Alison Gow gives the back story on deputy business editor of the Liverpool Post and Echo, Tony McDonough, who was caught in the crossfire at a Liverpool pub last weekend.
McDonough tweeted after it had happened and during his hospital visit.
Why?
“People are hardwired to want to share stories; at times of crisis we all want to tell someone (…) Journalists want to get news out too, and they want to get it out fast and first to as wide an audience as possible,” writes Gow.
Since I started using Twitter I’ve always been amazed (and grateful) at how quickly calls for technological help and assistance with ideas and projects are answered. It’s one of the main reasons I’m a fan of Twitter.
There are plenty of media/journalist Twitter databases out there, but below are the beginnings of a list of digital editors on Twitter.
What do I mean by digital editor? In this instance, a journalist working primarily online, on web projects or co-ordinating multimedia output. The web editor of a newspaper site or magazine site, for example. It’s in no particular order, except for being divided by ‘traditional’ industry sectors at the moment, but if this isn’t useful, just let us know – would be great to get more international representatives too.
But the criteria for inclusion on the list are intentionally loose – this is aimed at networking, problem-solving and idea sharing between journalists working in the same space and similar roles. (Feel free to nominate any additions or drop us a tweet @journalismnews)
UPDATE April 16 – please read blog post two on how to message the group via Twitter
Newspapers
Alison Gow (@alisongow) – executive editor, digital, Liverpool Daily Post & Liverpool Echo
Kevin Matthews (@kmatt) – head of web and data, Liverpool Daily Post
Neil MacDonald (@xxnapoleonsolo) – deputy head of web and data, Liverpool Daily Post
Jo Wadsworth (@jowadsworth) – web editor, Brighton Argus
Tom Pegg (@tomatthechad) – digital content manager, Mansfield Chad
James Goffin (@jamesgoffin) – regional web producer, Archant
Sarah Booker (@sarah_booker) – web editor, Worthing Herald
Gustav Svensson (@gustavsvensson) – web editor, entertainment and arts, Sydsvenskan.se
Stephen Emerson (@stephen_emerson) – deputy online editor, Scotsman.com
Sam Shepherd (@SamShepherd) – online journalist, Bournemouth Daily Echo
Joanna Geary (@timesjoanna) – web development editor, business, Times Online
Sarah Hartley (@foodiesarah) – head of online editorial, MEN Media
Iain Hepburn (@iainmhepburn) – online editor, DailyRecord.co.uk
Lucia Adams (@luciatimes) – web development editor, Times Online
Carmen Boles (@carmenb) – online news editor, Gazette.com
Marcus Warren (@MarcusWa) – editor, Telegraph.co.uk
Dan Owen (@danowen) – executive editor online, Trinity Mirror
Steve Nicholls (@steve_nicholls) – multimedia editor, Birmingham Post
Anna Jeys (@ajeys) – multimedia editor, Birmingham Mail
Steve Wollaston (@stevewollaston) – multimedia editor, BPM Media and Sunday Mercury
Julie Martin (@jules_27) – Teesside Evening Gazette
Helen Dalby (@helendalby) – regional multimedia manager, NCJ Media
Nick Turner (@nickincumbria) – head of digital content, CN Group
Christian Dunn (@christiandunn) – digital news editor, NWN Media
Hugh Dixon (@hugh_d) – web editor and production editor, thisisbath/Bath Chronicle
Paul Cockerton (@paulcockerton) – web editor, Lancashire Telegraph
Dan Owens (@hornetdan1979) – deputy news editor, Northampton Chronicle and Echo
Dan Kerins (@dankerins) – web journalist, Southern Daily Echo
Broadcast
Marsha Graham (@marshagoldcoast) – multimedia manager for 102.9FM Hot Tomato, Australia
Rob Winder (@robwinder) – news editor, Al Jazeera website, Washington DC
Tom Thorogood (@TomThorogood) – digital news editor, MTV
Magazines
Martin Stabe (@martinstabe) – online editor, Retail Week
Victoria Thompson (@VicThompson) – assistant online editor, Nursing Times
Neil Durham (@NeilDurham) – deputy editor, GP and Independent Nurse
John Robinson (@PulseToday) – digital content manager, Pulse Today
Peter Houston (@p_houston) – editorial director for Advanstar Communications, Europe
Alex Smith (@alexsmith68) – web editor, Building.co.uk
Keira Daley (@daleyrant) – web editor, Australian print magazine
Lara McNamee (@lovelylara33) – assistant intelligence editor, ICIS
Gabriel Fleming (@gabefleming) – online editor, Nursing Times
Janie Stamford (@janiestamford) – contract catering editor, Caterer & Hotelkeeper
Robin Latchem (@lgcplus) – online editor, Local Government Chronicle
Keely Stocker (@keelystocker) – digital content manager, Drapers Online
Scott Matthewman (@scottm) – assistant manager, The Stage
Specialist website
Michael Hubbard (@michaelomh) – founder and music editor, MusicOmh
Krystal Sim (@krystalsim) – web editor for sustainability magazine BSD – bsdlive.co.uk
Arun Marsh (@ArunMarsh) – content producer/editor, Local Gov
Rick Waghorn (@MrRickWaghorn) – publisher, MyFootbalWriter
Emma Waddingham (@emmawad) online editor, Legal-Medical.co.uk
Michael McCarthy (@HealthGuide) online editor, LocalHealthGuide
Steve Gooding (@rmtimestech)- Romney Marsh Times
Manoj Solanki (@ManojSolanki) – SeekBroadband.com
Graham Holliday (@noodlepie) – digital editor, Frontline Club
Craig McGinty (@craigmcginty) – publisher, ThisFrenchLife
Mark Crail (@markcrail) – managing editor, XpertHR
Freelance
Adam Oxford (@adamoxford)
Rachel Colling (@rachcolling)
Ashanti Omkar (@ashantiomkar)
We bid farewell to our fellow media reporters at Press Gazette, unless, as Roy Greenslade hopes, a buyer comes forward (again).
We haven’t produced our own coverage, as there has been more than plenty – with insider perspective – elsewhere. We would, however, like to wish the editorial team at Press Gazette the very best of luck in the future with whatever they go onto do. We’ve enjoyed meeting Press Gazette team – past and present – at events, and being kept on our toes when we’re covering the same stories.
Here’s a round-up of the coverage in links:
Please do add any others of note in the comments below.
Newly added:
A Florida judge has ruled that journalists can report court cases in real time – though they will not allowed blog, text or Twitter from the court room itself.
Alison Gow asks if such a change in the rules would work in the UK.
At last week’s Digital Editors’ Network event in Preston, Trinity Mirror’s new geotagged news maps were a popular topic of conversation.
Launched on the Liverpool Echo and Liverpool Daily Post (LDP) websites, the maps let readers search for news by postcode.
But what information are journalists required to input to make the maps work? and how does this affect their newsgathering?
Alison Gow, deputy editor of the LDP, explained the system to Journalism.co.uk:
“At the moment, every time our reporters create a news story they fill in certain fields which dictate where a story is placed online (e.g. story type, keyword tags, author).
“For stories to appear on the map the reporter simply ensures the new ‘postcode’ field is also completed; they do this by chosing from a vast selection of regional postcodes which are already included in a dropdown menu.”
For stories that could be tagged with multiple postcodes, the primary site of the news, e.g. the accident site in a road crash, is currently being used, though multiple location tagging is being looked into.
“We don’t use them for everything; there would be no point in geotagging Liverpool town hall for every council story, for example. But for location-specific articles they work really well.
“As it grows the map offers greater potential for ‘news from your street’ for readers, and it makes the Post and Echo sites more sticky – people can see markers for stories in their area and this should encourage them to click through and read more,” said Gow.
To develop the project further, the same map format is being looked at for other editorial content, such as business articles, she added.
Any more questions about the journalists involvement with these maps? Leave a comment and hopefully we can get a response.
Trinity Mirror regional titles, Newcastle’s Journal, the Birmingham Post and the Liverpool Post have joined forces to report on the economic situation on this live blog, happening right now, as we type this post.
It’s charting the falling FTSE share index and the Liverpool Daily Post reporter Alison Gow twittered this morning that it is the brainchild of Birmingham Post editor Marc Reeves and the head of regional multimedia David Higgerson.
Its purpose: “to provide live information on breaking news surrounding the banking crisis, as well as informed opinion from our team of experts across the country,” the administrator wrote at 12.19.
The poll shows that 63 per cent of voters think that yes, the government should offer 100 per cent protection on all savings.
At 14.23 Sion Barry of Media Wales writes that the length of of the recession ‘really is the golden question. Some sectors of the economy have been in recession from a while… just ask a housebuilder.’
The papers are using Coveritlive.com to create the blog.
The Hub and Spoke laying out may be in vogue for the majority of those adapting to an integrated newsroom but you’d be hard pressed to call Trinity Mirror’s Liverpool nerve centre anything other than an archipelago.
Alison Gow, deputy editor of Liverpool Daily Post, gave Journalism.co.uk a quick tour and explained how a partially rather than fully integrated newsroom for Liverpool’s Daily Post and Echo newspapers and a portfolio of weeklies served them best.
Similar to other large cities in the UK, Liverpool’s morning paper, the Liverpool Daily Post (typically 15,000 copies circulated per day) and the evening Echo (109,000) serve vastly different markets. To account for this the newsroom has integrated but also demarked areas where each paper’s interest is best served by not mixing processes.
The newsdesks of the Post & Echo had previously been fully integrated but the unsuccessful experiment lasted only 18 months and end in 2001, as it didn’t fully serve the needs each paper had and met with opposition from staff who were resistant to working on the other title.
“I suspect the industry is a lot more broad-minded now as we work across print, internet, TV and radio,” Gow told Journalism.co.uk.
COPY
The dailies and weekly newspapers have adapted and refined a partially integrated newsroom where the two main papers share news copy, but keep diary and features separate.
“A government minister in town would tend to be interviewed by a Post reporter,” Gow told Journalism.co.uk. “That copy would be sent by the Post newsdesk to the Echo newsdesk to be rewritten and subbed down. Echo page leads are around 350, Post 600 plus.
“The Post & Echo share a court reporter but the very distinct target audiences of both papers means what makes a splash in the Echo, gangster trials for example, may struggle to make a page lead in the Post.
“Inquests would be covered by one reporter whose copy would be shared between both papers.
“An exception would be Liverpool council meetings – mostly covered by the council reporters from both papers as it’s a contact-building exercise as much as anything.”
The Echo can also publish stories from the weeklies the day the papers are published, Gow added, as the assistant news editor has access to their content queues.
“It’s a co-operative system and involves the newsdesks, picturedesk and multimedia desks talking to each other. That’s why the command desk is so important,” added Gow.
STAFF
At the centre of the archipelago – the big island – is the command desk where Post and Echo news editors and their deputies sit along with a picture editor who works across both publications and the Echo design editor.
Reporters are title specific, as are the features and sports teams, and both papers have separate features and sports editors and deputy editors, Arts editors and motoring editors.
A multimedia head, working across both titles, also sits on the command desk. As on the web, Gow says, the two publications have ‘more fluid identities’.
Each department desks now has embedded digital journalist. Under the old system ‘they just used to sit in the corner away from everyone else’ said Gow. Now they espouse the need for web content and ensure the website remains an area of focus for each department on each title now that they break 99 per cent of their stories online.
Video is a separate entity altogether – one video journalist is responsible for managing libraries, cutting pieces and training newsroom staff and reporters in video-journalism.
She has trained eight other staff so far, giving them a week’s hands-on training so that they can manage handicams and cut footage. They aim for a new web video each day.
SUBBING
A pool of eight subs work across the Echo, the England and Welsh Daily Posts, Huddersfield Examiner, the Chester Chronicle, the Merseyside and North Wales weekly papers on a rota basis.
There are also title-specific staff who work primarily for each paper – ‘champions’ of each brand, adds Gow.
This approach has shifted subs from thinking they work for a single publication, she said, to a ‘hive-mind’ where they work across several titles.