Disturbingly accurate and very funny. Via British sketch comedy collective Idiots of Ants.
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Monthly Archives: April 2008
Evening reading + house cleaning
Due to my previous comment issue and the theme I was using not being supported any more, I decided to redecorate. Plus, being that I am talking about online journalism and the “future” of the medium, I thought it fitting that I have a more streamlined, futuristic theme. I’m quite pleased with it actually, though there are still some minor tweaks to make.
Some reading for today:
- It seems Cablevision Systems Corps. is joining the bidding war for Newsday. Looks like this one might be bloody.
- The 7th Annual APMR Online Convergence Awards are open! Who will be the biggest innovator?
- The San Diego Union-Tribune has taken a bold step and launched its own social network.
- Mathew Ingram: According to report coming tomorrow, Facebook and Wikipedia are better in emergencies. If you were watching either during the VTech shooting you can see the validity of this study. Josh Catone weighs in as well.
- Tools: Paul Bradshaw on how journalists can master twitter and Shawn Smith gives a good primer on RSS feeds.
- Robert Niles over at OJR wants to know ‘Where you would like to work in an ideal world?’
- New tool: BlogRize. Will it be the Orkut (read: elitist) of the social bookmarking sites?
Online feature: Las Vegas Sun, ‘Bomb Demonstration’
I’ve been incredibly impressed with the online presence of the Las Vegas Sun. There’s something about the site that just breathes and feels welcoming. One area where they are shining is their multimedia offerings. Like I mentioned in a post yesterday, they include a multimedia link as an integral part of their navigation.
There it is, right there at the top just screaming ‘Click Me!’
One of the pieces they ran recently was a video piece bomb testing and demonstration held by the Las Vegas Fire Department in the Nevada desert. What I liked most about this was that when you go to the video it is large and in your face with excellent quality. It’s big, loud and begs you to ‘Watch me!’ (Yes, I’ve managed to anthropomorphize Web pages, back off!)
Too often sites have their videos squashed into a tiny box along with the story. While many do offer a full-screen option, sometimes a near full-screen view as the default would better serve the piece. They way I see it, your organization paid the reporter or reporters to check out the story, film it and then paid your video team to edit and package the video. Why not play it up as much as you can? You’re paying these people for their hard work, show it off! The Las Vegas Sun is doing an excellent job of that.
The second thing I liked was that the Sun offers the video in a downloadable, MP4 format, in both iPod sizes and even in 720p HD. The effort may not see worth it now, but if people start downloading your site’s videos, sharing them and then word gets around that you offer these things on your site, the traffic will follow.
As an aside, I don’t know how much the complicated ownership structure the Sun has with the Las Vegas Review-Journal has to do with it (which I’m sure it does), but their site is refreshingly lite in ads. This may be a bad thing for them eventually in an increasingly revenue-centric model, but for now, it’s great.
I could go on and on about the Sun’s site, but I’ll let you decide. Check it out, they are a great example of design meeting journalism in a great way.
Dissecting the NYTimes.com with design director Khoi Vinh
Despite what Craig Ferguson says, the NYTimes is still leading the charge in many areas of journalism, most notably in the online world. The Times has been continually improving their online user experience and things seem to have really moved ahead since they took down their pay wall, something that all newspapers should do right now.
The NY Times is running week long, Talk to the Newsroom segment with Khoi Vinh, design director of NYTimes.com. What’s great about the interaction is that the questions are reader questions and not bland interviewer questions. It’s really a great chance to look behind the curtain and see what’s really going on in Oz.
Where’s the multimedia tab?
In perusing several newspaper Web sites I noticed an oddity. Many sites, though I won’t mention any names, did not have a ‘multimedia/interactive/data” tab as part of their navigation. For most of them it was shoved halfway down the page, sometimes even several scrolls below the main content. This is a travesty at this stage in the game.
Even if your site doesn’t have much in the way of interactive online content, you should already be paving the way for that content in the future. Whether it be audio slideshows, video or even just picture galleries, readers should have a direct link along with all of the major sections or channels of your site to get there.
Putting it anywhere else on the site buries the content and takes the eyes away from one of the largest traffic pullers of any site. Multimedia content is an integral part of any news Web site and deserves equal billing next the news, sports, entertainment and business.
Oh, and horizontal navigation is the way to go. For more information as to why, check out Poynter’s ‘Eyetracking the News.’
Quote of the Day*
From Ryan Sholin’s post on ’10 obvious things about the future of newspapers you need to get through your head’:
J-schools can either play a critical role in training the next generation of journalists, or they can fade into irrelevancy. Teach multimedia, interactivity and data, or watch your students become frustrated and puzzled as they try to get jobs with five clips and a smile.
That’s what I’ve been trying to iterate to so many of my fellow students (well, former students, I take the big walk on Friday). These same students laugh and smirk at my “blogging” yet don’t understand why their applications end up in the slush pile when all they have is “…clips and a smile.”
They’ll either learn or be left behind and without even Kirk Cameron to keep them company.
*I know his post is old, but it is still highly relevant and deserves a QOTD nod.
What would make the best news Web site CMS platform?
Right now newspapers use a variety of tools to update their Web sites. Some use proprietary content-management systems similar to WordPress or MoveableType, while others maintain simple, yet highly customizable HTML pages. Different sized organizations are still getting their online legs and figuring out what works best for them.
None of these systems have been perfected and most continue to evolve as technology increases. Eventually, however, most major news organizations are going to have to either have in-house developers in their technology department or hire contract Web developers create a CMS platform so they can stay competitive and relevant in an increasingly malleable online world.
Here’s a quick list of what I think would make the best news Web site CMS and/or what should be included in any news Web site CMS platform. It should be noted that some of these might be more wants than needs, some might already be in use by news organizations and some might not even be technologically possible, yet.
List below the jump.
Sunday talk lineup; Sen. Barack Obama on ‘Fox News Sunday’
Guest lineup for the Sunday TV news shows:
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ABC’s “This Week” — Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind.; former Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D.; Reps. Artur Davis, D-Ala., and Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas.
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CBS’ “Face the Nation” — David Axelrod, campaign adviser for Barack Obama; Howard Wolfson, campaign adviser for Hillary Rodham Clinton; Roger Mudd, author of a book on CBS news.
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NBC’s “Meet the Press” — Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean.
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CNN’s “Late Edition” — Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y; Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich.; Steve Coll, author of a book on the bin Laden family; James Rubin, a Clinton campaign adviser; Susan Rice, an Obama campaign adviser.
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“Fox News Sunday” — Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. (I’m sure there will be not one mention of the “bitter” comments, nah, none at all)
Darwin Award in 3…2…1
Thursday afternoon readings
A quick rundown of some of today’s interesting articles:
- Editor & Publisher is reporting that only 11 top newspaper Web sites are reporting an increase in time spent.
- Mark Glaser of MediaShift interviews William Bastone, creator of ‘The Smoking Gun’.
- Philip M. Stone: “Let’s rename the newsroom the content room.”
- Ruth Hochberger of HuffPo thinks it “…it will be a sad day for journalism if Murdoch swallows Newsday.“
- NY Times allows ‘Welcome ads‘; How deep will the ad-rabbit hold go?
- Romenesko: Boston Globe accepts buyout applications from 23 staffers
‘Suck on this’ Thomas Friedman
You may have heard that NYT columnist Thomas Friedman was recently hit with a pie at a speech he was giving. Yes, above is the video. The proof is in the pudding, or meringue perhaps.
Friedman has been under fire since an appearance on Charlie Rose where he summed up the War in Iraq by saying: “Suck on this!”
What does this have to do with online journalism? Nothing, it’s just rather hilarious. Carry on.
Facebook chat makes FB even more useful for journalists
You may or may not have noticed that social networking site Facebook recently launched its online, real-time chat service. The beauty of it is, much like Gmail chat, it is integrated into your Facebook front end with nothing to install and no changes to make. You can disable it, but it’s an opt-out feature rather than an opt-in.
Your “buddy list” is populated by your friends as they sign in and out of Facebook. You send them messages just like a third-party chatting client and they respond. Easy as cake (though it is a lie).
What can this do for (online) journalists?
While not having a drastic effect, it does open yet another door for quickly sourcing or touching base with anyone on your friends list. If you want to forgo a Twitter message or e-mail, spotting one of your friends, or sources, on Facebook can be a quick way to grab their attention. With the plethora of chatting clients and different services people have, there may be people on your friends list that aren’t on any of your chatting buddy lists (and who you may not want there either). This could serve to keep you connected without having to make a full-time buddy connection.
The real functionality will be if Facebook integrates a chat room function where people can either chat within groups, events or organizations without actually being friends with the other members. Or, being able to set up temporary, ad-hoc, password-protected and invite-only chat rooms for quick and secure Facebook “conference calls”. That would really make the chatting a robust and useful connection tool for anyone, but for journalists especially.
This of course would open the doors to all of the chat room problems of the old days such as trolls, spammers and guerrilla marketers. I’m sure the Facebook developers could find a way around that though, they’re a smart bunch.
Facebook chat, yay or nay?
‘New Media Bytes’ is ridiculously informative
All right, that’s it, I’m packing it up. No need for me to be yammering away about online journalism stuff when people like Shawn Smith have everything covered over at New Media Bytes. Smith is a senior news producer at MLive.com, the online arm of Booth Newspapers in Michigan.
Honestly, his blog is the most comprehensive site I’ve seen covering topics such as, but are not limited to, Twitter and journalists, new media metrics and how to coerce your newsroom into accepting the online world. Some notable posts:
- Ultimate guide to Twitter tools for Journalists
- Best newspaper blogs for comments, community and readability
- Blogging basics for journalists
- 6 minimal-effort ways to jumpstart your newspaper staff’s excitement about the web
I’m kidding of course about packing it up, but good grief, Shawn has done a terrific job. Kudos to you sir!
Wednesday reading in the online world
(See second story)
My obligatory smattering of links for today:
- Chicago’s ‘RedEye’ is using Facebook to connect to readers, even so far as putting some of them in print.
- Nina Simon at Museum 2.0 talks about the cost of Web 2.0 ventures, not in dollars however, but in time spent.
- Election 2.0 = virtual debates.
- Two things that need to happen in order to save journalism, according to Sean Blanda.
- Performancing: Advice for bloggers, less is more!
- Rupert Murdoch is closing in on Newsday for the kill.
- Speaking of Murdoch, Jeff Jarvis weighs in on the matter.
- And Gawker publisher Nick Denton is also wondering why the old man is in such a hurry.
Enjoy your day.
Scarborough Newspaper Audience Ratings Report 2008
Consumer shopping research firm Scarborough Research, a Nielsen Media affiliate, has released its 2008 Newspaper Audience Ratings Report. The SNARR, besides just being a fun word to say, can be a useful and quick measure for newspapers, but it is not a perfect measure.
CLICK HERE to read the report. (PDF)
What does all of this mean?
The numbers are basically a measure of your organization’s market penetration, meaning what percentage of the audience in a specific ‘Designated Market Area’ you have. In this case, the DMA is a specific grouping of counties that is in the newspaper’s coverage area.
This is an OK measure, but I take issue with their methodology. This is how they describe how they came up with these numbers:
The Scarborough study is based on a random sample of adults (ages 18+). Scarborough Research employs a two-phase methodology to collect data: a randomly dialed telephone interview followed by a written, self-administered consumer questionnaire and television diary. The newspaper audience information and websites visited are captured during the telephone interview. A Media Rating Council (MRC) accredited media and marketing service, our newspaper data meets the highest data quality standards.
Now, knowing what I know about polling and human behavior, I think these numbers might be slightly inaccurate. Even if it is random and even if people are given anonymity, they will lie. People are afraid to admit they don’t read the paper so they fudge the results. This happens in politics with voter turnout surveys and the like. The numbers never measure up to the reality because people lie. They don’t want to appear to be Luddites or a philistine, even if no one is actually watching.
If anything, this study should have some margin of error but I could find none listed. Still, these numbers could serve to give the advertising department more leverage to bargain with advertisers and give an indication to the newsroom of where they may need to focus their attention.
What does this mean for online?
I also feel that this holds a little less weight for online. Despite the low percentage of market penetration for most news Web sites, I think that is indicative of global reach and more ‘World is Flat’ mentality of news Web sites.
Sure a lot of traffic comes from the local market but more often Web traffic comes from outside links and search engine results. These readers, drive-by surfers, have little brand loyalty. The questions is: How can newspaper Web sites take advantage of this and quantify it to advertisers and also appropriate the behavior to how they run their sites?
Paul Gillin of Newspaper Death Watch recently wrote about what he called the ‘Content-driven Reader‘ and how it is changing the landscape of journalism and online journalism. A good read. Be sure to also follow the links to both Jarvis’ post and Alan D. Mutter’s post on the same topic.
The key word here: Content.