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POPSPlay the News - Get Your Sources Engaged Again: I often point to ReadWriteWeb, TechCrunch and Mashable as examples of beat blogging - and the latest experiment from RWW is a perfect example why. Using Impact Games they created four characters who could play out recent tech news. You could be a developer, Google, Yahoo, Facebook, etc, and predict what they would do next and how they would react to future circumstances. Imagine a situation where these scenario games are as quick to create as blog posts. Why not build a special one for your sources? Get them to comment on current events and feel like they are playing a game at the same time. So much of beat blogging is finding a way to engage your sources - give them a reason to stay involved, perhaps creating game-like sourcing is a means to do that.
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POPSWhat News Do You Share? Is Your Site Optomized for Social Media?
I'm always weary of news buzzwords - but this one caught my eye: "Social Media Optimization." At this point in the web's development "search engine optimization" is standard. I challenge you to find a serious web publisher who doesn't recognize the acronym SEO from a mile away. Social media, however, isn't on everyone's radar. My question in reading this blog post from the Early Edition, isn't how news organizations can leverage social media optimization to get more traffic - but on what rubric they are doing so. Journalism is not a consumer product. In some ways it's a social service - so on what basis do you want people sharing news articles? Because it is funny, entertaining or inaccurate? Or on the basis that it is informative, insightful and timely? This comes back to a reoccurring theory of mine: Social news sites like Digg, Reddit, Mixx, etc, all have different communities. To the extent that some of these sites vote on rubric that is very loosely defined like Redd
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POPSFormer Major Label Band Seeks Fan Funding I have been thinking increasingly about the business model of journalism. In the past - it's been something I've gratefully avoided. But I recognize that my young atypical career, as pointed out in an idealab post, is not sustainable. Still: I think crowdfunding, although a paradigm shift of the business model of journalism, has potential. Read the post below, from one of the beat bloggers, and imagine that instead of a musician that had just been dropped from a label - this blog post was about a reporter recently let go from the San Jose Mercury News.
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POPSUsing A WordPress Blog To Host Your Conversation In the past we noted that a Facebook group isn't really the best tool for a long-term group conversation. They tend to die-off after a little bit of time. But, if you have an event, with a date attached to it, Facebook seems to work wonders: It's quick, easy and free. Wordpress has also entered into that space. The new theme (described below by Reportr.net) looks like it could be set up in a snap and could organize conversation around breaking news: The Souther California fires, Virginia Tech, Katrina. I don't wish for any of these to happen again, but I've always said if they do, journalists should have a "community in the box" content management system that will allow them to be a conduit for others to speak through.
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POPSQuick Pitch Deployed From Eliot at Wired: This is not the full pitch, but a quick letter of intent just to see who else might be interested in joining his project. It's a quick letter explaining the space and asking for contact information. From there, Eliot can compile and send a fuller invite when he is ready.
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POPSDid Facebook Just Change the Game for News Orgs? If a beat blogger builds a group in Facebook right now, I think the functionality is limited. But soon you might ask a developer at your news organization to build a simple Facebook application (they are surprisingly easy to build) and you can embede it on your own site: Facebook will be open to your growing community - you won't be closed in on theirs.
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POPSSchedule a Chat With Your Sources Yoni Green thinks ChatMaker could work for newsrooms. I think it could work to organize a live chat with "friends of your beat" -- people who know and are invested in what you are reporting on.
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POPSSocial Bookmarking and Citizen Journalism I've always said that social bookmarking sites like Digg and Propeller are akin to acts of citizen journalism. That's why I recently started working for NewsTrust. Last night proved it even more. If social news sites are about the exchange of important information - the most active people are doing acts of reporting. When that ability was seemingly taken away from them - they began to use other tools to report on and protest. Journalism is about educating groups and causing action. That's what happened last night. Check the beat blogging post below for a different angle on it all.
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POPSWho is the "Online Leader in Citizen Journalism I was happy to hear that Helium has partnered with the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. I like Helium, I've had the pleasure to converse with some of the editors, who attended the Networked Journalism Conference that I organized in New York. But two things trouble me about this press release: 1. Helium is not strict citizen journalism. They do creative writing and fiction too. Which is great - I'm all for it, as long as we recognize it's not citizen journalism. The second point is a result of this being a press release (not Heliums fault). They describe it as "the leader in online citizen journalism." Who is the leader? Orato? NowPublic, OhMyNews? Associated Content? (which is also more like Helium in my eyes - not strict citizen journalism), who? It's a question we should think more about. If this is indeed a "business" then there is a market leader somewhere. I don't know who it is right now. But would love to find out. If you know or have an idea - please comment.
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POPSCitizen Journalism in Conflict Areas The following quote is from Jason Haber, one of the founders of iConflict. He will be writing a guest post at NewAssignment.net with more details in the neat future. "As you point out on your blog, citizen journalism arrived in 2007, but I believe 2008 will be the year it really solidifies its place in the media universe. Unlike other social media news sites, ours is very focused. We aren't covering Britney Spears, we aren't covering sports, gossip or news oddities. This site is about conflict and about empowering people to share and learn more about them. "
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POPSCitizen Journalism Isn't For the Lazy I recently had a trip to the Mother Jones office to meet with Nick Aster, formerly of TreeHugger who is planning some exciting things for Mother Jones. Shortly after my trip I read an article on citizen journalism written by Mother Jones writer Adam Weinstein. I then submitted the article to NewsTrust.Net for rating (you should rate it too - and then we can get a more objective sense of the article). Overall I thought it was a good article but there was one major mistake which Leonard Witt caught below.
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POPSPitfalls of Reporting Using Social Media If you want to be serious about beat blogging - read the full post. Below is just a recap, but in the full article the writer looks at benefits and pitfalls of Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube and other social networks.
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POPSJournalists Already Use Blogs, The Switch to "Social Networks" Shouldn't Be Difficult As noted below, journalists are increasingly becoming comfortable with blogging as a resource for finding and honing story ideas. Fantastic! Blogs can be social networks, but the blogosphere is chaotic and in the end, unorganized. Hence, the switch to using a social network to inform your reporting seems to be the next evolution. The question then - how to do it? That's what we will find out. The next post (tomorrow morning) will be a conversation with Scott Clark and Dwight Silverman from the Houston Chronicle on what to expect with their beat blog.
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POPSStop Evangelizing: Then What Should We Do? A few people have caught on to the "stop evangelizing" post I wrote a few posts back. I'm glad it struck a chord, but the question it leads to then is -- what should we do now? Exactly! I'm going to start a new series of posts - I have three in mind already - that will be practical tips and advice any newsroom can adopt to change/improve their culture. This isn't about evangelizing the need for change - this is about making it happen.
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POPSThe Exchange of Information Mike has some interesting thoughts about collective intelligence and the impact social networks will have. These are just highlights.
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