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News About News, in 140 Characters

Tyler Knowlton — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:48:56 +0000

By JENNA WORTHAM

Published: December 14, 2008

With staff changes and reductions across the media industry, even a blog post can be too time-consuming a way to announce who is in and out of a job. That is why a public relations employee turned to the instant-blogging platform Twitter to create The Media Is Dying, a Twitter feed that documents media hirings and firings in one-sentence bursts of text.

“These sorts of layoffs are unheard-of,” said the stream’s founder, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to preserve his sources in the industry. “It’s gotten insane to keep up with who was moving around and changing beats.”

Initially, The Media Is Dying was accessible only to select Twitter members, as the feed was intended to help those in the P.R. industry stay on top of the revolving entries in their address books. But requests to be included flooded the founder, who decided to go public three weeks ago. Since then, the stream, maintained at twitter.com/themediaisdying by its founder and seven volunteers from the industry, has garnered more than 3,000 subscribers.

The stream tries to confirm the tips it receives; if something cannot be verified, it is posted and labeled as rumor.

Sites like MediaBistro, Gawker and The Poynter Institute’s Romenesko blog have long provided an overview of the comings and goings of the media industry. But since Twitter limits posts to 140 characters, The Media Is Dying sidesteps commentary to deliver the bare minimum — a recent post simply read: “Kim Masters has been let go at NPR.” The feed has even broken a few stories, with reports of layoffs at Adweek and Brandweek posted before they appeared on traditional media sites.

Jim Romenesko, an industry expert for media news, isn’t fazed by the new kid on the block. “The more the merrier,” he said. JENNA WORTHAM

I Can’t Believe Some People Are Still Saying Twitter Isn’t A News Source

Tyler Knowlton — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 13:46:21 +0000

Via Tech Crunch

by Michael Arrington on November 27, 2008

Update: CNN says “It was the day social media appeared to come of age and signaled itself as a news-gathering force to be reckoned with.”

Twitter is emerging as a major force in breaking news. But some people disagree.

Today we saw yet another illustration, when people in Mumbai got the word of terrorist attacks out to the world well before mainstream media even knew something was happening. Mathew Ingram points out previous examples of Twitter users breaking important world news.

If I didn’t hear about something important happening by watching my Twitter stream, it’s the first place I go to get an idea of what’s going on. Years ago I would have turned to the cable news channels, now it’s Twitter.

It’s not just the speed of early reports either. Twitter also serves up a constant stream of updates as situations progress.

The facts seem to be irrefutable. But some people disagree, as they wrote in comments to my Mumbai post. You should also read TomsTechBlog, who argues that it’s irresponsible to think of Twitter as a news source. The reason? The facts are often wrong.

This is the same argument that mainstream journalists used against blogs when they rose to fill a void in the news over the last few years. Yet even the NY Times admitted years ago that blogs were an important news source when disaster struck: “For vivid reporting from the enormous zone of tsunami disaster, it was hard to beat the blogs.”

But blogs are nothing compared to Twitter, which lets anyone with a cell phone instantly update the world with what they see and hear, via the simple and ubiquitous text message.

Sure, lots of Twitter messages are flat out wrong and can spread disinformation. But as Ingram notes in his blog post above, other people tend to immediately correct those errors. Bad information is quickly drowned out by good information.

You can jump up and down and shout all you want that Twitter isn’t a real news source. But all you are doing is viewing the world through a reality lens that’s way outdated. People want information fast and raw from people who are on the scene. If it gets a little messy along the way, that’s ok. We’ll soon see tools that help us distill the really good stuff out of the stream anyway.

What matters isn’t any individual Twitter message and whether it’s right or wrong. It’s the organism as a whole, the aggregate, that lets people stream what they’re witnessing in real time to the world. That aggregate stream gives us more information, faster, than anything before. It’s news, and it’s incredibly valuable.

Web Sites That Dig for News Rise as Watchdogs

Tyler Knowlton — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 17:05:00 +0000

Via the New York Times

By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA

Published: November 17, 2008

SAN DIEGO — Over the last two years, some of this city’s darkest secrets have been dragged into the light — city officials with conflicts of interest and hidden pay raises, affordable housing that was not affordable, misleading crime statistics.

Investigations ensued. The chiefs of two redevelopment agencies were forced out. One of them faces criminal charges. Yet the main revelations came not from any of San Diego’s television and radio stations or its dominant newspaper, The San Diego Union-Tribune, but from a handful of young journalists at a nonprofit Web site run out of a converted military base far from downtown’s glass towers — a site that did not exist four years ago.

As America’s newspapers shrink and shed staff, and broadcast news outlets sink in the ratings, a new kind of Web-based news operation has arisen in several cities, forcing the papers to follow the stories they uncover.

Here it is VoiceofSanDiego.org, offering a brand of serious, original reporting by professional journalists — the province of the traditional media, but at a much lower cost of doing business. Since it began in 2005, similar operations have cropped up in New Haven, the Twin Cities, Seattle, St. Louis and Chicago. More are on the way.

Their news coverage and hard-digging investigative reporting stand out in an Internet landscape long dominated by partisan commentary, gossip, vitriol and citizen journalism posted by unpaid amateurs.

The fledgling movement has reached a sufficient critical mass, its founders think, so they plan to form an association, angling for national advertising and foundation grants that they could not compete for singly. And hardly a week goes by without a call from journalists around the country seeking advice about starting their own online news outlets.

“Voice is doing really significant work, driving the agenda on redevelopment and some other areas, putting local politicians and businesses on the hot seat,” said Dean Nelson, director of the journalism program at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. “I have them come into my classes, and I introduce them as, ‘This is the future of journalism.’ ”

That is a subject of hot debate among people who closely follow the newspaper industry. Publishing online means operating at half the cost of a comparable printed paper, but online advertising is not robust enough to sustain a newsroom.

And so financially, VoiceofSan Diego and its peers mimic public broadcasting, not newspapers. They are nonprofit corporations supported by foundations, wealthy donors, audience contributions and a little advertising.

New nonprofits without a specific geographic focus also have sprung up to fill other niches, like ProPublica, devoted to investigative journalism, and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, which looks into problems around the world. A similar group, the Center for Investigative Reporting, dates back three decades.

But some experts question whether a large part of the news business can survive on what is essentially charity, and whether it is wise to lean too heavily on the whims of a few moneyed benefactors.

“These are some of the big questions about the future of the business,” said Robert H. Giles, curator of the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard. Nonprofit news online “has to be explored and experimented with, but it has to overcome the hurdle of proving it can support a big news staff. Even the most well-funded of these sites are a far cry in resources from a city newspaper.”

The people who run the local news sites see themselves as one future among many, and they have a complex relationship with traditional media. The say that the deterioration of those media has created an opening for new sources of news, as well as a surplus of unemployed journalists for them to hire.

“No one here welcomes the decline of newspapers,” said Andrew Donohue, one of two executive editors at VoiceofSanDiego. “We can’t be the main news source for this city, not for the foreseeable future. We only have 11 people.”

CrisisWire: Your Aggregate Source for a Catastrophe

Tyler Knowlton — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 15:26:55 +0000

Via Mashable

November 14, 2008 – 2:58 am PDT – by Mark ‘Rizzn’ Hopkins

Right now, as per usual, California is burning. The current catastrophe is dubbed the “Tea Fires,” and like many crises in recent months, is being very well documented by social media tools like Twitter, Flickr, blogs and through the various Google Maps mashups.

I remember the earthquake that occurred a little over a year ago in San Francisco. Twitter was new to most of us, and Pete and I were the only two at Mashable on it yet. He and I were shocked and amazed at the volume, accuracy and rapidness of the data being provided on Twitter.

While the data was available almost instantly on Twitter, we were able to get a post up on the data within about ten minutes or so. The local news lagged behind Mashable coverage by about half an hour, and it wasn’t reported on cable news for another hour or two.

I later mused that it would be grand if there were some way to better track the data and make it useable for journalistic purposes, since shortly after news spread of the event, the data came in much quicker than it could be viewed and digested.

CrisisWire is a solution to that problem.

The site is a “self-aggregating website” that pulls information in not only from Twitter, but a variety of sources, including blog posts, photos, and videos. The site was launched yesterday evening, which site founder Nate Ritter tells us was purely coincidental in its timing with the Santa Barbara Tea Fire.

“During a disaster people spend valuable time searching the Internet and waiting for the media to report on their city, their neighborhood, their street,” Nate told us. “While main stream media serves a vital role during disasters, it is impossible to update the population on everything that is happening during a crisis.”

He went on to explain that CrisisWire bridges this gap by being a sort of personal “situation room.”

It’s a clever idea that has been tried several ways. The layout and presentation of the data on CrisisWire is more suited to the flash event, as opposed to some other similar attempts at this idea that are maybe more ideally suited towards ongoing coverage (we’ve seen a large number of these attempts during the various campaign coverage sites in the last several months – I’ll spare you screenshot comparisons, since most of us are still trying to move on with our lives after politics).

The layout to the site is still a bit spartan, but the information is there, and the updates seem fairly up to the minute. If you’re affected by or interested in following the Tea Fires, I suggest giving it a spin to see if it might be one of those sites you keep bookmarked… just in case.

He explained the concept and vision in a bit more depth to the team at Refresh San Diego earlier last month.

Delicious, Upcoming Founders To Show You Political Bias Of News Sites

Tyler Knowlton — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:07:00 +0000

Via Tech Crunch

by Michael Arrington on October 10, 2008

What has ex-Yahooer and Delicious founderJoshua Schachter been working on sinceleaving Yahoo last June? At least one project is a GreaseMonkey script that shows readers the political leanings of blogs and news sites on Memeorandum, a news aggregator.

Political sites are usually very biased, but the casual reader often doesn’t know which way a particular site tends to rant. With the newscript, also available as a Firefox plugin, sites are shaded towards blue (whiny cowards) or red (warmongers) depending on their linking behavior.

Andy Baio, who’s been working with Schachter on the project, describes it:

The colors don’t necessarily represent each blogger’s personal views or biases. It’s a reflection of their linking activity. The algorithm looks at the stories that blogger’s linked to before, relative to all other bloggers, and groups them accordingly. People that link to things that only conservatives find interesting will be classified as bright red, even if they are personally moderate or liberal, and vice-versa. The algorithm can’t read minds, so don’t be offended if you feel misrepresented. It’s only looking at the data.

Microsoft has been testing a similar product, based on different technology, called Blews.

Mainstream News Outlets Start Linking to Other Sites

Tyler Knowlton — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:01:28 +0000

Via the New York Times

By BRIAN STELTER

Published: October 12, 2008

“Thou shalt not link to outside sites” — a long-held commandment of many newsrooms — is eroding.

Embracing the hyperlink ethos of the Web to a degree not seen before, news organizations are becoming more comfortable linking to competitors — acting in effect like aggregators. The Washington Post recently introduced a political Web site that recommends rival sites. This week NBC will begin introducing Web sites for its local TV stations with links to local newspapers, radio stations, online videos and other sources. And The New York Times will soon offer its online readers an alternative home page with links to competitors.

These experiments exemplify “link journalism,” an idea that is gaining traction in other newsrooms across the country. “It is a fundamentally different mindset” for journalists, said Scott Karp, chief of the Web-based newswire Publish2, who coined the term.

For years, newspapers, television station Web sites and magazines have hesitated about linking to outside Web sites because, the logic goes, they want to keep the users on their own site. More internal page views and longer time-spent-viewing can equate to larger advertising revenue for Web sites.

Mr. Karp argues that Google, the leading search engine, is a direct rebuttal to that logic. “It’s all about sending people away, and it does such a good job of it that people keep coming back for more,” he said.

NBC hopes to benefit from the same user behavior. Beginning with its Chicago affiliate, WMAQ, on Monday, the company will turn its TV station Web sites into full-fledged city guides. John P. Wallace, the president of NBC’s local media division, said the partnerships with content providers and the links to third-party sites will “tap into our communities much deeper than we have been able to historically.”

“It’s a change in mindset,” he said. “We’re looking at the fragmented local market and saying, ‘We’re going to provide a destination where you can come and search across different segments.’ ”

Brian Buchwald, the division’s senior vice president for local digital media and multiplatform, said the move amounts to an acknowledgment that local television stations must do more online than merely regurgitate their newscasts online. “We need to be a lot more than just TV stations if we’re going to be relevant,” he said.

NBC’s local media operation has hired about 55 people to create original content and filter the Web. A test version of the Chicago site last week linked to The Chicago Sun-Times, USA Today, TMZ and the local blog Chicagoist. The sites do not distinguish between the articles written by their own staff members and the links to outside sites.

“If we can provide them great content, that’s wonderful. If it comes from somebody else, that’s fine, too,” Mr. Buchwald said.

As simple as that sounds, it represents an attitude shift. While linking to other sources is not a new occurrence by any means, it can still seem misguided to journalists who work vigorously to break a story ahead of other news outlets.

Mr. Karp believes the use of blogs by news organizations has helped newsroom managers accept that filtering the Web for visitors is a valuable editorial function. For bloggers, linking to original reporting, primary sources and discussions about stories is a form of etiquette, assigning credit to others who have written about a topic.

Jeff Jarvis, a prominent blogger who directs the Graduate School of Journalism’s new-media program at the City University of New York, has said that the culture of linking was creating a “new architecture of news.”

“Link unto others’ good stuff as you would have them link unto your good stuff,” he proposed in June. His “Golden Rule of Links” for journalists, naturally, earned at least 25 links from other bloggers.

Newsrooms seem more open than ever to that view. The New York Times is developing a version of the home page “that will contain links to other news sites and blogs alongside the articles we publish,” The Times’s chief technology officer, Marc Frons, told Web readers in July. That feature, called Times Extra, will be published using a technology called Blogrunner that the Times acquired in 2005.

Other Web sites are aggregating links manually: ProPublica, the nonprofit newsroom venture led by Paul Steiger, the former managing editor of The Wall Street Journal, has dedicated a section of its site to “Breaking on the Web,” a collection of links to the investigative reporting of others.

Last month The Washington Post added “Political Browser,” a professed source of “what’s good on the Web,” to its site. The page freely links to competitors with features like “Required Reading,” summing up articles in newspapers and magazines, and “Staff Picks,” a list of articles that Post employees are reading. Lest its own newspaper be forgotten, a “Best of the Post” section links to its own articles.

Buzz and NewsCred: two different takes on social news

Tyler — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:42:42 +0000

Via ARS Technica

By Jacqui Cheng | Published: August 19, 2008 – 11:45AM CT

As online news consumption grows, the methods by which we find and evaluate our news continue to evolve. “Social news” has become increasingly popular, especially with the advent of Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, FriendFeed, and more that let users vote on and evaluate each other’s shared items. Two more takes on social news have gone public this week, bringing along their own approaches on how to present the “best” news while allowing the users to interact with the stories.

The first is NewsCred, first launched privately in May and opened to the public today. NewsCred acts as a sort of news aggregator like Google News, except with a number of twists. For one, NewsCred allows you to choose among a handful of news and blog sources that you’d like to see news from. More importantly, however, is the fact that NewsCred uses an algorithm to rank stories on the page based on the credibility of the story, the publication, and then author.

Place Your Bets: Reuters Joins HubDub’s Prediction Market

Tyler — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 13:04:04 +0000

Via Tech Crunch

by Jason Kincaid on September 19, 2008

International news service Reuters has set up shop on HubDub, a prediction market on topics ranging from politics to technology. The new partner section of the site will feature standard HubDub surveys, as well as a selection of top Reuters stories and widgets. You can access the Reuters portal here.

Digging Deeper::The Best 2008 Political Convention Coverage Online

Tyler — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 15:11:20 +0000

Via Mediashift – by Mark Glaser

In 2004, the major political conventions gave a few dozen bloggers press credentials, a historic moment for the new media outsiders. And this year, the political conventions have tried to be even more open to bloggers, video reporters, podcasters and new media. The Democratic convention credentialed 120 bloggers, and the GOP has credentialed 200 bloggers, according to Forbes.

And the Democratic convention taking place in Denver this week also includes the Big Tent, a hangout for new media types outside the convention sponsored by Google and Digg. There have been panel discussions, appearances by political dignitaries and free beer, smoothies and massages there. (Simon Owens looked at the Big Tent in-depth for MediaShift last week.)

But perhaps the more interesting trend at the conventions this year is that it’s more difficult to tell the independent bloggers from the mainstream media bloggers. As traditional media embraces a multi-platform approach, including their audience in citizen media reports, the distinction between who deserves a media credential and who doesn’t has blurred like never before.

One example: Social-news site Digg and CNN’s citizen media-generated iReport are co-producing Digg Dialogg, where Digg’ers and other concerned citizens can ask questions to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The questions are then rated “thumbs up” or “thumbs down,” with the most popular being asked to Pelosi in a special Q&A with Digg CEO Jay Adelson. (No. 1 question so far: “Please describe what Net Neutrality is and your position on the issue.”)

Blogger Conditions Worsen as Many Defend Palin Pick

Tyler — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 15:11:03 +0000

Via Mediashift

by Laura Hertzfeld, 2:35PM

Laura Hertzfeld

Shame on us, the media, for thinking the Republican National Convention would pale in comparison to the Democrats’ show in Denver last week. For bloggers on both sides of the aisle here in St. Paul, what the RNC has lacked in strawberry-lemonade smoothies, it has more than made up for with juicy stories.

While Hurricane Gustav may have stopped the convention activities on Monday, it didn’t put a halt to the protests — more than 15,000 strong by most counts — that filled downtown St. Paul and continued in fits and starts throughout the week. The biggest bump for bloggers came from TheUptake.com, whose bloggers used Qik video streaming technology to broadcast live, while wearing shirts saying “I Am The Media.”

Riot police and protesters at the RNC

Inside the Xcel Energy Center, Internet video is still treated as something most attendees aren’t all that comfortable with. At the YouTube booth, set up so delegates could share their thoughts on the RNC directly with the YouChoose08 channel, there have been fewer videos submitted than at a similar setup in Denver. People working the booth said they are seeing some interest, but that there are about 60 to 70 videos coming in each night, compared with more than 100 at the DNC.