New Twitter database for the media

PR Sarah Evans, Help A Reporter Out (HARO) founder Peter Shankman and online database software TrackVia are teaming up to create a vast database of ‘meeja’ people on Twitter.

MediaOnTwitter is free to users and can be filtered by beat, location, name or media outlet.

At time of writing 658 folk were included – to add yourself or others use this online form.

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‘Twitchhiking’ freelancer Paul Smith completes journey

Paul Smith, a freelance journalist who pledged to ‘Twitchhike’ the globe in 30 days, has completed his adventurous journey by reaching New Zealand.

The aim of the trip, during which Smith was only allowed to accept accommodation and travel help offered via Twitter, was to reach the furthest point – Campbell Island off the coast of NZ – from his starting location – Gateshead – to raise money for Charity:Water.

Lack of transport, poor telecommunications in New Zealand and – as a result – a smaller Twitter community thwarted Smith’s plans to reach the remote Campbell Island, he said in a blog post today.

“After two months of living and breathing this project, I’d reached my journey’s end. I wasn’t going to see Campbell Island, but it honestly didn’t matter anymore. The aim was to travel as far as I could from home as possible within 30 days, and by reaching Stewart Island I’d travelled to a place the majority of New Zealanders have never set foot on, never mind the rest of the world,” wrote Smith.

Congratulations to Paul – and a safe journey back to the UK – but perhaps this isn’t the end?

“The big question is: what happens next? I don’t feel like this is the end. I’m already mourning the loss of this project from my life. It now feels entirely natural to live out of a single messenger bag, to throw my belongings into the back seat of a strange car, to bed down wherever I’m offered charity.

“There’s something else there. I just don’t know what it is yet.”

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More Telegraph and Twitterfall – spreads to topic pages

Further to our blog post on Friday about Telegraph.co.uk’s use of Twitterfall to aggregate tweets around live football match reports, the app is being used on the site’s Barack Obama page:

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Gawker: NYTimes falls foul of Google with IHT.com fold

Having folded the website of the international Herald Tribune into that of the New York Times, IHT story links now redirect to a generic landing page – denying the Times extra Google juice and frustrating users.

Full post at this link…

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The Argus: Reading a newspaper can help reduce stress, says study

A study by the University of Sussex has suggested that newspapers are a better way to reduce stress than listening to music or going for a walk.

Full story at this link…

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CounterValue: Why Burnham and the Beeb won’t save the local press

Andy Burnham’s proposals for partnerships between the local press and the BBC won’t save regional newspapers, argues Justin Williams.

“How would allowing Google News to classify this stuff as duplicate content help? And how exactly would reproducing a few semi-local videos from the Beeb boost the uniques at borcestshirebilge.co.uk?” he asks.

Full post at this link…

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Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – Visualising data with Many Eyes

Graphics: To present graphs or visualisations of complex figures and data try IBM’s Many Eyes. By uploading text or tables you can create simple piecharts to more complex maps or bubble charts. Tipster: Laura Oliver.

To submit a tip to Journalism.co.uk, use this link – we will pay a fiver for the best ones published.

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Independent.co.uk: First twitter libel suit?

Texas designer file suit against Courtney Love according to claim lodged with Los Angeles Superior court.

Full story at this link…

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Citizenzide launches English iPhone app

Amateur photography and video platform backed by Agence France Presse (AFP), Citizenside has launched an English version of its iPhone application in beta.

The app is intended as a mobile news reporting app for news organisations

“We’re really proud of this V1.2 application as French contributors are using the 1.1 version more and more and understand its goals: share news, faster,” Matthieu Stefani, vice president of Citizenside, told Journalism.co.uk in an email.

“As the international application market is more than 20 times bigger than French one, let’s hope we will receive more than 20 times more pictures.”

In an interview last month, Stefani told us the app will tap into an existing community of picture-sharers and amateur videojournalists, as well as promoting geotagged submissions.

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Stinkyjournalism.org: Time Warner comes under fire for Greg Gumbel infomercials

Stinky Journalism has unraveled a tangled web involving CNN, its parent company Time Warner, an anchor for a rival broadcaster and infomercials run without proper identification, as required by the Federal Trade Commission in the US.

Full story at this link…

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