Three thousand police officers hit the streets last Friday for Operation Admiral – a series of co-ordinated raids over a 24 hour period, aimed at hunting down Greater Manchester’s most violent drunken thugs.

During the operation 672 people were arrested and multiple weapons found including an AK-47 machine gun with a rocket launcher.

Manchester Evening News (MEN) reporter Dean Kirby was in the Greater Manchester Police (GMP) control room from 9am through till just after 5pm using Twitter to provide live updates to the MEN website, which were streamed via a CoveritLive blog.

Readers of Kirby’s coverage began leaving comments from as early as 11.35 am, one anonymously advising that ‘They need to concentrate more on Rochdale’.

Throughout the rest of the day sporadic messages of support filtered in from the public, one such said, ‘well done GMP keep up the good work’. In response assistant chief constable Garry Shewan thanked ‘the public for their strong support over the last 24 hours’.

The MEN’s online coverage provided a host of stories in the weekend’s print editions – broken down by the 12 divisions of the Greater Manchester Police – and several online follow-ups.

The MEN has previously made good use of data from news stories online – see its homicide map for the Manchester area – so figures from the raids could provide a starting point for new visualisations.

• Greater Manchester Police tweeting a day’s crime
• NUJ: Police reassure union ‘no more local press passes’
• Police attack The Australian newspaper over terror raids scoop
• Press Gazette: Media favoured protestors in G20 coverage, says police chief
• MEN harnesses multimedia for English Degence League protest coverage

Today’s budget announcement is being billed as the most significant of recent times given the UK’s current financial woes.

This is both a breaking news story, but one that requires closer analysis and follow up – and, perhaps most importantly, the ability to make it relevant to the reader.

So how are news organisations covering it online and who’s ticking these boxes?

Telegraph.co.uk
Currently performing well in Google News search for budget, the Telegraph is going in big on online coverage today.

It will be updating throughout the day via its @Telefinance Twitter account (headed up by @hrwaldram). Meanwhile a trio of Telegraph reporters have been liveblogging budget news since 6:30am.

On the subject of Twitter – the Telegraph has reinstated its Twitterfall – an embed aggregating all Twitter updates marked #budget. The feature had to be taken down earlier in the week, because of some mischief, but so far so good with the tweaked (filtered?) version.

In addition there’s a nice ‘What to expect’ guide breaking down the issues that are likely to feature in the budget announcement.

FT.com
Arguably the go-to site for budget coverage given its specialism, the FT is building on tried and trusted features from last year (a budget day podcast, video analysis, a budget calculator) with a new liveblog from 12pm covering Alistair Darling’s speech, editor Robert Shrimsley, who will participate, told Journalism.co.uk.

The format is based on the site’s MarketsLive feature successfully developed and used by its Alphaville blog. As such it will ‘bring people people up to speed, but inform them in an entertaining way’. Financial analysis but entertaining – two styles that rarely meet, said Shrimsley, but that will be key to FT.com’s liveblogging of the budget.

“There’s a premium on getting that information out and telling people what its means. We feel at the FT that we have the right people to pass on that analysis,” explained Shrimsley.

There will be a Twitter feed too, but it’s crucial not spam people with updates, he added. Readers are encouraged to participate in both this stream and the liveblog though.

Alphaville isn’t being used as a lab for experimenting with new ways of coverage, he stressed, but there is potential for more liveblogging across the site. It’s important not to overdose on technology, however, but to use only when applicable, he added.

“Can we offer our audience what is worth reading? There’s lots of innovation on the internet and there’s lots that you can do – that doesn’t mean you have to,” he said.

Channel 4 News website
More use of Twitter by the Channel 4 news team – as introduced by presenter Krishnan Guru-Murphy in the vid below:

There will also be use of CoverItLive (CiL) for a liveblog starting at 12pm, which was similarly used in the site’s coverage of the G20 summit.

Some nice additional touches include the use of FactCheck to test the claims made by the chancellor in the budget; and a wordcloud (or Snowcloud) of Darling’s announcement.

Sky News Online and Times Online
A specially built budget page has been set up including a liveblog, live video streams of the budget speech, and analysis from bloggers, tax experts and taxpayers, the site told us. There’s a good guide to how to use Sky’s online coverage too – one particular highlight, the chance for users to get answers from PKF UK tax accountant Matt Coward.

Meanwhile Times Online will be following up its excellent liveblogging of the G20 summit with a version starting at midday today.

Liveblogging at regional level
Deciphering what the budget means for the average news reader is being tackled head on by the Newcastle Evening Chronicle with a liveblog taking place across a number of Trinity Mirror centres.

“We’ll be mainly trying to digest it for *normal* people with rx [reactions] from experts, rather than the scary £180bn debt figures,” said Colin George, multimedia editor, in a Twitter update.

Wales Online (bringing in a tax expert) and the Birmingham Post – under its dedicated Live! Section – also host budget day liveblogs (using CiL again).

• Covering the cuts: how the media is reacting to the spending review
• #ge2010: How to follow election day online
• Twitter users play with Telegraph’s Twitterfall #Budget feature
• MEN harnesses multimedia for English Degence League protest coverage
• Budget coverage: what to expect

The Sun’s online coverage of ‘baby father’ Alfie Patten broke traffic records for the site. Hitwise’s Robin Goad analyses how search and social media played a part in this.

Full post at this link…

• Currybet.net: Google News not silenced by Alfie Patten restrictions
• Hitwise: How news sites can pick up Digg traffic
• Hitwise: More traffic going to content websites than transactional sites
• Hitwise: The Independent gains online market share in the UK
• Hitwise: ‘Guardian receives more traffic from Twitter than competitors’

To mark President Elect Barack Obama’s inauguration on January 20, news sites are plotting and planning their online coverage already:

CNN

CNN’s going for the social networking angle, teaming its live video streaming site, CNN.com Live, with Facebook. Users will be able to update their Facebook status from the CNN site and see a stream of updates from their friends.

The updates entered via CNNLive will be tagged with the hyperlink ‘via CNN.com Live’ so Facebook contacts can click through to view the inauguration site from the social network.

NPR

At the end of last year, NPR used its inside blog to put a call out for social media ways to cover the inauguration. Among the ideas mooted in the post were:

• Citizen journalism iPhone app
• ‘Mobcasting’ – audio recordings of voicemails left by listeners about their experiences of inauguration day
• An inauguration #tag – for Twitter, Flickr, blog posts etc. The tag #inaug09 seems to be in use already.
• Maps of user-generated content

More help is wanted from techies and journalists – contact Andy Carvin (@acarvin on Twitter) via the blog post.

• NPR’s Inauguration Report site goes live
• You can now add SoundCloud recordings to Storify
• App of the week for journalists – TinyVox, for recording and sharing audio notes
• Ten fantastic apps, tips and tools for recording audio
• lostremote: msnbc.com on linking to social media

Reuters, Associated Press (AP) and Agence France Presse (AFP) will not cover matches, training sessions and events for cricket in Australia, because of ‘unacceptable accreditation terms’ set out by Cricket Australia, the sport’s governing body in the country.

According to a release from Reuters:

“No text stories, photos or video of any of the training sessions, matches, press conferences or events will be distributed by the international news agencies to media around the world for the first test against New Zealand later this month, and potentially for the South Africa test coming up in December.”

Reuters partner Getty Images will provide images and ‘fulfil their commercial obligations only’ e.g. not providing any editorial of the matches.

Rights organisation the News Media Coalition said the agencies had been in discussions with Cricket Australia for months before rejecting the terms, which featured several restrictions relating to online coverage including:

• Rules on how newspaper websites can be updated
• Veto power for Cricket Australia over which websites and non-sports magazines the agencies are allowed to syndicate content to
• Restrictions affecting the distribution of content to mobile news services

“As in previous instances, this decision [the accreditation terms] compromises our ability to report independently and objectively, and comes at the expense of global fans and sponsors,” said Christoph Pleitgen, global head of News Agency for Thomson Reuters, in the release.

“We would like to resume our timely, premium coverage as quickly as possible, pending a solution to the current situation. However, freedom of the press and protecting the news interests and coverage rights of our global clients are at the core of both our business and Reuters editorial principles, and these must be upheld.”

• Media release: Reuters launches 24-hour live news stream
• Getty teams up with Yahoo to tap into Flickr users
• Media Release: AFP and Getty agree video partnership
• Sportsbeat agency puts content online
• Guardian: Indian Premier League to live stream matches online and on mobile

While reviewing the best online coverage of election day, CNN’s press office dropped us a line about the ‘magic board’ – a map of the states which will be used by presenter John King to show the results and forecasts as they come in.

For anyone who loves/loathes a good swing-o-meter, here’s Saturday Night Live’s take on it:

• AP to stream live video on US election night for first time
• Japan quake sends record audiences to broadcast and online news
• Media release: AP supplying Super Tuesday results on a Google map
• #ge2010: How to follow election day online
• Telegraph’s new election database (in beta)

For those that have been under a rock/on Mars for the last year, the next President of the United States will be decided tonight, giving news organisations another opportunity to flaunt their interactive, live reporting and user-generated wares as the votes unfold.

We’ve already covered Sky News’ election coverage and BBC News’ live online plans, but here’s our round-up of some of the best projects out there – open up twenty browser tabs, sit back and enjoy:

• NYTimes.com: the paper has set up a political ‘word train’ visualising how readers are feeling. It’ll update with new answers every 30 minutes (thanks to @matthewbuckland for the link). Elsewhere the site’s homepage is dominated by election coverage, with plenty of images and video – making use of the new video player – and a pop-up results widget.
• Twitter Vote Report: the microblogging tool has been harnessed by a network of volunteers to map voters’ experiences at the polls. Tweets tagged with waiting times (e.g. #wait 120 for a 120 minute delay) are plotted creating a rapidly updating map of problems. Could be a great service for local newspapers in the states to provide:

• Current: using Twitter, as it did during the presidential debates, the site and channel will integrate Tweets, Digg headlines and video from 12seconds as part of an election broadcast.
• WashingtonPost.com: the paper has gone for an aggregated approach, pulling together all strands of its election day coverage on a map. The TimeSpace: Election graphic shows photos, video, articles, tweets, posts and audio and lets you scroll through the day with a timeline:

• Yahoo: created a one-stop shop, US election microsite drawing together all of its features, including forums, Yahoo Answers, AP and Politico stories and aggregated content from external news sites, a Flickr stream of photos and options to set up news alerts on the candidates.
• Hubdub: the just-for-fun news prediction site is carrying an election forecast map, which it claims is based on ’51 underlying prediction markets that respond in real-time to breaking news’. Users can view forecasts state-by-state to help them decided where to place their Hubdub dollars when predicting the outcome of questions such as ‘Who will win the 2008 US Presidential Election?’ and ‘What will be the margin of victory in the state of Ohio?’

That’s not enough, I hear you cry. You want more? Well, over at paidContent:UK, Robert Andrews has wrapped up the online coverage from the UK’s newspapers, while Online Journalism Blog chieftain Paul Bradshaw has an extensive list of online activities.

This is only the tip of the iceberg – any other great coverage, tools or websites that need a mention, let us know below.

• News prediction game Hubdub launches widgets
• Washington Post buys #election hashtag for midterms
• Hubdub introducing ads to website
• AP to stream live video on US election night for first time
• US elections: CNN’s ‘magic map’ gets spoofed on Saturday Night Live

Cross-media will be key to covering the Beijing Olympics.

Organisations will need to make the most of online to keep up with the games – particularly because of the eight hour time difference.

To handle this, News International is pooling its reporters from Times Online and News.com.au to offer rolling online coverage.

• News articles today on Journalism.co.uk
• Mark Jones: Rolling news coverage – what works for Iran?
• Sportsbeat agency puts content online
• IFJ launches Olympics website to help journalists
• Zinio and Rolling Stone launch first iTunes-integrated iPad app

A new SMS news alert system from Ipswich’s Evening Star newspaper marked its launch yesterday by delivering the verdict in the Steve Wright prostitute murder trial.

Wright, who was yesterday found guilty of the murders of five prostitutes in the Ipswich area in 2006, is expected to be sentenced this morning.

Yesterday’s alert added another layer to the online coverage of the trial by the paper, which has featured live news updates, video and interactive maps relating to the case.

“We think using it [the SMS service] we were the first media outlet to deliver the verdict. We were also the first to deliver police-supplied footage of Wright being interviewed,” James Goffin, web editor at Archant Suffolk, told Journalism.co.uk.

The text message service, which is being trialled by the Archant title, will be used to cover large breaking news stories in the area and enables newsroom staff to send a message directly to subscribers from any computer or device connected to the internet.

To access the alerts, which will cost 25p to receive, users should text ESTAR ALERTS NEWS to 84070.

• Multimedia local coverage for Ipswich murder trial
• Hello magazine launches mobile alert service
• Essex hyperlocal website teams up with Archant to launch magazine
• Andrew Bagguley hired as consultant for Guardian mobile drive
• Poynter: How to set up Newsbeat, real-time analytics tool for news sites

The Guardian has removed a video from its website showing a suicide bomb attack in Israel after more than 550 complaints were made about the footage.

The piece, which was selected from a package of footage and text supplied to the paper by Reuters, showed the wounded being taken to hospital, as well as statements from the Palestinian agriculture minister and a Hamas spokesman. It was removed four days after being posted to the site.

Writing about the decision to remove the video from the site, Siobhain Butterworth, readers’ editor, says most traffic to the video came from the site Honest Reporting, which criticised the lack of an Israeli spokesperson in the footage.

In response Butterworth points out that at the time no Israeli sources featured in the Reuters package.

She also directs complainants, readers and Honest Reporting to the paper’s other online coverage of the event:

“Honest Reporting linked only to the video; it ignored the rest of the Guardian’s coverage. It didn’t mention that the story published on the day of the bombing (and which the video accompanied) began with comments from the Israeli prime minister and included statements from an eyewitness, a doctor at the scene and a police spokesman. Stories about the event in the following days also included statements from Israeli sources.”

However, with regards to the video in question, Butterworth admits there was ‘an editing error’, which may have lead to a perceived Palestinian bias. While this was the reason the piece was removed, this was not ‘a deliberate attempt to give a one-sided response to the event’, she adds.

• Online video: Reuters wants to offer more raw video to clients
• Video from Beet.tv: How Reuters used social media in Iran to source video
• Guardian.co.uk: Handling reader responses in a ‘digital age’
• Event: Reuters hosts social media Q&A with Lib Dem’s Nick Clegg – take part!
• Reuters ‘dissatisfied’ by investigation into death of Fadel Shana

Timesonline dedicated most time to looking at issues of race in the primaries although in a timely and sensitive way, according to Marty Karlon, Sunday editor at the Telegraph of Nashua, New Hampshire.

“But while the big picture was there, none of the coverage really captured the chaos,” said Ms Karlon, who reviews the coverage of the presidential election primary by UK online media for the Press Gazette.

• Goodbye Press Gazette: round-up of the links
• Nashua Telegraph experimenting with Qik
• AP to stream live video on US election night for first time
• PressGazette: Wilmington – Press Gazette magazine to close
• Washingtonpost.com: AP controversial in US election content