Tag Archives: United States

MySpace and NBC select citizen journalism competition winners

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Decision08, a competition organised by MySpace, NBC News and msnbc.com, has selected two citizen journalists to cover the 2008 US Democratic and Republican conventions.

Matt Britten and Sara Pat Badgley were chosen by more than 50,000 users who voted in the Decision08 convention contest, a press release said.

Entrants were asked to post a video to the Decision08 MySpace site answering the question ‘How will you stand out in the crowd and get the scoop no one else can?’

Below are the winning vids:

Killthecliche.com: ‘more data = better media’

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A website tracking the frequency with which journalists use certain cliches has been set up with the aim of improving journalism.

Killthecliche.com, which currently tracks five US newspapers and the Financial Times, aims to show ‘how smart data analysis can help us improve media’ – so this is more than a naming and shaming exercise.

The site currently has 167 cliches in its database, which it scours the feeds of the newspapers for.

According to the results, insurgent is the all time top cliche used, while amid tops the polls for today’s and the week’s most overused word.

The journalists behind the cliches are also ranked, as are the papers – the Boston Globe is currently coming out worst.

Please submit your most cliche-ridden sentences below and let’s get this post on the chart!

Deepening newsrooms cuts are changing the face of American newspapers, says PEJ study

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The American daily newspaper in 2008 has fewer pages, shorter stories and younger staff, but its coverage is more targeted than ever, according to a new report.

The study released yesterday paints a grim picture of how lay-offs in US newsrooms are damaging the quality of their products – but it’s not all doom and gloom.

The Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ) study, “The Changing Newsroom: What is Being Gained and What is Being Lost in America’s Daily Newspapers” surveyed senior newsroom executives at more than 250 newspapers in the US to map the effects of these cuts.


Less foreign news

“Papers both large and small have reduced the space, resources and commitment devoted to a range of topics. At the top of that list nearly two thirds of papers have cut back on foreign news, over half have trimmed national news and more than a third have reduced business coverage. In effect, America’s newspapers are narrowing their reach and their ambitions and have become niche reads,” the study said.

Larger metro newspapers were worst hit by the cuts – 85 per cent of those dailies with circulations over 100,000 surveyed have cut newsroom staff in the last three years compared to only 52 per cent of smaller papers making cuts.

More targeted and competitive

However, 56 percent of the editors surveyed said their news product is better than it was three years ago because coverage is more targeted.

The news organisations were perceived to have grown leaner and meaner and are attracting a different set of employees as a result of this:

“New job demands are drawing a generation of young, versatile, tech-savvy, high-energy staff as financial pressures drive out higher-salaried veteran reporters and editors. Newsroom executives say the infusion of new blood has brought with it a new competitive energy, but they also cite the departure of veteran journalists, along with the talent, wisdom and institutional memory they hold as their single greatest loss.”

One of those surveyed, Steven Smith, editor-in-chief of the Spokesman-Review, blogged about the study. His newspaper is also affected by the cuts, but he had the following message to his staff:

“Our readers are migrating away from print to digital platforms. We must migrate with them. Failure to change, put plainly, means failure (…) Our success will depend on the commitment of each of us to be fearless in the face of relentless, never-ending change, gritty in the face of doubt and resolute in the service of our communities who continue to rely on our journalism as never before.”

Finding “a way to monetize the rapid growth of Web readership before newsroom staff cuts so weaken newspapers that their competitive advantage disappear, ” was identified as a key concern for many editors, and 97 per cent of the editors surveyed said they are actively trying to develop new revenue streams.

links for 2008-07-16

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New York Times reporters told to keep political views under wraps

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Reporters and editors at the New York Times have been told to keep their political affiliations offline and out of sight in the build up to the US presidential election.

A memo received by the New York Observer sent to staff by Craig Whitney, standards editor at the paper, warns journalists that social networks and other websites pose ‘potential political entanglements’:

“When Facebook asks what your political preferences are, don’t answer, and don’t say anything in a blog, video, radio or television program or any other medium that you couldn’t say in the paper or on our Website – about politics or anything else,” the memo says.

An earlier memo from Whitney referred staff to the title’s ethics policy, which states:

“Journalists have no place on the playing fields of politics. Staff members are entitled to vote, but they must do nothing that might raise questions about their professional neutrality or that of The Times. . . They should recognize that a bumper sticker on the family car or a campaign sign on the lawn may be misread as theirs, no matter who in their household actually placed the sticker or the sign.”

A good day for unbiased reporting? A bad day for bumper stickers.

links for 2008-07-14

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How Do: NXTBOOK to launch digital business magazine in Manchester

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US digital publishing firm NXTBOOK Media is planning to launch an online business magazine later this year.

How Do reported tht new digital publication would be “covering topics such as media, business development, property, hospitality and investment” and that it “will be distributed to the cities [sic] thriving business community.”

Manchester has recently seen the launch of the first UK edition of US local business newspaper Crains.

After 250 job cuts, LA Times leading reporters head to ProPublica

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Last week LA Times, one of the biggest employers of journalists in the US, announced that it would be dispensing with the services of 150 of them as part of a total 250 job losses at the paper.

Yesterday afternoon it emerged that two more journalists would likely be leaving the LA Times, but not as a direct result of the editorial cuts.

According to LA Observed, Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporters Charles Ornstein and Tracy Weber will be leaving the paper later in the summer to join the not-for-profit investigative start up ProPublica.

“It’s another big morale blow in the newsroom, which used to be a place where journalists aspired to reach and stay to do their best work. With new deep cutbacks coming and [LA Times owner] Sam Zell’s outbursts making many of the best journalists feel the Times’ commitment to serious news is precarious, it’s no longer surprising to see stars like Ornstein and Weber flee,” wrote Kevin Roderick.

Last week’s editorial staff cuts, which amounts to roughly 17 per cent of the employees, will be spread between the print newsroom and The Times’ web operations.

Those cuts led to this fascinating quote from Times editor Russ Stanton:

“You all know the paradox we find ourselves in,” he wrote said in a memo to the staff. “Thanks to the Internet, we have more readers for our great journalism than at any time in our history. But also thanks to the Internet, our advertisers have more choices, and we have less money.”

One hundred and fifty losses job losses against two hires doesn’t really make a great case for the internet as a growth medium for the employment of journalists, but nonetheless the growth of ProPublica and its journalistic modus operandi online marks a neat stab at Stanton’s paradox.

The ProPublica site will be fully operational later this year and plans to have almost 30 investigative reporters working on in-depth stories (it helps that self-made billionaire Herb Sandler has set up the site with a donation of $10m a year from his foundation and that it’s under the watchful eye of former WSJ editor Paul Steiger).

ProPublica will conduct investigations, largely online, in areas of significant public interest. It will also use TV documentaries to reveal on that large canvas issues that will be followed up extensively online.

It’s first major project, an investigation into US-backed Arabic language TV network Alhurra, ran on 60 Minutes two weeks ago.

Zell say that newspapers have to slim down and become more economically viable. Newspaper’s are about money, not news, that’s fairly self-evident. Little wonder then that Charles Ornstein and Tracy Weber decided to walk and pursue their investigations elsewhere.

What awaits them at ProPublica?

A philanthropic backer claiming no editorial interference. No desire for profits. No ads on the site. Where almost all resources will be poured into journalism (what no free CD give away?).

The journalistic equivalent to Willy Wonka’s ‘golden ticket’, it seems.