News
Hyper-local news is the information relevant to small communities or neighborhoods that has been overlooked by traditional news outlets. Thanks to cheap self-publishing and communication online, independent hyper-local news sites have sprung up to serve these communities, while traditional media has tried their own initiatives to cover what they've missed. In some cases, hyper-local sites let anyone submit stories, photos or videos of the community, with varying degrees of moderation and filtering. Pioneers such as "Northwest Voice" in Bakersfield, Calif., and "YourHub", which started in Denver, actually reverse publish select material from their websites in print publications. Both of them are run by mainstream newspaper publishers.
more »Your Take
How important is digital media in the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign?
As the U.S. presidential primary season quickly approaches, the question remains just how important the Internet and new media have been in the election race. While political tracking sites such as TechPresident can show how many Facebook friends the candidates have, or how many video views they've had on YouTube, there isn't a direct correlation between online popularity and actual...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
6 Reasons I'm Not Hooked on Podcasts
A year ago, Mark wrote about the factors that were limiting the growth of podcast adoption. Some of the problems include the difficulty in finding quality content, a lack of understanding of the medium, and a general impatience in getting podcasts to work. I can relate. Try as I might, I haven't been able to make podcasts a part of...
more »Digging Deeper
Hype and Backlash for Second Life Miss the Bigger Picture
In May 2006, BusinessWeek ran a cover story on the virtual world Second Life (SL) by Robert Hof called My Virtual Life. The tagline breathlessly said, "A journey into a place in cyberspace where thousands of people have imaginary lives. Some even make a good living. Big advertisers are taking notice." It didn't take long for other mainstream media...
more »Philosophy
Revamping the Story Flow for Journalists
Every time I sit down to write an in-depth story for MediaShift, I start getting that same sinking feeling: I'm missing something. Did someone else already write this story? Did I talk to all the right people? Did those people tell me everything I should know? Are my assumptions and story angle sound? Did I get all sides of...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Last.FM, Jango, Pandora Trounce Music Discovery via Radio
Back before the Internet, listening to the radio was a one-sided experience. Beyond the occasional call-in request, music radio was about listening to whatever the DJs decided to play whenever they decided to play it. But a new breed of online music services are giving listeners access to music content on demand, and most are for free. Can these...
more »Digging Deeper
TechPresident, 10Questions Put Spotlight on 'Voter-Generated Content'
Just as the Internet and technology have shifted the playing field in media, allowing bloggers and podcasters to help set the news agenda, so has the realm of politics been disrupted by technology that gives voters more power to inject their own issues into the fray. And in the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, that disruption has been strongest in...
more »AdvertisingShift
How much do online marketers and websites know about us? Do they save records on what we've bought, sites we've visited, people we've contacted? It's a subject that few of us bother with until we find out our private information has been stolen or inadvertently been made public. And privacy concerns have been front and center lately as MySpace...
more »Weblogs
Losing the Journalistic Security Blanket
Here's the quiz of the day for 21st Century Journalism 101: What makes news critics howl, able reporters swoon and strong editors weep? (Hint: The great unwashed and untutored of the blogosphere consider them pure manna.)
more »Citizen Journalism
Teaching Citizen Journalism Challenges Both Profession and Professor
I have a unique place in the citizen journalism world -- I teach one of the very few practical courses in this growing area of our profession.
more »NewspaperShift
Rethinking the Mercury News...with Community Participation
When I was clicking through the website of the San Jose Mercury News metro newspaper, I noticed the navigation bar had the usual tabs for News, Tech, Sports, Business, and finally, Help. But this time, rather than consider this Help tab as a way for readers to get help, I could hear the Mercury News calling out to readers...
more »Digging Deeper
Traditional Media Evolves for Wildfire Coverage, But Hyper-Local Still Lacking
When people think of community or hyper-local neighborhood news, they typically think of bake sales, petty crime and development catfights. But when a disaster strikes, the stakes for community news are raised, and lightning-quick news updates online can save lives and help residents cope. That was the reality in San Diego and Southern California during last week's series of...
more »Social Networking
Am I Really Worth $300 as a Facebook User?
"I do not plan on being on Facebook too much anymore -- seems like a waste of time & it seems my friends cannot even take a breath without me receiving notification of it. E-mail is better!" That was the note I got from one of my new friends on Facebook who had become obsessed with Facebook, found that...
more »Media Usage
California Wildfire Coverage by Local Media, Blogs, Twitter, Maps and More
The last few days have shown that online resources, social media, and collaboration on the Net can make a huge difference in a natural disaster. As the wildfires have spread in Southern California, the evacuees and local residents have utilized the Internet not only to connect and get updated information; they have used it to tell their stories, share...
more »Digging Deeper
MarketWatch Turns 10, But Can It Evolve for Another 10?
As the financial news site MarketWatch celebrates its 10th anniversary next week, the stalwart Web 1.0 company stands on the precipice of change. It has launched a community initiative that lets people comment on stories, rate stories, and compete for points by making market predictions. As part of Dow Jones, MarketWatch will become part of the News Corp. empire...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Even in U.S., Bloggers Get Little Protection
Earlier this year, there was a debate in journalism circles and in the general public about who could be considered a journalist, as San Francisco videoblogger and media maker Josh Wolf was jailed after refusing to turn over video footage to federal authorities. After spending 226 days in jail, Wolf was dubbed the "longest-jailed journalist in American history." But...
more »Digging Deeper
BBC Trains Iranian Journalists through ZigZag Online Magazine
Iran has a thriving blogosphere and a large educated and Internet-savvy class of people. But because it's a closed society, most journalism training does not address the importance of objectivity and balance in reporting, nor does it stress the importance of online journalism. The BBC World Service Trust has been quietly trying to change that, training 150 journalists in...
more »Citizen Journalism
MediaShift Launches Idea Lab Group Blog
A few weeks back, I heard gunshots outside my window. It was pretty scary, and reminded me of my urban environment here in Potrero Hill, San Francisco. But where could I turn to get the story on what happened? Was someone killed? Do police know what happened? In the past, I might have heard something about it on the...
more »Your Take
Should bloggers and newspapers make peace?
Everywhere you turn, newspaper websites are getting the blog religion. They're either adding new blogs from reporters or community members, or setting up an alliance to share advertising, or just buying up big-name bloggers, as the New York Times has done with Freakonomics and by hiring TVNewser's Brian Stelter. Alana Semuels counts all the ways newspapers and bloggers are working...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Our Internet Obsession with Missing People Goes Too Far
Reading online news is a great way to stay constantly updated on what's going on in the world without having to rely on television. And in times of great tragedy the Internet has shown itself to be incomparable in its ability to make information move quickly for the good of public awareness and safety. But for all its positive...
more »Digging Deeper
Virtual worlds are online three-dimensional spaces where you can interact with other people, collect items and build structures, and communicate via a virtual representative of yourself called an avatar. These worlds have been influenced by various science fiction writers such as William Gibson and Neal Stephenson, along with the movie, "The Matrix."
more »Weblogs
Can Internet, Blogs Sustain the Saffron Revolution?
When the ruling military junta in Burma cracked down on protesters, killing unarmed Buddhist monks, the world was watching. While mainstream journalists have to work undercover in Burma for fear of the junta's wrath, Burmese citizens and tourists were able to shoot photos and videos of the protests and transmit them to the outside world. The contrast between this...
more »Digging Deeper
6 Maxims for Music Promotion in the Digital Age
Not too long ago, there was an established route for promoting musical talent. The music would go into heavy rotation on the radio and MTV, the artist would play in a record store, and promotion might include an advertisement in a music magazine. But the old formula has been updated with the advent of digital distribution, social networking sites...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
YouTube, Flickr Become Forces for Cultural Change
The term "social web" brings to mind images of people around the world interacting with each other without borders or barriers. With the arrival of more and more sites that help us connect, express ourselves and share media, it seems like we're advancing toward a more open Internet, in which everyone has the right to view or post whatever...
more »Digging Deeper
Henry Blodget, Silicon Alley Look for Resurgence
When I mentioned the name "Henry Blodget" to a friend from the old dot-com daze, she wrinkled her nose with disgust. "How can anyone trust what he has to say, when he was the one who caused the bubble in the first place!" she said. Blodget was a financial analyst who mightily predicted Amazon's stock would hit $400 --...
more »Open Source Reporting
EarmarkWatch.org Enables D.I.Y. Investigative Work
As professional journalists, we often believe that we have all the answers, or that we can find the knowledgeable source that has all the answers. When it comes to covering the workings of the U.S. Congress, journalists often rely on Congressional staffers or aides with inside information to find out what's going on. Or they follow the money through...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Bloggers Make Jump to TV Shows -- But Should They?
It wasn't that long ago that I was marveling over the fact that mainstream media was paying attention to blogs, particularly for culling public opinion on hot button political issues. I remember being shocked when CNN started featuring a segment quoting bloggers on "The Situation Room" -- shocked and wondering how it all happened. When did blogs suddenly become...
more »Digging Deeper
News21 Improves Multimedia, Still Lacks Audience Involvement
The News21 initiative had grand designs to provide fellowships to 44 bright journalism and political science graduate students, and have them create innovative, cutting edge -- and sellable -- work. In the first year, the Northwestern University fellows broke ground with a Flash-based story on Digital Data Trails and the UC Berkeley fellows had their work featured on a...
more »Your Take Roundup
Internet Offers Unlimited Time for Presidential Debates
One of the complaints most people have about televised politics and debates is the prevalence of the sound bite. There's never enough time for candidates to discuss issues in-depth or argue their point for more than a minute. Instead, we are stuck with the tyranny of zingers and one-liners, perfectly fit for highlights on SportsCenter, uh, I mean the...
more »Your Take
What blogs would you nominate as the best in the world?
It's that time of year again. No, not just the new fall TV season. It's also blog nomination season, when big international groups (and smaller national groups) ask people to submit nominees for the best blogs. In November, I'll again be a judge for the Best of the Blogs (The BOBs) awards, run by the German's international broadcaster, Deutsche Welle....
more »Digging Deeper
Can Citizen Journalism Make a Difference in Jordan?
Ramsey Tesdell would like to bring the concept of citizen and community journalism to Jordan, an Arab country that has a long history of state-controlled media. Tesdell, 23, along with three other early 20somethings, launched the site 7iber in May as a place for "people-powered journalism," hoping that average folks would tell the stories overlooked by mainstream media in...
more »Citizen Journalism
'People Searches' Let Everyone Investigate You
After being an online journalist for 12 years, I figure one of my specialties is doing investigations online about people I'm interviewing for stories I write. I want to know their background, where they've worked, where they live and whatever can give me relevant context for my interactions with them. But lately, I've noticed that my "people searching" skills...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Online Video Sites Scratch Your Niche
In my post about online television a few weeks ago, I wrote about why I don't enjoy watching television on the Internet. One of the reasons is that a big video-sharing site such as YouTube has thousands of different kinds of content jumbled together in one place, making it hard to find the content I want. Why should I...
more »Digging Deeper
Your Guide to Social Networking Online
Social networking websites help people connect with others who share their interests, build online profiles and share media such as photos, music and videos. The idea of social networks has been studied by sociologists for decades as they analyze the ties between people in families, organizations and even in towns or countries. According to "Wikipedia", "Research in a number of academic fields has shown that social networks operate on many levels, from families up to the level of nations, and play a critical role in determining the way problems are solved, organizations are run, and the degree to which individuals succeed in achieving their goals."
more »Online Video
The Tangled State of Archived News Footage Online
A couple of weeks ago a video of Vice President Dick Cheney from 1994 came up on YouTube, with Cheney saying that invading Baghdad would invite a quagmire. I investigated this on my own and discovered that, while I could find it today via the C-SPAN archives, it wasn't clear that someone in 2003 during the run-up to the...
more »Your Take Roundup
Google News Comments a 'Fabulous Step Forward'
For an experimental feature that barely registers a blip in reality, the idea of letting sources of stories comment on Google News has stirred up a hornet's nest in journalism circles and the blogosphere. Two software engineers at Google News said they would be adding limited comments to news stories that are linked from the news aggregator, giving quoted...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Free Newspapers Lead Way Online in Europe
As big newspapers struggle with shifting business models, a new breed of free newspapers have have found their niche in many parts of the world. According to the Newspaper Innovation blog, 36 million free papers are distributed daily in 49 countries. As newspaper subscriptions lag, advertisers turn to these papers that have a captive audience of commuters desperate for...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Is the Future of Television Online? Not Yet
Late last month the BBC announced that it would be offering up a large part of its television content free of charge on its website. And back in May, ABC announced it would stream some of its primetime shows in HD online for free. As networks begin to put more of their content online -- either on their websites...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Flickr Changes Lives, Launches Photog Careers
With the plethora of social networking sites, it's easy to come to the quick conclusion that what we are doing on these sites -- chatting up strangers, lurking on people's profiles, spying on friends -- is just a waste of time. But there is one site that is more than just an unhealthy habit: Photo-sharing site Flickr is a...
more »Your Take Roundup
Front Porch Forum Fans Adore Hyper-Local Email Reports
Yesterday, when I heard a shooting take place in broad daylight down the street from me in San Francisco's Potrero Hill neighborhood, I wondered what happened, who got shot and thought about how lucky I was not to be out and about with my son at that moment. Later, I got an update from an email list serving Potrero...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Food Lovers Become Experts at Chowhound, Yelp
Before the web was in widespread use, food lovers would wait patiently for the New York Times restaurant reviews to come out for the hottest new spot in SoHo, or for hometown papers to write up the little Korean joint that just opened down the street. We relied heavily on that system of stars, dollar signs and bells indicating...
more »Your Take
What's your favorite way of getting hyper-local or neighborhood news?
Lately there have been a lot of happenings in the world of hyper-local citizen journalism projects. The venture-funded Backfence series of sites crashed and burned, Pegasus News was sold to Fisher Communications, and the Washington Post launched its first hyper-local effort, LoudonExtra. The idea behind many of these sites is to capture the smaller stories that newspapers, TV and radio...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
'Open Universities' Try to Bring College to Masses
A college education in the United States can be one of the most costly in the world. For many young people, college isn't an option because of the economic strain it represents for their families. And many older people who would like to attend classes must forego studies to make ends meet. But thanks to the power of voluntary...
more »MarketingShift
Marketers Grapple with Giving Teens More Control Online
SAN FRANCISCO -- A curious thing happened at the Hotel Nikko in downtown San Francisco today during the Ypulse Mashup 2007 conference about those wired teens. Yes, a lot of older folks dressed business-casual tried to look hip and decipher what the kids were doing online in social networks, on mobile phones and in virtual worlds. But on numerous...
more »Citizen Journalism
Co-Founder Potts Shares Lessons Learned from Backfence Bust
There has been a lot of speculation about what went wrong at Backfence. To date, the company's investors and I have tried to stay out of the second-guessing in the blogosphere and the trade press, largely because there are private business matters involved that we've chosen not to discuss.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Why My Smartphone Is Dumb About the Net
I've got a problem: I hate using the Internet -- on my phone, that is. I am one of those people whose ears perked up at the idea of being able to take my online activities, such as reading news, watching videos and social networking with me wherever I go, on my phone. And after investing in a flashy...
more »Open Source Reporting
How Would You Build a Newsroom From Scratch?
A lot of the brightest minds in journalism have been thinking for some time about how the newsroom of the future might operate as we move from legacy print and broadcast operations into a more converged, Internet-centric world. I've taken a couple stabs myself at how a "New Newsroom" might operate, both in a guest post on PressThink in...
more »Digging Deeper
Topix Capitalizes on Forums, Reaches Rural Areas
When local news aggregator Topix decided to set up online forums last December for every city and small town in America, they figured the forums would be a loss leader. After all, online forums have a bad reputation for unfettered discussion, gossip and slander, leading most news organizations to abandon them altogether online. And people on forums are usually...
more »Social Networking
Social Media Runs on 'Friend' Power
I've been thinking a lot lately about friends, and the shifting definition of friends within online social networks such as "MySpace", "Facebook" and "LinkedIn." There was a time in the not-so-distant pre-web past when I considered a friend to be someone who had my back, someone I could go to for advice or help, someone I considered a trusted ally.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Face-to-Face Networking Trumps Panels at Conference
SAN FRANCISCO -- In my account of Supernova 2007 yesterday, I didn't mention one of the things that really irked me about the conference: the silence. When panelists were on the huge stage at the main ballroom in the Westin St. Francis Hotel, the large audience sat silent typing away at their laptops. While some sessions ended with a...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Business Crowd Considers Web Users in Third Person
SAN FRANCISCO -- Anyone tired of Web 2.0 topics and discussion, and the current venture-capital-fueled hype, would have been advised to stay far away from the Supernova conference here. The conference site bills it as "the only event that assembles the most compelling people and companies from the converging worlds of computing, telecom, and digital media to put decentralization...
more »Digging Deeper
TechDirt Builds Community of Bloggers to Offer Corporate Analysis
In the world of technology research, firms such as Gartner, Forrester Research and JupiterResearch seem to hold all the cards, knowing markets in-depth and charging firms thousands of dollars for a peek inside. Many small and medium companies, especially startups, are often on the outside looking in, not able to afford the high cost of research firms but still...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Orkut, Friendster Get Second Chance Overseas
What do Brazilian and Indian Internet users have in common? A favorite social networking site called Orkut, a Google web property which, when it was launched in 2004 was meant to put its parent company on the social networking map in the U.S. Orkut may not have taken off stateside, but it has exploded in these two countries, and...
more »Digging Deeper
Collaborative Radio Shows Invite Listeners into Creative Process
Long before the term citizen journalism became trendy, ordinary citizens shared the stage for decades with professional journalists in talk radio. They collaborated, they cajoled, they ranted and they often added wit and wisdom to live radio call-in shows. But with the advent of the Internet, public radio shows are finding that websites -- and blogs in particular --...
more »Your Take Roundup
Virtual Worlds for Kids Entwined with Real World
While the media has been abuzz about Second Life and adult virtual worlds, a bevy of virtual worlds for kids have been even more popular than their adult counterparts. Tween world Club Penguin has more than 4 million visitors per month, according to a New York Times article on the virtual world craze for kids. But I wondered when...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Online Map Craze Helps People Visualize Data
It's not often that you find an Internet trend based on something ancient. But that's what's happening with maps. Google Maps has gone from innovative to indispensable and highly replicated in a little over two years. Thanks to Google's open map API (appliction programming interface), just about anybody can create a map for just about anything -- from tracking...
more »Social Networking
Dangers Overblown for Teens Using Social Media
I remember the first time I watched Dateline NBC's To Catch a Predator, a TV series where they snared sexual predators using online venues. It was a train wreck -- the kind you can't keep your eyes off of. These predators were so creepy and so dumb. Some of them were lured into the trap more than once by...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Community-Edited News Sites Abound in Other Languages
Back in 2004, when developer Kevin Rose launched the community-edited news site Digg, he could not have imagined it would launch a global phenomenon. A simple application that allowed users to contribute web links and vote on stories to push them to the front page somehow appealed to so many of us that by the next year, it had...
more »Digging Deeper
Placeblog Pioneer Sees Geo-Tagging as Key to Local Aggregation
For the past few years, bloggers have been living in a keyword-based world. When they write a blog post, they can tag the post by putting it into relevant topical categories. A post about the U.S. attorney general firing scandal might be tagged: "U.S. politics," "Alberto Gonzales," "attorney general firings." But the missing element for bloggers has been a...
more »Your Take
What's the right age for kids to start visiting virtual worlds?
Forget about Second Life. The big buyout talk in virtual worlds lately has been around sites such as Club Penguin, a squeaky-clean world catering to kids aged 8 to 14, and Webkinz, a kids site with games and virtual pets. A recent BusinessWeek article noted that Big Media companies such as Sony and News Corp. were interested in paying upwards...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Reporting from Afar Might Work, But Not for Local News
While much has been made of the outsourcing of American jobs to foreign countries, until recently the field of journalism had remained largely untouched. Earlier this month local news website Pasadena Now announced its decision to outsource work to India, specifically reporting of City Council meetings. The site's owner, James Macpherson, said the meetings are streamed on the Internet,...
more »Philosophy
No Matter the Format, Interviews Are Not Dying
When you're a career journalist, you often find yourself getting into the deep groove of habit. A story breaks and you approach your known sources on the subject. You call them up for a comment or drop them an email query. But as I re-examine so many ingrained practices of journalism here at MediaShift, I wonder if the habitual...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Doing More Than Just Twittering Our Lives Away
When I first signed up for micro-blogging service Twitter last September, I remember reading that day that Evan Willliams, one of Twitter's founders, was in a horse drawn carriage winding through the streets of Marrakech. I found that fascinating. That day, I wrote one update ("I'm blogging...") and didn't sign in again until April of this year. Why? Because...
more »Guides
Your Guide to Micro-Blogging and Twitter
Micro-blogging allows you to write brief text updates about your life on the go, and send them to friends and interested observers via text messaging, instant messaging, email or the web. The most popular service is called "Twitter", which was developed last year and became popular among techno-gurus at the 2007 South by Southwest Conference in Austin, Texas. Part of the magic of Twitter is that it limits you to 140 characters per post, forcing you to make pithy statements on the fly.
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
Are We Sharing Too Much Information via Social Media?
Social media -- the online tools we use to keep in constant contact with friends and to spy on strangers -- is something many of us believe makes the Internet a more fun, more personal place to be. It makes it easier to keep in touch with people we care about, and facilitates relationships with people we might have...
more »Your Take Roundup
YouTube Video Ads Should Be Relevant, Brief
Video-sharing phenomenon YouTube has built up its online business in classic dot-com fashion: Get the eyeballs first, then figure out how to make money. You can say "Web 2.0" all you want, but this is classic Web 1.0 thinking. So now that Google has sunk $1.65 billion into buying YouTube, those banner ads aren't going to pay the mushrooming...
more »Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
U.S. Media Fails to Deliver Spanish News Online
Here in the United States, with over "31 million Spanish speakers", you would think Spanish would be our second language online. And you would think that content for the Spanish-speaking community would be not only available, but also rich and varied, if only for the value it represents to marketers. But that isn't the case.
more »Legal Drama
Digg Users Show Strength in Numbers in DVD Dust-Up
The community-generated news site, Digg, has been an experimental hothouse for online communities. Last summer, there was the move by Netscape to offer to pay top Diggers to do their news-article bookmarking at Netscape, with Digg CEO Jay Adelson saying he'd never pay Digg community members. Now comes the user revolt after Digg decided to remove posts that mentioned...
more »Your Take
Would you stop using YouTube if they inserted ads in videos?
YouTube has been an Internet phenomenon because the site provides an easy, friction-less way to share your videos with the world. The site has also resisted the siren song of video advertising, a format that is poised to explode in revenues in the coming years. Many video ads are called "pre-roll" and play before you get to see the video...
more »Your Take Roundup
Mixed Feelings on NBC Showing Cho Video Online
The folks at NBC News debated for hours what to do with the video they had received from Cho Seung-Hui, who killed 32 people on the Virginia Tech campus. Eventually, they decided it was prudent to show some of the video on TV and post some snippets online. After an outcry against glorifying the killer, MSNBC decided to stop...
more »PoliticalShift
Online Presidential Debate Distances the Candidates
The handshake at the beginning. The sideways glances and furious note-taking. The occasional interruption. The partisan cheering. These are the hallmarks of presidential debates of years past. Yet, Yahoo, Slate and the Huffington Post believe that having the candidates in distant locations hooked up virtually online will make for a better "user-generated" debate. The troika of websites recently announced...
more »Citizen Journalism
Can Media Get Beyond Reactive Response to Tragedy?
After the shootings at Virginia Tech, much of the initial reaction on the Internet followed the familiar rhythm of disaster reporting in recent years. First, the point is made that it is now more likely for an average person to be at a tragic hot spot with a cell phone or Net connection. Next, the story is naturally picked up, either directly or independently, by a traditional media outlet. Finally, the advocates of citizen media claim victory while the actual story is still bleating. Rob Walker first noticed this in Slate in March 2001, when the denizens of MetaFilter first noticed an earthquake. New media triumphalism is now professionalized, and the major journalism studies programs all contribute to it.
more »Digging Deeper
Your Guide to Presidential Campaign Videos Online
Candidates running for the U.S. presidency in 2008 have made use of online resources more than ever. With the rise of online video and YouTube, candidates have started to upload formal and informal videos online, and potential voters have tried to engage them in video dialogues.
more »Digging Deeper
Hyper-Local Citizen Media Sites Learn How to Serve Small Communities
In November 2004, I wrote a story for Online Journalism Review profiling various hyper-local citizen media sites such as "Northwest Voice" and "iBrattleboro" that cover local communities with the help of community contributors. Fulton's quote above came from that story, and her Northwest Voice project has been such a success for its owner, the Bakersfield Californian newspaper, that they launched the "Southwest Voice" to cover that neighborhood as well.
more »Digging Deeper
Sunlight Foundation Mixes Tech, Citizen Journalism to Open Congress
When people talk about corporate cutbacks in mainstream journalism organizations, there's almost a fervor about how our very democracy is in jeopardy because of the failings of Big Media in holding our government accountable. What such critiques fail to consider is that as citizens we can and will hold our government accountable, with or without the media apparatus. One...
more »Citizen Journalism
Assignment Zero Has Birthing Pains with 800 Volunteers
Especially after David Carr's column about "Assignment Zero" in the New York Times, people have been asking me how my new venture is going. Alright, I'll tell you.
more »PoliticalShift
Escaping the Bubble in Campaign Journalism
This week Arianna Huffington and I announced at the Huffington Post and PressThink a new project in campaign journalism.
more »NewspaperShift
How the Online Newspaper Can Become a Community Hub
I was talking with someone the other day about the future of newspapers. That seems like the topic du jour with anyone in the news business, or anyone who follows the media. I brought up the recent imbroglio over people who believe that investigative journalism will die with the newspaper printing presses, and I was asked, "Well, how will...
more »Digging Deeper
Will Video Kill the Audio Podcasting Star? Not Exactly
All the media heat these days is around online video and the YouTube phenomenon. Presidential candidates are sparring through YouTube. Google pays a bundle to buy YouTube, and then Viacom sues for $1 billion. It all makes the online audio phenomenon of podcasting feel like yesterday's news. Audio fans, however, need not despair. Video may have stolen the media...
more »Online Video
The Quirks, Dunks and Crashes of Live Streaming Hoops on CBS Sportsline
The camera pans into the crowd lazily, catching the sight of the painted faces of college basketball fanatics. It then cuts jerkily to cheerleaders getting ready to do a routine. The audio is off, and then suddenly comes to life. The scene cuts to the tunnel below the stadium where the Virginia Tech Hokies are getting ready to take...
more »Your Take
What hidden info-nugget did you find in the State of the News Media report?
When the Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ) released its annual report on The State of the News Media, the response was quick from the blogosphere: "We'll get back to you on what it all means after we have time to read the 160,000-word report." I lost count on the number of media watchers who made the same statement. How...
more »Legal Drama
Viacom, YouTube Legal Tiff Irrelevant in End
Judging by the sturm und drang roiling the blogosphere and media circles, you'd think that Viacom's $1 billion lawsuit against Google's YouTube is the epic confrontation of old media vs. new, of suits vs. hipsters, of DRM vs. free love, of greed vs. good. It may well be all those things, but it will not change the basic fact...
more »NewspaperShift
USA Today Walks the Talk of Audience Involvement
When a major newspaper announces it is redesigning its print layout or website, it doesn't usually merit much attention. The regular readers usually complain about it, and then get used to it, and life goes on. But in the case of USA Today redesigning its website, there was more at play than a new look; the site added social...
more »Your Take Roundup
Photojournalists Will Survive in Era of Citizen Photogs
Newspapers will die. Radio will kick the bucket. The packaged music CD is on death's doorstep. There is an irresistible urge to declare one medium dead because of the rise of the new. And so it is when we consider the plight of photojournalists after the proliferation of cameraphones and digital cameras in the hands of the masses, who can now capture breaking news in every corner of the world.
more »Digging Deeper
Podcasts are audio or video shows that you can subscribe to via the Internet and listen to or watch on your own time on your computer, portable MP3 player or other web-connected device. The power of podcasts is that you can subscribe to the shows you want, and then they automatically appear in your podcast aggregator software such as Juice or Apple's iTunes. When you plug in your portable MP3 player -- which can be an iPod or any other player -- your podcasts can then be uploaded and experienced on the go.
more »Your Take Roundup
Community Is Key to Participation in Citizen Media
There are so many citizen journalism sites that seem to be in search of communities to populate them. A site such as Yahoo's You Witness News looks so simple, inviting people to submit their photos or videos of news they have witnessed. So you've got easy ways to submit material, and then you can check out what people have...
more »Open Source Reporting
Imagining a Future Tense for Newspapers
It's easy to criticize the humble newspaper as being outmoded, out of style and out of business options. What's far more difficult is to imagine how newspapers can take their goodness -- the award-winning investigative reports, the service journalism, the knowledge of the community -- and combine that with new technology and the Internet to reach and interact with an enlightened, empowered audience.
more »Digging Deeper
Reuters Looks to Africa and a Decentralized Future for Media
The 155-year-old Reuters wire service has been reinventing itself for the modern age of decentralized journalism, where millions of people have the tools to capture the news around them. Reuters has made alliances and investments in blog aggregators Global Voices and Pluck, and with Yahoo for the citizen-submitted news site, You Witness News. Plus, Reuters made a high-profile move of putting a correspondent into the virtual world, Second Life.
more »TVShift
The heavyweights of the media world are lining up in opposition to YouTube, and supporting Viacom's recent removal of all its clips from the video-sharing service. That removal followed a back-and-forth last fall when Viacom initially asked for clips to be removed, and then went into negotiations with YouTube. Those negotiations turned chilly, and now comes the freeze-out for video clips from MTV and Comedy Central shows such as "The Colbert Report" and "The Daily Show."
more »Digging Deeper
AP Warms Up to Blogs, Citizen Media at NowPublic
There's something bland and homogeneous about an Associated Press wire story. Just the facts, ma'am, in classic inverted pyramid style. The satirical newspaper The Onion has made a mint mocking the news wire style, and the blogosphere has targeted the AP and Reuters for hidden agendas in their oh-so-perfect objective style.
more »We Media 2007
How Technology Can Help a Conference Succeed
I am back from the We Media conference in Miami, but I am not done reporting on what took place there, and how the conference helped clarify the role of "we media" or citizen media in society. While I spent the last couple blog posts savaging the parts of the conference that got under my skin -- most notably an underlying theme of Big Media showing they "got it" -- it's also worth writing about the good parts of the conference. (As a former writer of humorous satire, including a newsletter called "3-Minute Roast" and a CNET column called "Skewer," I obviously gravitate toward the negative before the positive.)
more »Your Take
What would motivate you to contribute to a citizen media site?
Let's say you were a witness to something tragic or exciting, something newsworthy like a terrorist bombing or a record-breaking track race. You were on the scene and captured important photos or video, and wrote a story about the experience. Now there are many citizen journalism sites that want you to submit your material, from NowPublic to Yahoo's You Witness News to CNN Exchange. And there's also hyper-local sites around the country and world that want you to contribute every little happening or event in your local neighborhood. My question is where would you take that newsworthy information that you have, and why? Would you go to the highest bidder, see who would pay you the most? Would you want your work to have the biggest impact? Or would you just be doing it to help the wider community? What would motivate you to submit material to one of these sites? If you run one of these sites, tell us how you get people to contribute. Use the comments to share your thoughts, and I'll run the best ones in the next Your Take Roundup.
more »We Media 2007
Informal Conversations Trump Pomp of Panels
MIAMI -- Your tireless correspondent shook off the South Beach-induced hangover and slogged over to the University of Miami for another day of schmoozing and conversing at the We Media conference. Once again, I was impressed with the people who attended the confab, and learned a lot about what's going on in the social media world -- but not in the main auditorium where the "stage-setters" largely hogged the stage.
more »We Media 2007
Mainstream Media Wants to Take Back Control
MIAMI -- Thanks to the audience taking control of their media experience and creating their own media in blogs, podcasts, video and social networks, the people who are losing control have decided to meet -- and meet, and meet again -- until they figure out how they can take back some control of this uncontrollable situation.
more »Digging Deeper
Talent Agencies Evolve to Show Clients the Digital Money
Everything about the Ask a Ninja videoblog phenomenon smacks of a new form of entertainment. Two guys in Los Angeles produce a series of simple, low cost video clips where a ninja character answers profound and ridiculous questions. The comedic series gets popular as a video podcast through iTunes, with viewership of 300,000 to 500,000 per episode, and the show's web presence branches out to include an online store for merchandise.
more »Digging Deeper
Can Brightcove Solve Net Video for Pros, Big Media?
While YouTube has been the darling of video-sharing sites online -- letting anyone become a video star -- Cambridge, Mass.-based startup Brightcove has quietly been working in the background to become the go-to video services company for professional content owners and media companies such as Dow Jones, Newsweek and The New York Times. Rather than creating a big hub for the world's quirkiest video moments, Brightcove has focused on the technology that will let content owners show video on their own site; sell or rent video downloads; or place advertising on their videos.
more »PoliticalShift
2008 Candidates Jump Online with Early Blog Ads
There has been a delicate dance between political operatives and the Internet. While activists have been using blogs and new media to spread the word about politics or specific candidates for years, the politicians and their consultants have been wary of spending too much of their campaign chest on online marketing. They have largely stuck to the tried and true: TV ads.
more »Digging Deeper
Google Search Snafu Can Have Huge Impact on Niche Blogs
Dear Google,
What happened? Where's the love? You used to bring me flowers, you used to sing me love songs. You used to bring me traffic, at any rate...
Google, baby. Let me back in. Me and my pretty dumb things are shivering out here in the digital ether with no one but Ask.com and Yahoo to keep us warm. We need you honey. We miss you and the 500+ visitors a day you used to send to us. We're lonely. Please, Google. Don't be evil.
kissykiss,
chelsea girl
Citizen Journalism
Saddam Cell Video Subverts News Packages
There's a certain predictability and glossiness to news "packages," special reports on breaking news that journalists knew were going to happen ahead of time. So when a pope dies after a long illness, the U.S. invades Iraq after a long runup to war, or the Democrats are sworn into power in Congress, you know there will be spiffy graphics, an on-the-scene reporter, and even an original musical intro on CNN.
more »Digging Deeper
Nielsen BuzzMetrics Tries to Measure Buzz in Social Media
Last year was a watershed for social media, with millions of people creating and sharing their own media on sites such as MySpace, YouTube, and Flickr and turning away from traditional one-way media such as TV, radio and newspapers. But for the proprietors of these new media sites, there's one very big problem: How do you make money off that popularity?
more »Digging Deeper
WSJ Gets Comfortable with Blogs, Wants to Boost Community
Historically, the august Wall Street Journal's website has been the antithesis of Web 2.0 and online innovation. The Journal's site, WSJ.com, costs money to access, even if you already pay for the print edition. The site has stressed online columns, as opposed to blogs, and there has been very little multimedia.
more »Open Source Reporting
Building the Ultimate Auto Media Center
When it comes to enjoying music or talk radio in the car, why does everything have to be so complicated? First, I have to spend time loading up my iPod with music or podcasts I've downloaded. Then I have to charge my iPod up with power. Then I have to connect my iPod to my car stereo's converter cable. Then I have to fiddle around with the iPod controls to find the music or podcasts I want to listen to -- and NOT while driving.
more »Digging Deeper
YouTube Explains the Mystery of Home Page Picks
Mark Day, a friend of mine in the San Francisco Bay Area, has been trying to break into stand-up comedy for the past year. Recently, he got a big break by having one of his brief video comic bits -- The Smiley Intervention -- featured on the front page of YouTube. Not long after getting in the featured spot, his video shot up to 750,000 views, and he got hundreds of new subscribers to his YouTube channel, the home of his videos.
more »Futurama
Big Media's 'OurTube' to Dominate Online Video Realm
NEW YORK, November 31, 2008 /PRNewswire/ -- The heads of the four major U.S. televion networks today announced the long-awaited unveiling of "OurTube," a new online video-sharing service where people will be able to legally upload and share any video approved by the media companies for sharing. The service has been in development for more than two years, and promises to take video-sharing to the next level.
more »Digging Deeper
Valour-IT, Milblogs Give Hundreds of Laptops to Wounded Soldiers
As I sit here and type this blog post, I pause for a moment to consider how important my fingers and hands are to me as a blogger and writer. If I should be injured or lose the use of my hands in some awful accident, what would I do?
more »MarketingShift
'YouTube,' 'Iraq Videos' Searches Lead to MediaShift
Back in January, not long after I launched the MediaShift blog, I wrote a blog post about soldiers in Iraq uploading their videos to YouTube. When I made that post, I included a screen shot from one of the videos, which I casually titled "YouTube soldier." Now, nearly 11 months later, that picture is bringing in the most referred traffic to my blog.
more »Podcasting
Podcast Audience Small But Growing...Enough?
You could call it the Headline Conundrum. Or maybe Sound-Bite Logic. Whatever the term, there's a regular problem with journalism related to the brevity of space to explain a complex issue or finding. A recent survey by Pew Internet & American Life Project found that 12% of Internet users have downloaded a podcast, up from 7% who said they did the same thing in a similar survey six months before. But as for people who download podcasts on a daily basis, the number was a tiny 1%.
more »Your Take Roundup
Bloggers Leading Mainstream Journalists in Transparency
Perhaps I was being a bit purposefully provocative in my question to you -- "Should bloggers avoid conflicts of interest as journalists do?" -- but it didn't take long for readers to correct my thinking. While journalists do have a code of ethics they are supposed to follow, no such code exists for bloggers, which is just fine for many of you.
more »Digging Deeper
TPMmuckraker Thrives as Political Corruption Runs Rampant
If Roosevelt lived today, he might add in "blog" to the list of places where muckrakers do their work -- and he probably would be a bit more scared of the work they're doing. One hundred years after Roosevelt coined the "muckraker" term for journalists who uncover corruption and fraud, bloggers have taken the mantle once reserved for investigative print journalists and created a new brand of muckraking that moves at the speed of the Net and involves collaboration with readers.
more »Your Take
Should bloggers avoid conflicts of interest as journalists do?
With so many journalists now blogging -- thanks to so many mainstream media websites adding journalist blogs -- the question is whether this new wave of bloggers will bring a different ethos to blogging. Say what you will about mainstream media's various foibles and biases, but professional journalists often keep the interest of their readers -- instead of their own self-interests -- paramount. The journalist's code of ethics requires that a reporter should "avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived." But in the blogosphere, the rules are a bit fuzzier.
more »Digging Deeper
Pentagon PR Blogger Explains Military's New Media Challenge
The U.S. military is proud of its history and strength as a top-down organization, with a clear chain of command. In fact, you can't talk to anyone in military public affairs (the equivalent of private-sector public relations) without hearing the inevitable phrase "chain of command" in response to a question.
more »Weblogs
Judging the Best Weblogs in the World at The BOBs
Last Friday, I was sitting in a conference room on the 37th Floor of the Park Inn in Berlin, Germany, along with people from Brazil, Holland, Spain, France, Russia, Germany, China and other far-flung places. We had all been flown into town by German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle to be jury members to decide the winners of the annual Best of the Blogs (The BOBs) awards.
more »Citizen Journalism
Keeping an Eye on the Kenyan Parliament
One of the things I'm most proud of as far as my accomplishments go is being the co-founder of Mzalendo. At a basic level Mzalendo intends to monitor what Kenyan Members of Parliament are doing for their constituents. The Kenyan government generally operates in a very opaque manner and it is very difficult to obtain access to public information both online and offline. While there are some government offices that are trying to remedy this (the Office of Public Communications is one example), most of the information provided is generic.
more »World View
Over the last year or two, mainstream media outlets have started paying much more attention to China's increasingly strong presence in Africa. This interest was recently amplified by the China-Africa summit, which was recently held in Beijing.
more »PoliticalShift
Live Blogging the U.S. Mid-Term Elections
Today is election day in the United States, so despite my overall bad feelings about politics at the moment, I'm going back to my roots as a political junkie and watching the results as they come in around the country today. I'll be watching on TV and online at the same time, and considering the differences in media coverage in both mediums. The following post will be updated live throughout the day and night, with the most recent information at the top, and the time it was posted.
more »Online Video
Fake Anchor Colbert Gives Best Take on YouTube Takedowns
The last week has been a surreal one for fans of fake news. TV shows such as Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" have had huge boosts in their popularity thanks to online communities, who share video clips and summaries from each show. But the corporate parent to Comedy Central, Viacom, was a bit blind to that fact when it asked video-sharing site YouTube to pull down video clips from those shows that had been posted by fans.
more »Digging Deeper
A wiki is simply a web page that can be written or edited by the public or a group of people. What sets wikis apart from other web pages is the simple way that anyone can edit or add to an existing page, or start a new page.
more »Online Video
Stephen Colbert: Don't Love and Leave YouTube
We in the Colbert Nation are sickened by the recent news that heavy-handed trial lawyers at Viacom, representing Comedy Central, have asked YouTube to force its users to remove video clips from "The Colbert Report," "The Daily Show," and "South Park." While those lawyers have legal standing to do this, it goes against the spirit of Internet sharing and viral promotion -- two phenomena that have helped make your show so popular in the first place. It just doesn't sound like you, Stephen, baby.
more »Your Take
Wal-Mart 'Flogs' Par for the PR Course
All blogs are not created equal, and many of them are not transparent in their athenticity either. Sometimes we are hoodwinked, we want to believe, but we are deceived by what have become known as "flogs" or fake blogs, bought and paid for by someone else. In the case of our hot topic of the week, it's Edelman PR creating multiple flogs to tout Wal-Mart, including Wal-Marting Across America wherein our two heroes traipse around the country in a RV in praise of Wal-Mart. Surprise, surprise, their trip was funded by Edelman on behalf of Wal-Mart.
more »Digging Deeper
Brian Ross: Foley Story a Watershed for ABC News on the Web
The website navigation on each of the top U.S. broadcaster sites is the same litany of typical news categories: U.S., World, Politics, Business, Health, Science, etc. But at ABCNews.com, the list is slightly different: U.S., International, Investigative -- that's right, the Investigative category lands in the No. 3 slot in the site's navigation, while MSNBC, CBS, Fox News and CNN don't even bother breaking out investigative reports.
more »Virtual Worlds
Wired, CNET, Reuters Agog Over Second Life
A friend of mine who works in PR in San Francisco came up to me at a party last week, and was wide-eyed at what's been going on lately at the virtual world Second Life.
more »Social Networking
Finding Balance in Teen Use of Social Media
Earlier today, I had the unusual experience of giving a speech to a group of academics at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, in Aurora, Ill. The unusual part was that I talked and interacted with them via AIM instant messaging on video. They could see and hear me talking from my home office in San Francisco, and I could hear their reactions and questions, and see the people questioning me. I even heard an announcement on the school loudspeakers about pumpkin projects!
more »Your Take
What do you think about the fake Wal-Mart blogs by Edelman PR?
Right now, the most searched-for term on blog search engine Technorati is "Edelman." Why? Usually even negative media mentions are good PR, but in this case, the Edelman PR firm has been under attack from the blogosphere for helping to run three pro-Wal-Mart blogs without being transparent about their involvement. One of those blogs, Wal-Marting Across America, turned out to be a paid gig for the "average couple" that was taking an RV tour of the U.S. and staying in Wal-Mart parking lots. Worse, the photographer half of the couple was Jim Thresher, whose day job was at the Washington Post. He was outed by the Wal-Mart Watch blog and was forced by his employer to take down his photos and return payment from the Working Families for Wal-Mart (a group set up by Edelman).
more »Digging Deeper
Creative Commons + Flickr = 22 Million Sharable Photos
When I was writing a blog post about Mark Cuban and his ShareSleuth site, I wanted to illustrate it with a good photo of Cuban but didn't like the photo he sent me. So I turned to an invaluable source of photography for a non-commercial blog like MediaShift -- the Flickr Creative Commons pool. On that site, you can search through 22 million photos for shots that are being legally shared by photographers, under flexible copyrights licensed through Creative Commons (CC).
more »PoliticalShift
Gallaudet University Protests Gain Global Audience
If you're a non-deaf person who generally follows U.S. national news, you probably have a vague idea that there have been protests going on at the only university for the deaf, Gallaudet University, in Washington, DC. You might not be sure why the protests are happening, except that the students don't want the incoming president, Jane Fernandes, to assume her new duties in January.
more »Your Take Roundup
Facebook Still a Favorite...For Now
Sometimes we in the media get carried away by the news of the day, and draw hasty conclusions that turn out all wrong. Take Facebook and the rise of social networking sites such as MySpace. Because they are the province of the young, we assume their tastes are fickle and that these sites will be hot today, gone tomorrow.
more »Digging Deeper
Cafebabel.com Breaks Down European Borders with Grassroots Media
In all the various efforts to unite Europe under the framework of the European Union, European Commission, and Euro currency, there is still one effort that has largely failed: creating a truly pan-European media outlet.
more »Online Video
Google Spends $1.65 Billion for YouTube
It's deja vu all over again as an unprofibable Internet startup, barely 19 months old, was bought for $1.65 billion yesterday. But the startup in question, video-sharing phenomenon YouTube, is not just any startup looking to cash in on hype. YouTube is the eyeball catcher of all eyeball catchers, racking up 100 million-plus videos watched per day, and has become a brand that has broken through to the mainstream, to the non-technical masses, to our grandparents and little kids.
more »NewspaperShift
Don't Stick Fork In Editorialists Just Yet
At least not until this proud editorialist gets another job, that is! Actually, after reading the case for abolishing traditional editorials presented by the always interesting Jeff Jarvis at BuzzMachine.com, I have to nod my head in agreement with much of what he says even as I vigorously disagree with his marquee assertion.
more »NewspaperShift
WECAN Harnesses Wisdom of Crowds for Newspaper
One of the biggest reasons I can't wait to get to the newsroom most mornings is the WECAN project --- the Washington Examiner Community Action Network. This project is barely in its infancy but is worth watching because it combines elements of citizen media and open-source journalism, with a semi-traditional daily newspaper.
more »Social Networking
MySpace May Be Worth $0 in Three Years
SAN FRANCISCO (Goiters) - MySpace, the social networking Web site, could be worth around $0 within three years, measured in terms of the value created for shareholders of parent company News Corp. , according to a media analyst forecast on Wednesday.
more »Open Source Reporting
Eliminating Physical Media Sprawl of CDs, DVDs, Books
Lately, I have declared my own personal war on clutter in my life. That means all the paper littering my home office had to go. Those outdated hats from Burning Mans past also were out, as were old loose photos of places I don't remember. But for whatever reason, in each clean sweep I do of my stuff, I can never part with my collections of books, CDs, VHS and DVD movies (not to mention vinyl records and audiocassettes).
more »Your Take
Has Facebook jumped the shark?
The popular college and high school social networking site Facebook has recently been in the news for all the wrong reasons. The site introduced a controversial "news feeds" feature that allowed people to see what their friends had been doing lately online, leading to thousands of users signing a petition saying they opposed the feature. Facebook relented and allowed people to opt out of the feature. But then the service decided to change from being a closed community of college and high school communities, and become a more open service where anyone could sign up for geographic-oriented communities. Has the service lost its way and "jumped the shark" (meaning it's passed its prime)? If you are a longtime user, are you going to stay with Facebook or try another service? What do you like about it, and what turns you off about it? Share your thoughts in the comments below, and I'll run the best responses in the next Your Take Roundup.
more »Digging Deeper
Your Guide to Citizen Journalism
The idea behind citizen journalism is that people without professional journalism training can use the tools of modern technology and the global distribution of the Internet to create, augment or fact-check media on their own or in collaboration with others. For example, you might write about a city council meeting on your blog or in an online forum. Or you could fact-check a newspaper article from the mainstream media and point out factual errors or bias on your blog. Or you might snap a digital photo of a newsworthy event happening in your town and post it online. Or you might videotape a similar event and post it on a site such as YouTube.
more »Digging Deeper
Can Witness, Global Voices Make Human Rights Video Go Viral?
There is an impulse when we see quirky videos we like on YouTube to email them on to friends or co-workers. When those catchy videos start accumulating viewers, marketers say it's gone viral through word-of-mouth popularity. So what if you could take videos shot by citizens of human rights violations, such as police brutality or torture, and got them to go viral, bringing more attention to the crimes?
more »Your Take Roundup
Award-Worthy Blogs Showcase Evolution of the Medium
Not too long ago, your blog might be judged by your skill with the written word. Are you funny? Do you have a new view on politics that hasn't been covered by the mainstream media? Are you writing anonymously about a sensitive subject? These were the attributes that helped drive the popularity and influence of the early A-list bloggers, who also were well connected to the technology world.
more »Social Networking
Why Participants Matter in Online Communities
It must be fun to play God as the owner of an online community or social networking site. You have millions of people who "live" on your website, and with each feature or new technical wrinkle, you are changing the way they live their lives online. But with that power comes responsibilities, and when those responsibilities are forgotten, the community rebels and leaves you in the dust.
more »Digging Deeper
Associated Press, MSNBC Video to Support Macs, Firefox
There is nothing more frustrating for Macintosh users or those who use the Firefox browser than going to a video site and hitting a wall demanding Windows and the Internet Explorer browser. But when the Associated Press' Online Video Network first launched last spring in conjunction with Microsoft, the requirements for users were just that: Windows and Internet Explorer. The idea behind the OVN is that Microsoft provides the video hosting, technology and ad sales; AP provides the video content; and small and medium news site partners show the videos on their sites for a split of revenue with Microsoft and the AP.
more »Online Video
Matt Foremski's Sleuthing Leads to Jessica Rose
Ladies and gentlemen, it appears we have a winner of the MediaShift Your Blog Here Contest. I was a bit flustered trying to figure out the mystery behind the Lonelygirl15 series of videos on YouTube, so I started a contest to see who could solve this mystery -- and to take my pain away.
more »Citizen Journalism
Reliving 9/11 Without Glitz of Big Media
Today is September 11, and the date 9/11 will seemingly forever be linked to the terrorist attacks on the U.S. in 2001. I kept hearing on NPR News yesterday that the memorials for 9/11 had already started a day earlier on 9/10. I dreaded this day, especially as a media watcher, because I knew the mainstream media would turn the 5th anniversary of 9/11 into another spectacle, complete with theme music, glitzy graphics and teary made-for-TV melodramas.
more »Online Video
Help Solve the Lonelygirl15 Mystery
My head is spinning, hurting. I'm not sure which confounds me more -- figuring out who YouTube star-of-the-moment Lonelygirl15 really is or figuring out why so many major news organizations have taken the bait and played along. I'm hoping that you, dear MediaShift readers, will take my pain away and help solve the mystery once and for all.
more »Your Take Roundup
U.S. Government Should be Focus of Investigative Reports
Whether it's the Iraq War, the events of 9/11 or the Department of Homeland Security, government conduct (or misconduct) is what you'd like to see investigated most. I asked a very open-ended question to you last week, "What investigative report would you like to see done?" Your answers included many bread-and-butter issues such as health care, education and real estate. But the overriding issue was government conduct, a popular issue in classic journalism investigations such as Watergate in the '70s -- but perhaps lacking in today's corporate media.
more »Your Take
What weblog or podcast would you nominate for Best of the Blogs?
Is there a particular weblog or podcast that you love more than anything? Do you think it deserves some international attention? Now's your chance to nominate that blog -- whether it's yours or someone else's -- for the Best of the Blogs (The BOBs) awards, put on for the third year by German public media company Deutsche Welle. There are awards given for blogs in 10 different languages, and now they have categories for audio and video podcasts. Plus, award categories include Best Corporate Blog, Blogwurst Award (for wacky subjects) and Reporters Without Borders award for a blog supporting freedom of speech. You can nominate a blog for The BOBs here. But also explain your nomination(s) in the comments below, and I'll review some of the better ones in next week's Your Take Roundup. (Full disclosure: I will be judging the English-language blogs.) Nominations close on Sept. 30.
more »Digging Deeper
News21 Produces Investigative Reports, But Can Universities Think Different?
In May 2005, you could almost hear the flourish of trumpets when the Carnegie Corporation and the Knight Foundation joined with five prominent journalism graduate schools in pledging $6 million over three years to create the Carnegie-Knight Initiative on the Future of Journalism Education.
more »Your Take Roundup
Watching Shows on Computers Supplements Your TV Viewing
Let's be clear about one thing. Watching TV shows and movies on computer screens -- as they exist today -- will not replace watching TV and movies on much bigger screens, in much more comfortable environs. Of course there are computers that can function as TV sets, and TV sets that can do some computer functions, but we haven't found nirvana yet, at least on a mass-quantity affordable basis.
more »Philosophy
Your Own Views of the Media Shift
A couple weeks ago, I was trying to come up with a way to sum up some of the many concepts I've been illustrating on this blog. How could I do that in a simple, catchy way? The result was the Oldthink vs. Newthink post, where I simply listed the old ways of doing things in media and the new ways that were being explored.
more »Digging Deeper
Mark Cuban's Sharesleuth Takes Business Reporting to Ethical Edge
Billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban has one of the best named weblogs, Blog Maverick, because he is nothing if not a maverick in the technology, sports and online worlds. He shepherded his Broadcast.com streaming multimedia company through a successful initial public offering in 1998 and sold it to Yahoo in 1999 for more than $5 billion. Cuban used the proceeds to start high-definition TV networks, HDNet, buy Landmark Movie theaters and buy the Dallas Mavericks NBA team. He's probably the only major team owner who asks fans to email him feedback.
more »Your Take Roundup
AmigoFish, VlogMap Point to Podcast Goodness
For people new to the world of podcasting, there are a few hurdles to jump before feeling comfortable with the medium. First, you have to consider where you'll listen or watch podcasts -- on your computer or on your portable MP3 player. Then you have to subscribe to podcasts you want to hear, and learn how to do that. For the techno-savvy, it's a relatively painless process, but for others it could be simpler.
more »Open Source Reporting
Bloggers Gauge Web 2.0 Features for Newspaper Sites Around World
So this is how open source reporting works. On August 1, The Bivings Group released a research report of how the Top 100 U.S. newspaper websites were implementing features such as blogs, podcasts and social bookmarking. (I summarized the findings here.) By August 10, three bloggers located outside the U.S. took it upon themselves to do a similar study of their own country's top newspaper sites to see how they stacked up to their American counterparts. And one German blogger set up a wiki to track results for German newspaper sites.
more »Digging Deeper
'War Tapes' Film Lets Soldiers Tell Their Stories from Iraq
So many times on the Internet, I've watched a video clip of combat in Iraq that looks like it was shot by a soldier. I hear some talking, the sound of shooting, screams and yelps in the background. But just as often I don't have the context of who was filming, why they are filming and what's going on inside their head. Where are they? What's the situation? Did they succeed or fail?
more »Your Take
How do you find out about good podcasts?
A couple years ago, you could find all the podcasts in existence just by checking the iPodder Directory to see the eclectic mix of homegrown and technology-related audio shows. Now the number of podcasts has exploded as many mainstream news and entertainment companies jump on the bandwagon, and Jupiter Research estimates that 9 million Americans downloaded a podcast in the month of June. I've done a Guide to Podcast Directories but I'm wondering how you find out about good podcasts. Do you find them on news websites or other media sites? Do you check the iTunes podcast directory? Do you hear about them from friends and family? Share your thoughts on how you find good podcasts in the comments below and I'll run the best ones in next week's Your Take Roundup.
more »Your Take
Skepticism Rampant Over War 'Fauxtography'
Most people trust that the photos they see of war in their daily newspaper shot by a professional photographer are accurate. The photographer risked his or her life to get the shot, snapped the picture, sent it to a photo editor, who then vetted it for publication.
more »NewspaperShift
Newspaper Sites Hot to Blog, Cool to Podcasts
Newspaper companies are feeling the shift hard, as people go from reading print newspapers to getting their news and classified ads on the Internet. But if there's one thing the Newspaper Association of America can hang their hat on, it's that newspaper websites continue to grow their audiences and advertising revenues. So if people are not reading papers in print, at least they might be getting their news online from the same news source.
more »Digging Deeper
Your Guide to Soldier Videos from Iraq
If the first Gulf War put cable news and CNN on the map, the second Gulf War in Iraq has put video shot by soldiers in the spotlight. I first wrote about these videos in January, focusing on the ones that proliferated at the video-sharing site YouTube. But now, the phenomenon has exploded into the mainstream, with an MTV documentary, Iraq Uploaded and a full-length film, The War Tapes ("the first war movie filmed by soldiers themselves").
more »Your Take
What's your favorite site for finding and sharing photos?
Digital technology has changed forever the way we take photos, share them, and print them out. Before, we had to buy 35mm film and pay to get the film developed. Now we can use powerful digital cameras that have no film and allow us to print only the best photos with our own photo printers. Plus, we can post photos online at sites such as Flickr and Shutterfly to share with friends or the world. So tell us which photo sites you like to visit either to see great photography, or to share your own photos. Why do you like the site, and what features set it apart? As a bonus, tell us what features you would like that don't exist yet. Share your thoughts in the comments, and I'll run the best ones in the next Your Take Roundup.
more »Your Take Roundup
True Gritz Videoblog a Comic Fave Among Friends
So this is how you win elections in the South. I asked MediaShift readers to name their favorite sites for comic relief or work breaks, and the True Gritz video blog won in a landslide of 11 votes. But upon further review, two of the votes came from the True Gritz videoblog's stars, Jen Gordon and Grayson Hurst Daughters, with another vote coming from the show's lighting person, Danielle Ayan.
more »Weblogs
Being a BlogHim at BlogHer Conference
SAN JOSE, CALIF. -- Compared to last month's fiesty, combative BloggerCon IV conference in San Francisco, the BlogHer conference here is almost a revival meeting of mutual support and warm emotion. During the jam-packed opening session today, BlogHer organizer Elisa Camahort had women come to the stage to describe how blogging had changed their lives. With each personal story, the audience applauded or laughed along.
more »Citizen Journalism
Can Investigative Journalism Be Done in Collaboration Online?
Robert Parry, an investigative reporter who broke stories about the Iran-Contra scandal in the '80s, wrote about the importance of investigative journalism for his ConsortiumNews.com site.
more »Digging Deeper
Should Community-Edited News Sites Pay Top Editors?
If there is one push-and-pull balancing act that defines news in the age of Web 2.0, it's the question of how much power to give the audience, the masses, the collective mind, and how much control remains centralized. That balancing act has played a crucial role in the development of community-generated sites such as Wikipedia, Slashdot and even Google, where search results and PageRank depend on people linking to the most authoritative sources on a subject.
more »World View
Bloggers Freed From Jail in China, Egypt, Iran
With bombs dropping in Lebanon and Israel, sectarian violence rising in Iraq and civil war in Somalia -- among other bad tidings -- we are in dire need of good news and a reason to get up in the morning. Thankfully, there has been a spate of such news in the blogosphere, with a few high-profile bloggers being released from jail in China, Egypt and Iran.
more »Media Usage
Big Media Last to Know Bloggers Not in Pajamas
Today was going to be a day of triumphalism in the new media world, a day where I would celebrate the growing ranks of blog creators (a.k.a. bloggers) and blog readers in the U.S., while also noting the growing number of people downloading podcasts. I would combine the happy results from a Pew Internet survey on blogging with the great news (PDF file) from Nielsen//Netratings that podcasting was gaining a foothold.
more »Digging Deeper
Stanford Fellow Imagines Every Cell Phone as Citizen Media Outlet
Perhaps some day in the not so distant future, every person on the planet who has a cell phone camera will be able to snap a photo of a newsworthy event happening in front of them and easily send it to a web clearinghouse of such news images. That's the dream of Erik Sundelof (pictured at left), a Reuters Digital Vision Fellow at Stanford University, a program that aims to develop technology to advance humanitarian goals in underserved communities.
more »Your Take Roundup
Everyone Has an Opinion on Future of Rocketboom
So what's up with Rocketboom, the popular video blog that lost its longtime host, Amanda Congdon? When we last left the he said/she said soap opera, Rocketboom honcho Andrew Baron was readying a replacement for Congdon, while Congdon was upset about being "unboomed" from the show.
more »Weblogs
Is Amanda Congdon Replaceable?
When I lived in New York City in the late '80s, I thought I was a hotshot DJ. I spun records (yes, vinyl) at a restaurant in Queens that had a special dance night catering to flight attendants. More people started showing up, the owner started charging for entry, but I was still being paid $125 per night as the DJ.
more »Your Take
Who should replace Amanda Congdon at Rocketboom (if that's possible)?
I tried hard not to watch the car crash that was Amanda Congdon splitting from the most popular video blog in history, Rocketboom. But rubbernecking is a tough habit to break. Congdon left the show or was fired by producer Andrew Baron, depending on who's telling the story. If you're just joining the soap opera that's been splashed all over the blogosphere, gossip site Valleywag has the blow-by-blow blog posts. I'll have my own thoughts on the high-profile split, along with quotes from various observers, on Monday, but now it's your turn to weigh in. Who should be the next face of Rocketboom? Who has the humor, the charisma, the smarts to follow in Congdon's footsteps? Or do you think no one can follow her and Rocketboom will flounder? Share your thoughts in the comments and I'll run the best ideas in the next Your Take Roundup.
more »Your Take Roundup
Google Reader, Sage Lead as Favorite RSS Readers
Why use an RSS reader if it's not straightforward and easy to set up and use? That's the underlying point of what MediaShift readers said in responding to this week's question, "Which RSS news reader do you use and why?"
more »Digging Deeper
From time to time, I'll give an overview of one broad MediaShift topic, annotated with online resources and plenty of tips. The idea is to help you understand the topic, learn the jargon, and hopefully consider trying it out -- even if it's all new to you. I've already covered blogging; this week I'll look at RSS._
more »RSS
RSS Week::How to Make RSS = Really Satisfying Syndication
We live in a time of information overload. News and opinion swirls around us online, burying us in an avalanche of foreign newspaper sites, viral video, political blogs, school email newsletters, showbiz podcasts and on and on. Just when you think you've seen it all, another hundred new sites spring up and become must-read material. That's where the promise...
more »TVShift
Sleeping With the Enemy::NBC, YouTube Cross-Promotion Off to Crass Start
When I talked to my sister yesterday, she said she had been thinking of me when she saw a report on "NBC Nightly News" about the video-sharing service, YouTube. "I thought that story might interest you, because of what you write about," she said. OK, true enough, and I had heard about the recent promotional deal between NBC Universal...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::Blogger-Anchor Brian Williams Defends Nightly Newscasts
After countless months of blissful ignorance, I finally broke down and watched the "NBC Nightly News." OK, so it was at 10:30 pm and it was really a netcast online. I still watched what looked like the evening news. It harked back to a time, perhaps 10 years ago, when I would make sure to end my work day...
more »Your Take Roundup
Your Take Roundup::You Listen to Podcasts On Your Own Time
Perhaps the term "podcasting" isn't the best way to describe these audio shows that run the gamut from talk to music. First of all, you can listen to podcasts on your home or work computer, or on any portable MP3 player you choose and not just an Apple iPod. Plus, you can listen on your car radio with the...
more »BloggerCon 2006
Live from BloggerCon::Thinking Beyond Blogs
SAN FRANCISCO -- Despite my initial reaction to BloggerCon as being a room full of bloggers talking about blogging, the topics of discussion on the first day actually went beyond just blogging. The technical discussions touched on web standards and podcasting, and at one point someone even complained that the technology discussed didn't relate directly to blogs. For one...
more »BloggerCon 2006
Live from Bloggercon::From a Room Where Bloggers Blog About Blogging
SAN FRANCISCO -- If you wondered what happens when bloggers get into a room together for a conference, the unsurprising truth is that they sit around and talk about blogging while simultaneously going on their laptops to blog about it. That's the scene here at BloggerCon IV in the offices of CNET Networks in the South of Market neighborhood...
more »TVShift
Digging Deeper::Big Media Slowly Giving the Audience Some Control
Have you ever watched your local TV news broadcast and railed against the stream of homicides, car crashes and fires? What if you could have a say in what the station was reporting each day? John Schiumo has made that dream a reality for New Yorkers who watch the local 24-hour cable news station, NY1. Last July, Schiumo helped...
more »TVShift
Open Source Reporting::Designing an On-Demand TV Service That Beats DVDs
We are a culture that thrives on immediate satisfaction. We want what we want when we want it. So the idea that we can order any TV show or movie we want -- for a small fee or with advertising -- appeals to us immensely. Slowly, but surely, the cable and satellite operators are starting to offer "on-demand video,"...
more »Your Take Roundup
Your Take Roundup::Sports Video on Cell Phones Works in Right Situations
It's easy to ridicule the idea of watching a World Cup soccer match or baseball game on a tiny mobile phone screen. Where's the ball, who's on first, how'd they score that goal? But for the rabid displaced fans of any sport, having the tiniest video highlights in town is better than nothing at all. I asked if you...
more »Citizen Journalism
Opening Up the Grant Process::Help the Knight Foundation Give Away Millions
The email pitch was so cheesy, that I almost didn't open up the message, thinking it was probably a get-rich-scheme spam email: "Last Chance to Help Spend Someone Else's $$$" was the subject line. But for once, this was no empty come-on. The Knight Foundation -- started by the newspaper moguls Jack and Jim Knight -- is asking for...
more »NewspaperShift
Opinion-Page Makeover::Turn NY Times Columnists Into Bloggers
Last week I tried to channel Ronald Reagan in asking New York Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. to tear down the TimesSelect pay wall. But perhaps I tried too hard to stick to the original speech, without clarifying my points well. Plus, I wonder what would happen if the Times took the opposite tack, and turned all its columnists...
more »NewspaperShift
Your Take Roundup::Newspaper Blogs Must Break Social Control of Newsroom
Something about the juxtoposition of the words "newspaper blog" doesn't ring true. Newspapers and blogs don't seem to fit together naturally unless you're thinking of a blogger who likes to rip apart the bias of a local newspaper. Yet, if you can set aside the early combative relationship between bloggers and newspaper folk (and other mainstream media types), you...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::Blogger Beware: Syndicators Might Offer a Raw Deal
Budding writers often dream of the day their words will reach a wider audience, and that they'll get paid for their hard work. And for many bloggers who toil in obscurity below the radar, the thought of having their blog posts show up on a huge newspaper site such as washingtonpost.com is enticing. But the dream doesn't always match...
more »Weblogs
Sock Puppetry::Bloggers Must Be Vigilant Against Astroturf Comments
If you run an online forum or a blog that allows readers to comment, you sometimes feel like you're having a conversation in the fog. Often people will contribute anonymously or make up names or places where they live, or even lie about their gender, age or occupation. So what can you do about it? You might require a...
more »World View
Digging Deeper::Blogs, Wiki, Google Bomb Used to Free Egyptian Activist
Last August, when I was working on a story for Online Journalism Review about activists using technology to organize protests in Egypt, I made the mistake of focusing too much on blogs. One of the people I interviewed, Alaa Abd El Fattah, was quick to pounce on me for asking about blogs and only blogs, when Egyptians were using...
more »Your Take Roundup
Your Take Roundup::YouTube Just the Start for Video Sharing
It's easy to lose yourself in all the video at YouTube. You watch one music video, which leads to a spoof video, which leads to a stupid pet trick, which leads...who knows where. Before you know it, it's time to leave work. Free time just evaporates when you're immersed in a viral video site like YouTube or iFilm, where...
more »Guides
Digging Deeper::Your Guide to Blogging
From time to time, I'm going to try to give an overview of one broad new-media topic, annotated with online resources and plenty of tips. The idea is to help you understand the topic, learn the jargon, and hopefully consider participating in some way -- even if it's all new to you. The first topic is the one I'm...
more »Open Source Reporting
Open Source Reporting::Living Your Life Online Has Benefits
Back in late March, I detailed some of the ways that computers and the Internet had changed my life. I use Google News to check breaking news. I use online services such as Evite to organize face-to-face activities. I communicate with more people through email than by phone or in person. I buy gifts online. Then I asked you...
more »MusicShift
Your Take Roundup::Do-It-Yourself Ways to Find Good Music
Just as the Internet and technology have changed the way people get their news, the same can be said about finding good music. At one time in our unconnected, non-Internet past, we had to listen closely to the radio, studiously writing down artist names and song titles, and then going in search of the music at local record stores...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::Reuters Looks to Provide 'Spine of Truth' to Blogosphere
In the brave new world of citizen media -- with bloggers, podcasters and video journalists doing it themselves -- what role does the musty old wire service play? An important one, if it can stay relevant, honest and transparent. Because if you eliminate the tell-it-like-it-is wire stories from the Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France Presse, it's very difficult...
more »Live from London::We Media's World Tour from Reuters
LONDON -- First, the good news. I can report that the halls of the We Media conference were buzzing today with people slagging the overproduced Big Media lovefest at the BBC yesterday, and heaping praise on the second day's global focus and more intimate setting at Reuters' headquarters in Canary Wharf on the east side of London. Today, the...
more »Citizen Journalism
Live from London::We Media, Me Too Media and Them Media
LONDON -- It's exciting to be in a room -- well, actually a glitzy BBC TV studio -- with a group of top media executives, consultants, think-tankers and gadflys for a day of discussion about We Media or citizen journalism. Much of the discussion was about how Big Media is embracing the new democratization of media online with citizen-shot...
more »Live from London::Which Media Do You Trust?
LONDON -- I am your on-the-scene correspondent this week from London, where I am currently in a BBC TV studio listening to various people discuss citizen journalism at the We Media Forum. The conference bills itself thusly: "No ordinary conference, We Media is about how we create a better-informed society by collaborating with one another." The big news early...
more »Legal Drama
Opinion Roundup::Mixed Views on Apple Vs. Gossip Sites
In the Age of the Blog, the wheels of justice are spinning in the U.S. as courts are trying to rule on the rights of bloggers as journalists. There are more questions than answers in a case such as Apple vs. Does: Are the people who run gossip news sites such as PowerPage.org and Apple Insider journalists or even...
more »PoliticalShift
Free Hao Wu::Blogosphere Unites to Help Jailed Chinese Filmmaker
It's a strange sensation reading through the personal musings of Hao Wu on his Beijing or Bust blog. There is an entry, Teacher for Life, in which Hao recollects a recent meeting with a former teacher. The entry is dated February 22 -- the same date that the Beijing division of China's State Security Bureau arrested Hao, jailing him...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::Singapore Tries to Squelch Political Blogs, Podcasts
While many Americans have been focused lately on online censorship in China, few have noticed a similar practice in other countries such as Singapore. That island state is a parliamentary republic in theory, but has really been run by one dominant party in its history of independence since 1965 (see a Singapore historical timeline here). The mainstream media is...
more »Weblogs
Get a Life::Fighting Blog Obsession
When I first started blogging in January, I had a sneaky suspicion that this blog might become a bit of an obsession. Here's what I wrote then: "But now, finally, in 2006, I am ready to turn my life over to the blog. I hope it doesn't eat my wife and son, chew through my assorted leisure activities, and...
more »Wikis
Email Debate::Wales Discusses Political Bias on Wikipedia
Conservative blogger Robert Cox, who writes the National Debate blog, told me he was amazed at the quality of Wikipedia and thought it was a great resource. But there was something about the free online community-generated encyclopedia that was getting under his skin -- what Cox believed was a liberal bias in many hot-button topic entries, despite Wikipedia's principle...
more »Your Take Roundup
Your Take Roundup::Believers, Negativists Debate Wikipedia's Trustworthiness
Are you enjoying Wikipedia Week yet at MediaShift? The more time I spend looking at Wikipedia, delving into its arcane rules and hearing from its various supporters and detractors, the more it feels like a religious sect. People have very strong views on the community-generated free online encyclopedia, ranging from calling it a revolution in collective wisdom to a...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::MySpace, Wikipedia Cope With Growing Pains
When a TV show or radio program becomes a hit, the producer usually makes more money and everyone benefits. But when an online community becomes hugely popular, complications arise with the influx of a mainstream audience and trouble-makers who have no history with the site. That's because TV and radio are broadcast or one-to-many outlets, while user-generated content sites...
more »Citizen Journalism
Wikipedia Bias::Is There a Neutral View on George W. Bush?
One of the guiding principles for Wikipedia, the free online community-generated encyclopedia, is the "neutral point of view." According to Wikipedia's own explanatory page, "NPOV (Neutral Point Of View) is a fundamental Wikipedia principle which states that all articles must be written from a neutral point of view, representing views fairly and without bias." The problem is how to...
more »Weblogs
Blog Tempest::Strumpette an 'Anonymous Coward' or PR Muckraker?
Everyone who toils in glamorous industries dreams of the day that they'll write a tell-all book or blog on the subject of what really goes on at their workplace. And the example of the Washingtonienne is instructive: Capitol Hill staffer writes about her sexcapades with co-workers on an anonymous blog, gets outed and fired, and writes a novel on...
more »Jargon Watch
Jargon Watch::What is Web 2.0, and Should You Care?
From time to time, MediaShift will try to explain the jargon of the digital media revolution, the catch-phrases and buzz words that get bandied about ad infinitum -- yet no one really knows what they are. Use the comments to share your own personal definition of what Web 2.0 is and isn't. Jargon: Web 2.0 (noun or adjective). Definitions:...
more »Citizen Journalism
Citizen Media Conundrum::If You See News, Where Do You Report It?
One of the ideas behind citizen journalism is that anybody who witnesses something newsworthy can photograph it, videotape it or write about it for the rest of the world. But one of the conundrums of citizen journalism is where do you do that? You could start a blog or put the information on your existing blog. You could try...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::YouTube CEO Hails 'Birth of a New Clip Culture'
There is a simple truth about video-sharing site YouTube, and an enigma. The simple truth is that this web startup has bottled up the viral video idea and made it eminently drinkable by anyone -- you go to the site, find the video clip you want to watch, and, voila! you're watching it in seconds. And if you want...
more »Your Take Roundup
Your Take Roundup::Sense of Community Motivates You to Work for Free
So much of the web is powered by volunteer work it's mind-boggling. The non-commercial ethos of the early days of the web, when people posted their thoughts to usenet groups and bulletin-board services, stuck around for years even as the web became more commercialized. America Online's chat room moderators, eBay's user-generated ratings, and Flickr's vast array of user-submitted photos...
more »Online Video
Fighting for Open Standards::Cox Newspapers Says No to AP Video
Since launching MediaShift in January, the one post I've written that has received the most vehement response so far was about the Associated Press' new online video service requiring Internet Explorer and Windows. And I even followed up on that with a blacklist and a whitelist of other online video services that either shut out alternative browsers or the...
more »Weblogs
Israeli Elections::Live Blogging the Next Best Thing to TV
Before the 2004 U.S. elections, I considered political news on the Internet to be an addendum to the breaking news I would get from cable TV or the serious journalism of newspapers and magazines. But as the 2004 elections neared in October of that year, I realized that any serious political junkie was getting a much better fix on...
more »AdvertisingShift
Digging Deeper::Go Daddy Gives Podcasters Freedom to Create Ads
Advertisers and marketers spend much of their time (and money) trying to pitch the public on their products and services. Their language includes terms like "mindshare" and "branding" and "conversion rates." It's all about convincing you and me to go out and buy their stuff, and how to motivate us to do it, by any means necessary. But imagine...
more »Open Source Reporting
Open Source Reporting::Living Your Life Online
I've been thinking a lot lately about life before the Internet, and life before computers. How was life different? Was it worse? Was it better? How? Of course, there is a generation of people and children whose entire lives have been lived on computers and online -- they know no other way to live. Conversely, there are huge populations...
more »TVShift
Dear CBS Sportsline::Close Down Live Streams of Tourney for Our Own Good
Open Letter to CBS Sportsline Dear Keepers of the March Madness Tournament Flame, We the college basketball-loving public appreciate all you've done for us. You offer satellite packages with all the games in the men's college basketball tournament. We can go to Las Vegas and watch and bet on all the games. And now, in your crowning moment, you've...
more »Online Forums
Riding Talk Revisited::Politicians Speak Out About CBC Forums
In early February, I looked at an interesting project by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (CBC) called Riding Talk, where they provided a moderated forum for each and every riding (electoral district) in Canada before the late January elections. I had hoped to include the thoughts of a few politicians who participated in the forums but I didn't hear from...
more »MusicShift
CD Swapmeet::La La Love Ya, Don't Mean Maybe
I have a wall of CDs that sit around gathering dust. I always thought that one day I would just rip them -- i.e. copy them to my computer hard drive -- and get rid of them. But that day never came, and the CDs just sat there, unlistened to and unloved. Then came La La, a service that...
more »Open Source Reporting
Open Source Reporting::The Whitelist: Video Services That Play Nice
Since last week, I've spent a lot of time ferreting out online video sites that don't play nice with a huge number of web users. These sites don't let you view videos with the popular Firefox browser, or on Macintosh computers. First, I wondered why the new AP Online Video Network shut out Firefox and the Mac. Then I...
more »TVShift
Digging Deeper::TV Critics Eye Online Content Reviews
Anyone who has spent an afternoon at a site such as iFilm Viral Video or YouTube can attest to how addictive online video can be. Some of it's funny, some of it's stupid, some of it's classic. But the problem is finding the good stuff, as the most popular videos and the ones with the highest user ratings aren't...
more »Online Video
Open Source Reporting::Which Online Video Services Require IE?
Last Thursday, I wondered why the Associated Press was launching a new video network online that required the use of the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser. The AP's Sue Cross says that the news cooperative is working on a solution to the compatibility problem, but many readers pointed out that the AP Online Video Network isn't the only video service...
more »Weblogs
Blog Obsession::I Am a Technorati Addict
When I started this blog, I was worried that it would take over my life. What I didn't know at the time was that the blog wasn't the only thing that would take over. Now, when I log on each day, it's not just to read comments on the blog or write something for it. I also must make...
more »Online Video
Millions Not Served::AP Video Requires Microsoft Browser
Most people don't realize just how important the Associated Press is. The news cooperative -- owned by its U.S. news organization members -- has been around since 1848, and now supplies 8,500 subscriber news outlets with text wire stories and photos, and 5,000 radio and TV outlets with audio and video content. And online, the service is ubiquitous, popping...
more »Social Networking
Your Take Roundup::Split Verdict on MySpace's Future
Lately, the hugely popular social networking site MySpace has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. Politicians and parents are worried about sexual predators and other illegal activity on the site. And Jupiter analyst Nate Elliot believes the membership numbers for MySpace -- hovering around 60 million registered users -- are deceptive. Most of these users create...
more »Weblogs
Far From a Twilight::Blog Hype Over -- Business Has Just Begun
Journalists can be very predictable. They love a story about something exciting and new that is changing our culture, changing our politics, transforming our very lives! And they equally love a story debunking that thing that was supposed to transform our lives as really being a crock, just something that was overhyped and is truly finished before it ever...
more »Weblogs
Your Take Roundup::Giving Props to Last-Place Finishers at Olympics
As we are knee-deep in the Winter Olympics games, I wondered how you were experiencing the Olympics online, and asked you to tell me about some quirky sites you liked. The Games so far have been a bit quirky, from the marshmallow-headed mascots Neve and Gliz (pictured here) to the many ice-dancing falls to the Austrian doping raids. But...
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::How Does iTunes Pick Featured Podcasts?
While working on last's week's guide to podcast directories, I stumbled onto one of the great mysteries of the podcasting world: Just how exactly does Apple choose the featured podcasts in its popular podcast directory? And the more I looked at other directories, the more I had similar questions about what was chosen and why. So I methodically contacted...
more »NewspaperShift
Citizen Power?::CBS, Wisconsin Newspaper Let Audience Vote
Two recent announcements made me wonder if the mainstream media was really starting to "get" citizen journalism, and starting to allow the former audience into the news process. The Wisconsin State Journal newspaper, run out of the state capital of Madison, decided to let its web visitors vote on one of five articles that would run on the front...
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Digging Deeper::Your Guide to Podcast Directories
Even though podcasts didn't exist until mid-2004, there are now so many of them that it's easy to get overwhelmed by the sheer number. Yahoo recently listed more than 23,000 podcasts in its News category of podcasts. So what's a listener to do? Luckily there are a few excellent online directories that list and rank podcasts to help you find...
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Video Blog Sellout::Rocketboom Nets $80,000 After eBay Auction
When Andrew Baron decided to use eBay to sell the first ads on his popular video blog Rocketboom, he was worried that no one would bite. But bite they did. After Rocketboom's 10-day auction, the winning bidder had the screen name of StarFinder5, and paid $40,000 for five ads to be produced by Rocketboom. Rocketboom also retains creative control...
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World Wide Flame War::Topix.net Forums Give Window on Cartoon Flap
Pre-Internet days, a newspaper in Denmark that printed cartoons could be assured that they wouldn't be seen in other parts of the world. Those days are over. With protests and riots still burning bright in the Middle East over cartoons depicting Mohammed, we cannot ignore our global neighbors even if they live on the other side of the world....
more »Digging Deeper
Digging Deeper::CBC Offers Moderated Forum for Every Precinct
The hodge-podge of political discussion boards online can give you a headache. Usually it's a matter of who can scream the loudest and attack the fiercest. And if the subject is economics, someone will spout off on abortion. Plus, how can you find the right forum for the issues that concern you or your locale? The Canadian Broadcasting Corp....
more »MagazineShift
Your Blog Here::SportingNews.com Gives Readers Super Platform
If you're nutty about sports, and live in the U.S., you probably spend a good amount of time on the leading American sports website, ESPN.com. It's flashy, it has attitude, it's filled with good info, and it's awash in video highlights. And for fan involvement, there's ESPN SportsNation with its polls and forums. But the sports leader online could...
more »Futurama
Futurama::San Francisco Earthquake Coverage, Circa 2016
The year is 2016. President Jeb Bush is running for a third term as U.S. president. There has been major upheaval in the entertainment world, and the Long Tail has come to pass, with each of us gaining global access to all the music, movies and news and information we could ever want. After a January morning spent swimming...
more »Open Source Reporting
Open Source Reporting::The Search for a Fighter Jet and a Groundhog
A little over a week ago, I told you about my frustration in trying to find video of the 2004 Summer Olympics using all the hot video search engines. In the spirit of "open source reporting," I asked some of you to share your own experiences of trying to find video using popular video search engines such as Google...
more »Your Take Roundup
How Much Should You Moderate Comments? It Depends
After the Washington Post's website decided to shut down comments on its Post.Blog, I asked our own budding MediaShift community how you thought blog comments should be moderated here and elsewhere. Should online forums and blogs put up technological roadblocks to spammers and people spewing vitriol? Should they employ humans to check every comment before publishing them? Your responses...
more »Citizen Journalism
A year ago, Dan Gillmor was in a plum position. He had been a technology journalist and columnist for the San Jose Mercury News, in the heart of Silicon Valley. He had written the Bible of grassroots journalism, We the Media, describing how weblogs and other new media forms were democratizing media and giving power to the "former audience"...
more »AdvertisingShift
Rocketboom Auctions Ad to the Highest Bidder
In the beginning, when the web first became popular, everyone talked about disintermediation, the idea that the Internet would help eliminate the middleman or intermediary. You could buy books without going to a bookstore, read newspapers without going to a newsstand, and communicate with like-minded folks without going to group therapy. And that was good. And yet, book stores...
more »Online Video
Soldier Videos Don't Violate Policy
Last week, I wrote about the video-sharing site YouTube and discussed some videos there that appeared to be shot by soldiers in Iraq. The videos are well produced, and show soldiers in the field of combat, with gunfights, explosions and the like all edited to heavy metal and rap music. I had contacted the military and was awaiting their...
more »NewspaperShift
Washingtonpost.com Walks the Line
The people who run the website for the Washington Post newspaper, washingtonpost.com, really want to empower their readers and give them more online. They offer live online chats with reporters and editors, online forums for readers to discuss Post articles, and a slew of blogs including the Post.Blog, in which "The Editors Discuss Site Policies, Design and Goals." Ah,...
more »Digging Deeper
YouTube Offers Soldier's Eye View of Iraq War
The American public's interest in the War in Iraq has waxed and waned over the years, from intense debate to complete disconnection. So too has the media's interest, as Iraq goes from the front page of the newspaper to someplace buried deep within. But there's one viewpoint of the war that has never diminished: that of the soldier. If...
more »Open Source Reporting
Can Video Search Engines Find What You Want?
Video search engines are based on a simple premise: Type in a few key words, and voila! you can see the video you have described. The problem is that the main video search engines haven't figured out how to match key words to content, and they don't have all the commercial and amateur video you might want. In other...
more »Social Media
Blogging is a funny thing. Weblogs, those online diaries that run in reverse chronological order, are just like any other new technological advance: more people have heard of them than have actually read them or written them. My Aunt Bobby, when she heard that I was writing about blogs, would say, "Gosh, those conservative bloggers are sure stirring up a...
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