Monthly Archives: May 2010

iPad or why pad? Mixed messages for UK news publishers

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For those of you that have been in hiding and didn’t know, Apple’s iPad launched in the UK today with granular reports from the media on who was the first to buy the device to who was the first to emerge from Apple’s London store holding one (hopefully we’ll soon have details of who’s been the first person to leave theirs on the London Underground or to ask for a refund).

Bit of a love-in for the Apple store in the Telegraph’s report:

While braving the cold, the trio were given food and drinks by sympathetic Apple staff with several other customers offering them hundreds of pounds to replace them in line.

As Jake ran into the store, after a countdown, he was greeted by screams and cheers from dozens of excited staff members who hugged and high-fived him before posing for the world’s media.

And plenty of coverage from the Guardian, which, despite having its website on much of Apple’s pre-launch marketing material, has decided not to launch a news app on the device in time for launch. The title did announce today, however, that its Eyewitness photography app has been downloaded more than 90,000 times since the US launch of the product in April.

The Financial Times, as expected, and the Times have jumped onto the new touchscreen bandwagon. The Times iPad edition comes hot on the heels of the launch of its new website earlier this week, though the app’s pricing structure adds another layer to News International’s paywall plans.

Accompanying the Times’ launch, an article on ‘How iPad may make the future of newspapers a different story’, which suggests that:

Many media organisations think that it will give them the opportunity to correct past mistakes with online journalism, allowing them to charge customers for content and in return provide an enriched experience more compelling and interactive than printed newspapers.

Let’s hope the latter does come hand-in-hand with the former to make these news apps something worth paying for. New research from analysts Ovum warns publishers about sticking all their eggs in one Apple-shaped basket and ignoring other devices and a digital strategy addressing all platforms: web, mobile, tablet and future. At least the Financial Times, which is operating a standard, tiered pricing structuring across its various digital outlets, seems to get this. Meanwhile, media journalist Patrick Smith wonders whether you need a news app at all, arguing that apps are a convenient, but limited way of publishing information.

As a Financial Times report earlier this week says:

[M]any of the most popular European publications on the web – including the Guardian, the Daily Mail and the Economist – will not be in the App Store when the iPad launches in nine countries this Friday.

Digital publishers, analysts and design experts say the first publishers’ apps are confusing to use or boringly faithful to the offline product, and are not being used as much as hoped.

Media organisations might get the charging for content right this time around (although the Times’ model leaves some questions), but will content and designing to make the most of the iPad’s features be overlooked by some news organisations in the rush?

Life after graduation: ‘Enthusiasm is really the key’

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This time last year I was set to embark upon the biggest obstacle of my young adult life, the daunting but exciting prospect of trying to start a career in a already overflowing industry with thousands of competitors jostling just to ‘get in’. Yet I’m proof that it can be done, and all it takes is a little self belief and application.

Back in October 2009, only a few months after finishing my course at Coventry University, I was fortunate enough to have been offered a role within the UK’s number one sporting channel, Sky Sports News. This was a dream environment for me to work, as a large amount of student life was lost watching this potentially degree destroying channel.

I was later informed by my boss that over 250 applicants had applied for my Ingest Operator role, a junior position which means I am responsible for live and tape feeds being recorded onto a server to then be played on air, usually as soon as possible, meaning communication with producers, editors and reporters is an essential part of the job. I’m a small but indispensable cog in the wheel of TV News.

My advice for those looking to work in any form of media, whether that be broadcast, online or print, is that enthusiasm is king! Guest speakers at the university’s Coventry Conversation series would often say tell us if we wanted it bad enough, we would get it. That statement could not be any truer.

With the ever increasing number of new media platforms, opportunities for entrepreneurial students are many and varied. There are so many new ways to build a unique portfolio to impress potential employers.

My journey started by charming the producer of a local radio station to give me some work experience. This was a long haul placement which turned into a paid part time job from June until October, when I joined Sky Sports News. The radio station placement gave me valuable basic editing and production experience. Being multi-skilled is vital in today’s newsroom. You can expect to be competing with far too many multi-skilled candidates not to take this seriously.

I undertook other work experience writing for a non-league football website, which gave me a niche to build a portfolio around. Soon I found my work on the BBC local sport web pages.

I also took it upon myself to take a voluntary position as a press secretary for a non league football club, Corinthian-Casuals. This gave me real life match reporting experience, which also got my name in both national and local newspapers.

Finding a niche is an excellent way of standing out from the crowd, and can give you an expertise others may find useful in their companies or websites.

As a journalism or media student, not having a blog to hone your writing skills is unforgivable, and not using applications such as Twitter and Audio Boo to promote your work is a missed opportunity.

Creating opportunities is essential. A few weeks ago I got in contact with Julian March, producer of SkyNews.com, via Twitter and asked if there was any way I could get involved with the election night coverage. He responded within minutes by emailing me internally. He put me in contact with the right people and I ended up on the Sky 100 team on election night, collecting results from the key 100 marginals and getting them on air and on screen as soon as possible.

Enthusiasm is really the key; you can be brilliant at something in this industry but you won’t get anywhere if you aren’t prepared to put in the time and effort. There are just too many other people out there who are.

#followjourn: @roztappenden/broadcast journalist

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#followjourn: Roz Tappenden

Who? Broadcast journalist

Where? Tappenden currently works for BBC News Online as a broadcast journalist, working for the South and South East regions. She has previously worked as a news reporter for Brighton’s local newspaper the Argus and for ITV Central News.

Contact? @roztappenden

Just as we like to supply you with fresh and innovative tips every day, we’re recommending journalists to follow online too. They might be from any sector of the industry: please send suggestions (you can nominate yourself) to judith or laura at journalism.co.uk; or to @journalismnews.

Brand Republic: Shortlist revenues give hope to free magazine market

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Shortlist Media, publisher of the free, weekly magazines Shortlist and Stylist, has reported an 81 per cent year-on-year growth in revenues, from £3.1 million to £5.6 million in the year to 31 August 2009.

The group significantly reduced its operating losses and said Stylist, which launched in October 2009 with a start-up cost of £181,000, is expected to be profitable in its third year.

Full story at this link…

BBC College of Journalism blog: The problems with reporting a coalition government

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The BBC College of Journalism’s Jon Jacob raises some interesting points about journalists’ coverage of the UK’s new coalition government:

  • “The coalition is still in its early days. It’s easy to forget how the business of reporting the coalition agreement has overshadowed the true schedule of government business;”
  • “[S]hould journalists actually continue referencing the government ministers they talk about in their reports – including in vision graphics and on-air announcements – to illustrate how ideologies differ within a coalition government?”

When can the media stop referring to it as a coalition government or is there a danger in doing so?

Full post at this link…

Newsweek: Is BP restricting journalists’ access to oil spill?

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More than a month into the disaster, a host of anecdotal evidence is emerging from reporters, photographers, and TV crews in which BP and Coast Guard officials explicitly target members of the media, restricting and denying them access to oil-covered beaches, staging areas for clean-up efforts, and even flyovers.

Journalists from CBS, Mother Jones and the Times Picayune have been denied access to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, according to reports, raising concerns that the disaster will not be properly documented for the public.

Full story at this link…

Design is key to good online journalism, not just coding and data

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The correlation between good design and good storytelling

It is good to see that the internet’s powerful influence on journalism, while not universally welcome, is being enthusiastically tackled. The willingness of some writers and broadcasters to get to grips with programming is one of the most important aspects of this on-going narrative.

Having written a couple of blogs on journalism and coding recently, I have noticed how much of the conversation revolves around learning the technical skills required for developing new apps, the emphasis seems to be on coding and computer science.

Yet in many ways a digital journalist is more likely to struggle with design than coding. Before you can begin coding you have to have this side of things clear, whether you are working on your own independent blog or developing a complex data rich piece for a much larger news website.

Packaged up for perfection

We can all agree that the internet allows for a highly competitive market in which a good producer of quality journalism can thrive without the support of a big media giant. If you are one of these aspiring indie journalists then you are quite likely to be advised things like: be niche, be hyperlocal, be as specialist as possible.

These are fine buzzwords, but remember that regardless of how good your content may be, the first thing people will experience when they click on your site is a subconscious reaction to how your page makes them feel. If they don’t like it they will probably leave in a matter of seconds, unless there is a compelling piece of information that they cannot get elsewhere.

So how do you help your content to make your site a ‘sticky’ one? Our head designer, Cat Kempsell, believes that there are some very basic design rules to follow:

“Articles on a webpage need space to breath and flow. Don’t be afraid of white space and stick to three columns for a news driven site. Above all, make sure that your headings and sub-headings are distinctive, preferably in different colours – Times Online does this really well. People want to feel comfortable, that they can relax and interact with a website without feeling like they just landed in a maze of words.”

It’s strange to see how many news websites don’t do this. I suspect that it’s a hangover from a print history that encouraged every spare inch of white space to be filled, but on a website it just looks horrible. Someone should tell the Sun.

Making sense of data

Data journalism is another area that we are being encouraged to explore. You can build a programme that scrapes large amounts of data from a website, but how do you then organise that information into an easily accessible set of graphs, facts and stats that will deliver the maximum impact in as short a time as possible?

Making an infographic is quite easy; making a good one is an art form. Infographics are incredibly popular at the moment and many of us feel that it is another area that we need to become proficient in. My opinion is that, like coding, you’ll get the best results when you’re working in a team of professionals; that digital trinity of a journalist, a coder and a designer.

As an online editor for a digital media company, I am aware of just how important coding is, although I don’t believe that journalists and coders will ever meld into the same role. I just think that a modern journalist should be able to understand and talk about web architecture fluently. The same applies to basic design principles.

In a space that’s filled with websites clamouring for the public’s attention, how a site makes you feel when you’re on it really matters. Judging by its new design, the Times recognise the issue. If anyone else wants to start charging for content they’re going to have to recognise it too.

RSS feeds beat any branded iPhone or iPad news app

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There are still so many uncertainties in the media landscape. Media fortunes fluctuate upwards due to the green shoots of cyclical recovery and downwards thanks to the continued – and permanent – failure of long-standing print-based publishing models.

But one thing you can be assured of is that in boardroom and management meetings across the worlds of newspapers, magazines and broadcast media, executives are being asked: “What’s our app strategy?”

Still regarded as something of a secret sauce for newspapers and magazines – Rupert Murdoch believes that all media will find its way to the iPad – the very success and survival of newspapers and magazines apparently relies on us iPhone- and iPad-wielding middle class types going on an App Store shopping spree.

I’ve written on these pages before that, much like an English goalkeeper facing a German penalty, the iPad won’t save anything at all – least of all the news business. Analysts at paidContent:UK and Journalism.co.uk agree.

So here’s another thought: despite their convenience, apps are a limited way of publishing information. The self-constructed, community-based, open, Google-able news eco-system gives the serious media consumer a better all-round experience than the closed off system represented by the iPad and App Store, and all it takes is a little effort to make the most of it.

Most apps available now are primitive, quickly-built bits of smartphone software that publish articles via sequential updates. In the main, even market-leading apps don’t begin to present stories, pictures, video and graphics to readers in the way they should.

The experience of using the Guardian and Telegraph apps is only fractionally as rewarding and revealing as using Guardian.co.uk and Telegraph.co.uk – indeed, it’s probably not even as good as those unprofitable paper things. Andrew Sparrow may be the king of political liveblogging, but try reading him on the iPhone app – it’s confusing, jumbled, the links aren’t live and it’s not worth the effort.

Look at Journalism.co.uk’s review of iPhone apps from March: out of 34 leading apps, a measly five allowed offline reading.

So what’s the alternative? Do it yourself, with friends

Since the advent of the iPhone I’ve fallen back in love with RSS. With Google Reader’s mobile version (when in internet range) I can quickly read the 1,000+ feeds I check regularly. When out of range and on the London Underground I use the free NetNewsWire app which syncs seamlessly with Google Reader and works offline beautifully, as does the paid-for Byline app which shows pictures well and partially downloads online-only content too.

But both of those RSS aggregator apps allow me to add articles to my shared items on Google Reader and post things to Twitter. It’s a real-time news diet chosen by me and the community I belong to.

Times Newspapers launched its paid-for products this week and the £2-a-week sites are soon to be tied to access to iPhone/iPad apps, much like the FT’s app. With Times executives openly predicting reader numbers to collapse by as much as 90 percent, News International may be relying on the attractiveness of the iPad apps to shore up subscription numbers. I’ve seen the TheTimes.co.uk app in action on an iPad recently – it’s essentially the day’s online and print news digested into a series of regular “editions” – and the ‘liveness’ possible from online news appears to be lacking, as is the sharing aspect.

Of course, the everyday Man On The Clapham Omnibus doesn’t care or want to know about RSS, much less mobile apps that create a mobile version of their OPML file. But Journalism.co.uk readers are media professionals – and I’d wager that most of you are capable of using free or cheap software to create a mobile news experience that no branded premium app can match.