Northern Quarter to become home of Hyper Island school

Readers of this blog could well be interested in this move by digital training giants Hyper Island. As I blogged here earlier today, the Swedish organisation is setting up in Lever Street in the new year and offering heavily subsidised places for students of digital media.

links for 2009-07-17

• How not to defend newspapers | Dan Kennedy | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
  At a time when the very survival of newspapers, whether in print or online, is in some doubt, the last thing we need is a supposed advocate for readers whose real agenda, it would seem, is allegiance to a way of newsroom life that was out of date five years ago.
  (tags: future blog guardian media news newspapers)
• Richard Sine: Close the J-Schools
  J-school deans, you should slash your enrollments. How much? Simple: Assess the degree to which the profession has shrunk, and then reduce your class size accordingly. How else can you assure the media world that you’re not just flooding the market with new blood, eager to do the job of laid-off workers at lower pay?
  (tags: journalism education news future newspapers business history research)
• Is Crowdfunding the Future of Journalism?
  Chi-town Daily News, a hyperlocal community news site in Chicago that launched in 2005 and is also a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit, began posting a box at the end of each story stating how much it has spent on reporting, writing and editing and asking people to donate. Editor Geoff Dougherty said the cost is calculated based on the site’s expenditures for the fiscal year that closed June 30, divided by the number of words they published during the year to get the cost per word (67 cents). The cost per word is multiplied by the number of words in each story.
  (tags: journalism crowdsourcing media newspapers online future funding innovation chicago chi-town)
• Mediating Conflict: We know our news sucks?
  We (journalists?) make shitty news. We know our news sucks. But we’ve published it. Next time we’ll do better, but even then it will be shitty. The only news that’s perfect is the news you’re dreaming about.
  (tags: news journalism)

links for 2009-03-04

• Sexism in geekdom
  Paul Robinson calls for change in the tech sector. Interesting read.
  (tags: blogging blogosphere stevejobs marissamayer tech IT geek sexism)
• FREE multimedia training for journalists
  As part of the Meld initiative UCLAN is working on a project called InFuze. It is offering freelance journalists and content producers looking to update their skills for a multiplatform world a FREE six week course. Pass it on.
  (tags: blogging blogs blog bloggers journalist journalism training freelance multimedia)
• Skittles home page takeover – great viral or social media spam?
  I’m not impressed with this skittles do dah but this post takes a less dismissive look at whether the campaign achieves it goals.
  (tags: blogging skittles socialmedia)

links for 2009-02-18

• Skills training not enough for digital journalist
  “The skills, though, aren’t the answer. As one news executive said, “We need to take staff to Web 2.0 and beyond – to make learning more nimble and flexible.” This executive, after putting staff through training pilots, realized that multimedia literacy and a basic understanding of what it meant to work in a Web environment was what people needed – before they could go about learning the hardware.” This thoughtful post also makes the understated point that “multimedia training is also about making new connections across your organization.”
  (tags: journalism onlinejournalism future training)
• Can Hulu Hold Off TV.com After NBC and Fox Deals Expire?
  Hulu.com has become the fourth-biggest online video distributor by unique visitors in January, behind YouTube, Yahoo and MySpace, according to the latest from Nielsen VideoCensus. In total video streams, it’s No. 3, with 232 million, behind YouTube (5.8 billion) and Yahoo (277 million).
  (tags: video online television cbs fox hulu)
• Announcing Digital Sunlight: Publish2′s Platform for Collaborative …
  A collaborative database unveiled. “We aim to overcome what we believe is a limitation of many “citizen journalism” initiatives to date, i.e. viewing citizen journalism as an end in itself, where citizens are supposed to replace professional journalists, filling up community sites with reporting. We believe citizen journalism is part of a larger process where professional journalists still play the vital role they always have.”
  (tags: journalism publishing community social citizenjournalism citizen collaboration collaborative)

Will journalists write off journalists?

Councils, police forces, global brands and individual consumers.

All of the above are now publishers.

So what’s to become of us journalists?

OK nothing I’ve  posted above should be news to anyone but, attending Friday’s social media seminar in Manchester really brought one issue home to me – the relevance of the journalist is under scrutiny.

Addressing an audience of mainly public relations professionals, speaker after speaker questioned this relevance when revealing their day-to-day activity.

“Why just send your release to 20 or so journalists when you can go direct to your audience?”

“Journalists, if something happens in the national press, can turn something we we saw as a positive, into a negative story.”

Just two examples I picked out from the day at the Don’t Panic Guide to Social Media (there’s plenty more to be found on Twitter using #dontpanic or via my blog postings from the day).

Of course they are right on both counts. The West Midlands Police force posting youtube clips of operations ensures it presents its activities in the way the force wants to. The PR company can prove to a client that the story has been seen by x number of users thanks to the measurables all social platforms provide.

(I would say that both points also have a counter argument to do with credibility, authority and watchdog but that’s a different blog post).

Looking through the eyes of the delegates mentioned above, you have to ask the question –  what is the point of us?

Interestingly just a few miles away in Salford Quays on the same day, the National Council for the Training of Journalists was also looking to the future as it considered what sort of skills people are going to need.

At least part of the conference considered the skills survey carried out among employers and training providers, and what did the employers want of this august body – shorthand!

I know much has already been said on this topic but doesn’t this rather exemplify a gulf between what’s actually going on in a landscape where all the rules of engagement are rapidly shifting, and what’s perceived to be the issues within (still largely print-centric) newsrooms?

I would love to believe that a  beautiful T-line outline would make the role of the journalist truly connected with an audience and retain their relevance so safeguarding the principles of journalism for generations to come.

But does anyone, anywhere actually believe that it will?

Online communities: Background resources

Below is a series of links to further information about online communities.

These sources formed part of the research carried out in the preperation for my presentation ‘Online Communities: A social world’ at the Shape conference in Lisbon this week.

They are intended to provide further reading to those who attended the event, but could also be of interest to anyone looking at online communities.

Any thoughts, comments, questions or further links, as ever gratefully received – I see a conference such as this as the start of the conversation, not the final word and I look forward to hearing from you.

Either submit at the end of this page, contact via email at sarahhartley2004@yahoo.co.uk or choose your platform from the contacts page.

Anthropology of youtube
This is the full lecture from Dr Michael Wesch of Kansas State university. It does break the general rule of how long a clip online can be, but I think you´ll stick with it because it is so informative.

BASIC Principles of Online Journalism: C is for Community & Conversation (pt2: Conversation) | Online Journalism Blog
This blog post from Paul Bradshaw goes into greater detail and explanation of the ‘conversational loop’ diagram.

Reasons not to ignore coments: Julie Moult
Further information about what happens when things goes wrong from the case study of the the Daily Mail in the UK. Also goes into further detail and has links about “google bombing”.

Online communities best practice
This presentation is from the marketing company Forrester and gives more details about the concept of POST and that all-important taxonomy of detractors. Take notice of the trolls and bozos!

The “me sphere”
A further explanation of the diagram demonstrating the influencing factors for online audiences. This blog post from Jeff Jarvis looks at how this has come about in traditional publishing, but is relevant to any content providers.

Community a review of the theory
This is a vital piece of reading – it is not restricted to online communities but is concerned with community in general and how society operates. Goes into greater detail about the motivating factors of tolerance, recopricity and trust.

Recommended reading
This book is essential reading for anyone who wants to get on top of Web 2.0. It’s also an easy read and enjoyable. Goes into further details about the Egyptian experieince mentioned at the conference. Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations

There´s also a whole lot more to discover in my ongoing collection of links on the subject of community here. Please feel free to add me to your delicious network and share you own links. In that way we can build a repository of knowledge about online communities.

Multi-media training sessions

With my training hat on, I’ve recently been planning some sessions. Looking back over them I thought these notes might prove useful to a  wider audience – perhaps for those attempting to arrange such things themselves.

If you’d be interested in hosting sessions similar to this for your organisation, please feel free to contact me.

 

1. Digital Away Day

Duration: Six hours.

Who’s it for?
Heads of departments and senior managers.

What’s the objective?

Bring management to a level of understanding of digital development in the newspaper sector.

What will be covered?

How the industry is moving with case studies from other newspaper groups.

An introduction to the new tools of journalism.

Challenges facing the organisation digitally. 

 

2. Video for reporters

Duration: One week.

Who’s it for?

Print reporters starting out in video.

What’s the objective?

To equip print reporters with the skills to shoot and edit “made-for-web” video packages.

What will be covered?

Camera skills; composition, audio, lighting, exposure, focus, tripod.

Content skills: differences with TV , what makes good web.

Editing skills: creating packages, using PremierPro.

 

3. Tools for newsgathering

Duration: 2-3 hours.

Who’s it for?

Newsdesk and reporters.

What’s the objective?

To educate newsgatherers in the host of digital tools at their disposal to track breaking news and generate story leads.

What will be covered?

Setting up personal RSS feeds to bring the news to you.

Tracking breaking news across social media.

Crowdsourcing.

Building your online contacts.

 

4. Better blogging

Duration: 2-3 hours.

Who’s it for?

Existing and wannabe bloggers.

What’s the objective?

Introduce some new skills to improve quality and quantity of output and grow audiences.

What will be covered?

The currency of linking.

Micro-blogging to extend reach.

Using social media.

Creating and distributing feeds of blog content.

Mo-blogging and live coverage.