#jpod – Assessing the impact of the Freedom of Information Act and its future

This week’s jpod comes days after the Justice Select Committee began hearing evidence as part of its review of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Given the impact of the legislation on the everyday activities of the newsroom, we speak to Trinity Mirror’s David Higgerson and KM Group’s Paul Francis about current scrutiny of the law, the impact it has had on the news gathering process and how they would – and would not – like to see it developed in the future.

We also hear from:

• member of the #SaveFOI campaign and FOI officer Paul Gibbons (@FOIManUK) about why he has joined the campaign to secure the future of the Act and his view on calls to introduce charges,
• a director at the Local Government Information Unit Jonathan Carr-West about the role the FOI Act has played in building a culture of openness within public bodies,
• and head of policy delivery at the Information Commissioner’s Office Steve Wood about the ICO’s role in adjudicating FOI complaints and proposed changes to the Act

Podcast: Download

You can hear future podcasts by signing up to the Journalism.co.uk iTunes podcast feed.

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#jpod – Paywalls: Helping readers over the fence

A part-paywall will go up on a number of news sites in Slovenia on Monday (16 January), following a group paywall model first introduced in Slovakia by Piano Media.

In this week’s podcast Journalism.co.uk technology correspondent Sarah Marshall speaks to Tomas Bella, the CEO of Piano Media; Frédéric Filloux, managing director for digital operations at French newspaper business Les Echo, who, until recently, was also managing director of ePresse, a consortium of French publishers; and François Nel, founding director of the journalism leaders programme at the University of Central Lancashire and co-founder of the Digital Editors’ Network, an academic who has carried out extensive research on how publishers can make money online.

Filloux talks about the digital kiosk set up by ePresse and outlines his theory shared on his Monday Note newsletter that the Financial Times and New York Times are encouraging readers to take out a digital subscription by raising the price of their print editions.

Podcast: Download

Journalism.co.uk’s next news:rewired event will feature a panel debate on paid-content models. See the agenda, list of speakers and list of delegates. Tickets are £130+VAT and can been booked using the ticket page. There are just a handful of tickets left so book now to avoid disappointment.

You can hear all our podcasts by signing up to the Journalism.co.uk iTunes podcast feed.

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#jpod: How multiplatform strategies are evolving

This podcast takes a look at multiplatform strategies and how newsrooms – and journalists and editors – are adapting and creating content to be viewed on four or five screens: desktop, mobile, tablets, e-readers and IPTV.

It hears from Patrice Slupowski, vice president of digital innovation and communities at Orange, and Guido Baumhauer, director of strategy for marketing and distribution at Deutsche Welle, who spoke to Journalism.co.uk’s news editor Rachel McAthy at the inaugural Global Editor’s Network news summit this week.

The podcast, presented by Journalism.co.uk technology correspondent Sarah Marshall, also includes an interview with Adam Thomas, communications manager at  Sourcefabric, a not-for-profit that last month announced the creation of Superdesk, a free multiplatform solution for newsrooms due to launch in summer 2012.

Podcast: Download

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#jpod in depth: Discussing the press self-regulation question after #soe11

The debate around the need for reform of the UK’s self-regulation of the press returned to the spotlight this week, as industry representatives joined to discuss the issue at the Society of Editors conference on Monday and Tuesday. Following the event we spoke to a number of leading journalism figures, to hear their views and find out where the industry may go from here.

In this week’s #jpod news editor Rachel McAthy speaks to editor of the Independent Chris Blackhurst, group managing director of Northcliffe Media Steve Auckland, director of the Press Complaints Commission Stephen Abell and director of the Media Standards Trust Martin Moore.

Podcast: Download

You can hear future podcasts by signing up to the Journalism.co.uk iTunes podcast feed.

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#jpod: How journalists can use SMS to engage with the audience

Three quarters of the world’s population has a mobile phone and text messaging has become ubiquitous.

This podcast takes a look at how journalists can connect with sources, communicate with audiences, gather tips and crowdsource information using SMS, which is used by more than 80 per cent of Europeans who have a mobile phone.

A session on how to architect the SMS newsroom took place at the Mozilla Festival in London at the weekend.

Journalism.co.uk technology correspondent Sarah Marshall attended and caught up with the four speakers: Jim Colgan, who was digital editor and producer at WNYC radio in New York when the station created this award-winning crowdsourced SMS snow map and who is now working with Mobile Commons, a platform which allows you to send and receive text messages; Florence Scialom and Amy O’Donnell from FrontlineSMS, the provider of free software to enable you to text large groups of people; and Stevie Graham from Twilio, which allows developers to create voice, VoIP and SMS applications.

The podcast explains how to create a crowdsourced map, set up an anonymous tip line, and has advice from the four SMS experts.

Podcast: Download

You can hear future podcasts by signing up to the Journalism.co.uk iTunes podcast feed.

*Statistics on mobile use are taken from the mobiThinking site.

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#jpod: Why the Guardian is taking a laid-back approach to news on the iPad

The Guardian’s long-awaited iPad app was launched yesterday (Thursday, 13 October).

The news app is closer in reading experience to the print edition than to the constantly updated Guardian.co.uk.

This week’s #jpod hears from the Guardian’s digital marketing manager, Steve Wing; media blogger Daniel Bentley and James Weeks, who leads Sky News’ mobile strategy.

Podcast: Download

You can hear future podcasts by signing up to the Journalism.co.uk iTunes podcast feed.

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#jpod: Lessons in digital storytelling from Storify and the Guardian

How can journalists best use the latest digital storytelling tools?

In this podcast, Journalism.co.uk technology correspondent Sarah Marshall looks at current trends in integrated storytelling, hearing from multimedia producer Adam Westbrook, co-founder of Storify Xavier Damman and executive producer for Guardian.co.uk Stephen Abbott.

All three gave presentations at Journalism.co.uk’s news:rewired – connected journalism event which was held at MSN HQ, London yesterday (Thursday, 6 October).

Podcast: Download

You can sign up to our iTunes podcast feed for future audio.

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#jpod in depth – ‘It just sent shockwaves through you’: journalists reflect on 9/11

In this week’s podcast we speak to two journalists with remarkable stories to tell of their experiences of 9/11, one of them having been in the World Trade Centre when the first plane hit and the other being the only journalist in Afghanistan with a video phone to report live at the time.

In interviews with Journalism.co.uk Stephen Evans, who was the BBC’s North American business correspondent at the time (now Berlin correspondent for the broadcaster) and Nic Robertson, senior international correspondent at CNN, describe their experiences of 9/11 and reflections ten years on.

Podcast: Download

Stephen Evans was on camera when the first tower began to collapse:

CNN will be broadcasting live from New York, Washington, Shanksville, Afghanistan and Pakistan on Sunday. More details on its live programming is available here.

Meanwhile on the BBC on Sunday Stephen Evans will be interviewed on Radio Wales for ‘Ten Years On: The Welsh Journalist at 9/11′.

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#jpod: SEO success stories – the LA Times on its traffic hike

The Los Angeles Times is the only major US newspaper to have a website that is increasing in traffic year-on-year, according to the site’s senior editor.

In this podcast Journalism.co.uk technology correspondent Sarah Marshall speaks to Jimmy Orr, managing editor of the LATimes.com about how appointing SEO chief Amy Hubbard has led the site to record traffic. As well as discussing Hubbard’s day-to-day role, Orr offers his advice on SEO strategy and outlines his optimism for the news industry.

We also hear from SEO expert David Amerland on how the different strategies of the Guardian and the Mail Online have resulted in traffic success and how other news organisations have struggled to move from print to the online world.

Podcast: Download

This podcast is the second in a two-part series on headline writing and SEO.

You can find a guide on how to get to grips with SEO as a journalist, how to write great headlines the work for SEO and more from David Amerland on the state of the UK newspaper industry.

You can sign up to our iTunes podcast feed for future audio.

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#jpod: Does SEO kill the carefully crafted, clever headline?

For some time within the industry there has been an often lively debate about the impact of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) on online news. Just recently the Los Angeles Times took on a new SEO chief, whose job it is to build newspaper headlines fit for the internet, by ensuring they’re web-friendly and searchable.

The new role has been credited with contributing to a 65 per cent rise in traffic from search and a 41 per cent jump in traffic from Google compared to this time last year, according to a report by the Nieman Journalism Lab.

So does SEO’s demand for keywords really take the art out of headline writing?

Journalism.co.uk’s technology correspondent Sarah Marshall speaks to SEO consultant Malcolm Coles and Duane Forrester, senior product manager at Bing to find out more.

Podcast: Download

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