THIS BLOG IS MOVING

I've bowed to the inevitable and decided to move the Online Journalism Blog to Wordpress. I've had a few good years with Blogger but the relationship never felt like it was going anywhere, and, to be honest, on occasion I even felt ashamed to be seen in public together.

I admit, I was starstruck by the prospect of better Google rankings, but the indie appeal of Wordpress has finally won me over. Oh, and the fact that when Blogger went over to a Google sign-in I couldn't log on at work (I'm sure it's something to do with cookie settings and I could sort it out if I had the time, but no, I'd rather spend endless hours configuring Wordpress to work the same way).

So, if you want to carry on reading my clippings, comments and very occasional flash of insightful analysis, add http://onlinejournalismblog.wordpress.com/ to your Favourites and http://onlinejournalismblog.wordpress.com/feed/ to your RSS feed.

I may occasionally still post to Blogger while I figure Wordpress out, but don't hold your breath.

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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Integrated Newsrooms part 1: The new Telegraph model

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. In the first of a promised three-part series, Editors Weblog looks at the new 'multimedia hub' newsroom of the Daily Telegraph. Unfortunately, it reads a bit fluffy, complete with a riding-into-the-sunset final paragraph:

"[Rhidian Wynn Davies, Consulting Editor of The Telegraph] says simply “we couldn’t do what we do now in the old structure”. [Edward Roussel, Digital Editor at The Telegraph] explains a little further “Everyone is on one floor and no-one can hide away in their office – there aren’t any. It improves communication. I don’t think anyone would want to go back to how it was. It’s such a dynamic environment now, we have short sharp meetings where decisions are made quickly rather than hour long arranged meetings. Before people didn’t communicate. Now those that aren’t good at communicating are forced to. There is no question that it works a lot better and the quality of the content is higher”"

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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Newspaper Video: Editing and apps

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. Andy Dickinson presents his summary of what newspaper video producers need, in terms of software. A second part is also promised which covers freeware/shareware options.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Online journalism discussion

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. The OJR have launched a discussion board on their website around online journalism - looks like a great space to contribute to.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Students make mobile phone news

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, citizen journalism, blogging]. News editors, meet the graduate journalists of 2017 (caveat/shameless plug: students on the journalism degree I teach on will have these skills too when they graduate in 2008, but judging from what I hear of online journalism education I'm assuming they're the exception rather than the rule. Controversial? Well, the beauty of a blog is, you can pull me up if this isn't the case. So, if you teach on a journalism degree please let me know - via comments - what new media/multimedia skills your students gain. Conversely, if you're a journalism student, I'd also like to hear what skills you're gaining and what you think you should be learning. Parenthesis over.)


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Futurology

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. I've only just caught up with Shane Richmond's post on the future (or proposed death) of newspapers, following a seminar which suggested in the year 2012 "a typical media group will have a stable of publications: a daily premium news magazine, a free daily paper, a portfolio of websites, an internet television channel and a hyperlocal publishing network."

Richmond disagrees with the magazine element because "people are less and less inclined to pay for bundles of content" and the RSS-fuelled Daily Me (Frighteningly, Negroponte's idea is over a decade old) is a "model of media consumption that leads me to believe that media delivery to portable devices (phones, PDAs, electronic readers, flexible displays etc) will, at some stage in the future, supersede ink-on-paper media. I think so, others in the room disagreed."

I'm of the mind to agree that portable devices and the My Google-style personalised news page will come to dominate news consumption, but that paper will continue to have an important role for the reason that RSS still requires you to select what interests you, whereas paper presents a browsing experience different to the 'search-and-scan' approach online. Research shows people are very task-oriented when they go online; a paper is an opportunity to come across stories you wouldn't otherwise find; and in a local paper context, get an overall picture of what's happening.

Now, two things may change this: first, social recommendation. When those whose judgement we trust begin to drive our news consumption in a mainstream way, the editor's role becomes, if not redundant, at least transplanted. Second: screen resolution. When reading a story online or on a portable device becomes as comfortable as reading paper, we may drop the search-and-scan approach.

As for magazines, as I've written elsewhere, I think one future for them is as facilitators of virtual communities - a forward thinking magazine publisher will be investing in social recommendation software, forums, reader-editors and expert bloggers right now...


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Trinity Mirror head speaks of "garlic bread moment"

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, citizen journalism, blogging].

At yesterday's Citizen Journalism conference Trinity Mirror Head of Multimedia Michael Hill spoke of this being the "garlic bread moment" for the local press - the realisation that new media and citizen journalism "is the future".

At the same time "Local papers have been doing citizen journalism for over a hundred years - it's always been about local people." The battle now is to convince hearts and minds that local people want to consume - and take part in - their news in a different way. This is the "man on the Clapham Omnibus 2.0" who checks the news on their mobile phone, picks up a free newspaper but walks past the newsagent, searches for items of interest online, and relies on bloggers as much as journalists.

"We have to accept that breaking news online has to come first," he said, a process he intimated some journalists were finding hard to swallow. One had protested: "Why kill the goose that laid the golden egg?" His response? "The goose has got bird flu".

The process of persuasion has already begun, with 'Back to Basics' presentations to Trinity Mirror staff around the country. In the process the company has discovered latent talent in some staff - web savvy journalists; writers who can also edit video - but there is a conscious attempt not to "create islands" of 'new media teams' or 'digital teams'. Hill described the process as being "like turning round an oil tank," and that some staff would never get it, "but they'll do what they're told to do."

The group have a number of plans for the future. Hill argues that "Local is Web 2.1," and work is already under way on the first five of a planned 35 'micro-sites' around the country, created by key local people. Blogs are already integral to the newspaper sites, with 34,000 pages being read across the group in the last week alone, and will become more so, as the group looks to tap into the niche publishing of 'Long Tail' economics, illustrated most vividly (and to some attendees' consternation) by the 'Geordie Dreamer'.

The group are also working on technology to rank stories by the number of people viewing them. "Newsworthiness used to be a judgement of what would sell copies," he explained, but for the website it is a judgement of what will generate page views.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

/discuss... How?

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. What's happened to the Press Gazette /discuss section? I was just about to comment on the latest piece in the print paper ('Mainstream media must show respect for the new kid on the blog') only to find the link at Press Gazette now goes straight to the AOL homepage.

So, no copying and pasting, no linking, and because I have other stories to blog (and a bathroom to strip) Press Gazette (and AOL) lose the opportunity to get a few more hits.

The piece in a nutshell focuses on Daily Mail columnist Keith Waterhouse's "distaste for bloggers" but that this changes "when it comes to photo bloggers. Citizen journalism suddenly becomes worthwhile, even respectable, if the blogger has a camera."

Interestingly, given that the issue was debated at yesterday's Citizen Journalism conference, Waterhouse is quoted as saying

"This Damascus U-turn took place in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's
execution, when the pictures began to come in.

"You will recall that the reports originally had it that the death sentence was carried out with as much decorum and dignity as such gruesome rituals allow.

"No Western reporters were present - the BBC's John Simpson was asked along to the necktie party by the Iraqi leader himself, but was turned away.

"The bloggers were there, though, armed with picture-snatching mobile phone cameras. The official photo coverage, taken to convince the world that the monster had indeed paid the price, were grisly enough.

"The bloggers' contribution - grabbed at the gallows either by a mini-mob of gleeful Shia interlopers or by the condemned prisoner's guards themselves - shocked all right-thinking people."

Thankfully, because Waterhouse's piece is available online, I can quote at length.

Well, you may not be able to discuss it at Press Gazette, but feel free to discuss it here.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Sky and social networking?

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, social networking]. Journalism.co.uk is reporting on plans by Sky for "a video-based social networking website with Google":

"Asked if it will have a creative or news-based focus, Mr Wright said it could be a 'combination of those things'. However, he added that the site would not follow either the MySpace or Bebo social network formulas - thus offering the possibility of something wholly unique."

But possibly more interesting is the note that "Google also agreed to provide search and targeted search advertising, email, messenger and VoIP telephony." While social networking is relatively new and difficult to get right, facilities such as these could make a difference to the user experience and, more importantly, advertisers.

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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Citizen Journalism conference blog

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, citizen journalism, blogging]. Well, the Citizen Journalism 2007 conference finally took place today. Michael Hill, Trinity Mirror's Head of Multimedia, spoke of the group's "garlic bread moment" in converting to the new media age, while blogger Tom Reynolds talked of the power of the blogosphere, as well as its self-regulating nature. Vicky Taylor, the BBC's Head of Interactivity, outlined the organisation's approach to user generated content, and the whole was riddled with extensive questioning and debate.

You'll find some coverage already at Journalism.co.uk (Trinity Mirror launches ultra-local citizen journalism sites), but for more on the speeches take a look at the conference blog at http://citizenjournalism.wordpress.com/ - which I'll be adding to later - and there's a conference wiki at http://citizenjournalism.xwiki.com/xwiki/bin/view/Main/WebHome which anyone can contribute to.

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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Journalism stories: A multimedia approach

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, citizen journalism, blogging]. Great series of articles from Mindy McAdams on how to approach interactive storytelling - well worth spending some time on:

Journalism stories: A multimedia approach (Part 1)...

Journalism stories: A multimedia approach (Part 2)...

Journalism stories: A multimedia approach (Part 3)...

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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

 

 

List of guidelines for the BBC's Web 2.0 project

For some reason I am unable to log in to my Blogger account from work, and so am having to post this via email. So, forgive me if this doesn't read as smoothly as it could:

 

Quick link for today: Tomski's list of guidelines for the BBC's Web 2.0 project. My favourite guideline: "5. Treat the entire web as a creative canvas: don't restrict your creativity to your own site."

 

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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

 

 

Web sites for citizen journalism techniques, tutorials

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, citizen journalism, blogging]. A list of resources from Danny Sanchez that's worth browsing if you're interested in the CJ arena - particularly OurMedia Personal Media Learning Center: "A great resource containing interviews with citizen media pioneers, summaries of media law and more."


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

PCC to regulate newspaper audio and video

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. Journalism.co.uk reports on the move by the PCC to extend its regulation to cover newspaper audio and video, with chairman Sir Christopher Meyer quoted as saying: "We have now persuaded the newspaper and magazine industry of the United Kingdom to agree also the principle of our regulating moving pictures and sound on newspaper's websites [...] we are going to make an announcement, I hope, pretty soon in the next few weeks about exactly what that entails - there are some definitions to be sorted out - but it's a major step forward, and it's the first time, I think, that newspapers have voluntarily agreed without outside pressure to extend the remit of regulation through the PCC."


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

A glossary of online news terms

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. The Online Journalism Review have started a potentially very useful glossary of online news terms on their site - and in admirable fashion, have made it a wiki that registered users can edit.

I've been in there and said my bit, adding user generated content, crowdsourcing, podcast, vodcast, vlogs, moblogs, photoblogs, CMS, and 'wiki' itself - and just to be a pedant, I've changed the headings from being simply bold (meaningless), to actually using heading tags (h3, if you must know). I'll be claiming my percentage when the OJR's search engine rankings improve.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

The most popular news video clips online

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, video journalism.] How have I missed this before? The Guardian have been featuring a chart of viral news videos since November, with weekly commentary by Jemima Kiss. Well worth bookmarking.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Newspaper group to train its 1,500 journalists in online skills

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism]. As if proof were needed of the need for online journalism skills in today's jobs market, HoldTheFrontPage reports that:

"Every journalist working on a Northcliffe newspaper is to be trained to update its accompanying website, putting stories online themselves and learning how to "add value" to articles.
"The group says fully integrated multi-media newsrooms will soon be in operation across its titles, with all of its 1,500 journalists writing for both print and online."

What's particularly notable here is the fact that "Sub-editors are also able to rewrite headlines for online stories." The punny, cryptic headlines that work in print are not always suitable for search engine-optimised, scannable online consumption - but is this what they mean?


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media

Last chance to book a place on Citizen Journalism 2007

[Keyword: journalism, online journalism, citizen journalism, blogging]. If you want to listen to the BBC's Head of Interactivity Vicky Taylor, best-selling blogger Tom Reynolds and Trinity Mirror's Head of Multimedia Michael Hill, you'd better get a move on: booking closes tomorrow for the Citizen Journalism 2007 conference in Birmingham on January 26.

You can book online at MediaSkills.org's page on the Citizen Journalism conference which will take place next Friday (January 26).

Hope to see you there.


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Paul Bradshaw lectures on the Journalism degree at UCE Birmingham media department. He writes a number of blogs including the Online Journalism Blog, Interactive PR and Web and New Media