Tag Archives: blogs

Comment: The NUJ and new media – ‘bloggers rejoice in lower standards’

It was with some astonishment that I read the following comment from the chair of the UK’s National Union of Journalists (NUJ) professional training committee, Chris Wheal, on Adam Tinworth’s blog:

“The NUJ fails to maintain standards in blogs because bloggers themselves rejoice in having lower standards.”

Tinworth had written about his discovery in his blog’s referrer logs that an email exchange within the NUJ under the subject ‘effing blogs’ had led someone to his website.

Wheal points out some flaws in the original post, as he sees them – in particular an alleged witch hunt surrounding one of the recipients of the email.

Personally I don’t believe a witch hunt was Tinworth’s aim – he was, as Suw Charman points out in the post’s comments, writing about what he observes.

Aside from that it’s hard to engage/respond/take on board what Wheal is saying when the tone gets your back up in the way it does and makes sweeping statements like the above.

He goes on to say that the NUJ is currently looking at Yahoo Pipes and new Webvision CMS – great, talk to your members, many of whom are also bloggers, about it.

But do this in a way that respects the ‘social’ aspect of social media and learn that blogs like Adam Tinworth’s are intended as open conversations.

Wheal says he wants the NUJ training committee to engage with bloggers to raise standards – this is a lesson in how not to do it.

Bild reaches out to blogosphere with Twingly

We’ve seen it picked up by newspapers elsewhere in Europe, but this week Germany’s Bild announced it will improve its connections with bloggers by introducing Twingly to its sport, entertainment, German premier league football and English-language site, Bild.com.

The Blogstream widget links back to bloggers who are linking to Bild content in an attempt to share some link love and let the paper see where its content is being picked up and talked about.

Currybet.net: No mention of blogs/Google/Twitter in Ofcom report

Martin Belam has run a quick search through the ‘Putting Viewers First’ section of Ofcom’s public service broadcasting review.

Despite looking at ’emerging trends involved with Internet delivery of content to an ever more interactive British audience’, there’s no mention of search, Twitter, blogs, Google…

Full story at this link…

Friday procrastination: the blog gender analyser

It’s Friday, so fancy a bit of distraction now you’ve joined another Ning network, checked your Twitter/Facebook thoroughly and read all of yesterday’s PopBitch and Sam Leith’s witty account of surprise redundancy …? (note: that’s no reference at all to Journalism.co.uk’s own Friday morning activity)

Well… introducing the GenderAnalyzer: a nifty little site that predicts within a second just whether there’s an extra X or Y chromosome influencing that blog. Spookily accurate, according to the very necessary research just conducted.

Without further ado, or procrastination, here’s the link: http://genderanalyzer.com/

Britannica.com: Blogosphere, R.I.P?

Britannica dropped us an email to let us know about this post: Nicholas Carr, who sits on their board of advisors, has posted this from his own blog: blogging, has entered its midlife crisis, he writes. No one killed the blogosphere, he says, ‘its death was natural, and foretold’. Vidaus apdailos ir būtų remonto darbai Vilniuje www.bustovizija.net

Shiny Media reports October blog traffic boost

Blog publisher Shiny Media recorded a 7 per cent increase in unique users to its network of sites in October, according to Google Analytics figures posted to the company’s blog.

Unique users to the blogs grew to 3.2 million for the month with 6.1 million page impressions.

Figures for individual titles for October included:

Crafty Crafty – a 40 per cent rise in unique users to 89,000
CorrieBlog – a 37 per cent rise in unique users to 79,000
Xboxer.tv – rise of 34 per cent
ShinyStyle.tv – rise of 28 per cent
Kiss and Make Up – rise of 24 per cent

In the blog post, Shiny co-founder Chris Price said the figures might be prompted in part by the economic downturn, as more people turn to lifestyle and home-based interest sites.