Archive for February 12th, 2010

“Data-Driven Journalism and Digitizing Your Life”

Posted in "Journalism Next" Chapter Blogs with tags , , , , on February 12, 2010 by

Journalism Next by Mark Briggs Chapter 9 Blog

“Data-Driven Journalism and Digitizing Your Life”

The amount of information on the internet is endless. If you get too sucked in you will become burned out and not want to look at the computer screen ever again. So, in order to keep yourself sane you must organize, organize, organize!

You must use the technology to your benefit. It might seem like a complete waste of time downloading more and more technology to organize your technology, but it will help!

Once you have that down, the next step is to capitalize on the new technology. In order to capitalize on the technology Mark Briggs refers to “Getting Things Done” author David Allen.

“The key,” says David Allen, “is to find as few solutions as possible that do as many of the things on your list as possible.”

Are you a productive worker? Check here.

Like any busy writer it is very important to have time to write! But you also must save what you write.

“It’s been said,” says Briggs, “that computer users come in two varieties: those who back up their data, and those who will.”

Backing up data is extremely important! Who wants to try to remember a 750 word blog post verbatim? Not me.

Briggs then discusses how to capitalize on technology and be the most productive writer you can be. You can use programs that are online or that are on your computer and sync with everything online. My favorite is using on that is online so I can access everything from wherever I am.

Databases

  • Access broad information and find localized points
  • Give the raw information to the audience for them to search for what they want to know
  • From one or two databases they can grow into a “dynamic and growing data set”, explains Briggs
  • If you use a computer algorithms to help analyze the data in the database it can help journalists find information that they need to create a newsworthy story.

Briggs used a great example of the Google Map Mashups. Google left the codes open for people to expand upon and put in information. So, newspapers can create code for a localized map and publish specific areas where a crime took place, or streets that are closed that day or areas that have no power.

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“Advanced Blogging”

Posted in "Journalism Next" Chapter Blogs with tags , , , , , on February 12, 2010 by

Journalism Next by Mark Briggs Chapter 2 Blog

“Advanced Blogging”

“Every college journalist should have a blog,” states author Mark Briggs.

I tend to agree. Every employer is going to love clicking through an interactive website over reading through endless piles of resumes.

With the blog, you should be interactive. Ask your audience what they think about a certain topic and keep it an on-going conversation.

That being said, it isn’t always easy to keep finding new topics to blog about, or new angles to blog from. Always be aware of what is around you and if it could be newsworthy!

Blogs are revolutionizing journalism as I type. They are more localized, more involved with their communities. Blogs are not normally about the overall news community, but about a niche within a community. Some very successful blogs focus solely on politics, celebrities, news or sports. This is because audiences are able to pick and choose what they want to read now.

To operate a blog successfully you must understand the template of blogs:

  • Post: to write an entry on the blog
  • Permalink: A link to the post, normally with comments available on the page.
  • Trackback: technology that allows the blogger to know if someone has linked to their blog
  • Blogroll: a sidebar that allows the readers to see what sites the blogger visits
  • Vlog: a video blog
  • Moblog: blogging from a mobile device

After learning the language, how do you know people will follow your blog?

Author Mark Briggs is here for you.

Briggs says to… “

  • Put the reader first
  • Organize your ideas
  • Be direct
  • Be the authority, with a personality
  • How’s this, Mom?
    • “Write, the wait 15 minutes before publishing… for you to edit yourself dispassionately”
  • Make posts scanable
  • Link, summarize and analyze
  • Be specific with headlines
  • Have a good attitude

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“Microblogging: Write Small, Think Big”

Posted in "Journalism Next" Chapter Blogs with tags , , , , , on February 12, 2010 by

Journalism Next by Mark Briggs Chapter 4

“Microblogging: Write Small, Think Big”

Microblogging is the fastest way to get the news. On Friday, February 12, 2010, when the DC Metro Red Line derailed the place that was reporting it within five minutes was Twitter. 140 characters can really say a lot.

Especially when newspapers pay people to find out the news and people on Twitter just do it, and they do it faster. For journalists this can be made into something amazing. Even with a lead to a story and you can get feedback to or a link to a possible story line that you are getting feedback immediately.

With microblogging the audience is developing “ambient awareness” says Briggs, [it] allows for one-to-many communication”. This is important because the audience doesn’t have to work for their information anymore. It just comes to them.

Microblogging has created “Real-Time Web”, which allows people to find out what is going on at all times. We have become a world of constant updates.

The audience can now see the journalist’s process and makes it more transparent, so the audience to only responds to the story, but with the writer as well. The best part for journalists is that they can become closer to their audience. Now they will know what their audience wants to know and creates audience interaction.

We all know those people who constantly update with nothing to say. Mark Briggs has a solution for that the 80-20 rule.

“Follow the 80-20 rule:” says Briggs, “On a personal microblogging account, use 80 percent of your psots to add something of value to the community…The other 20 percent of the posts can be self-promoting”.

Blogs are a great tool, but it can be a little intimidating to send your words out to everyone in the world, microblogging can be a little less daunting.

Brigg’s Tips for Microblogging Language

  • Post: write only 140 characters
  • Read: read the messages of the people you follow on your homepage
  • Reply: on someone’s page if you want to reply just click the reply button or write “@username”
  • Direct Messages: click “Direct Messages” and use it as if you were going to send someone an email

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“We Are All Web Workers Now”

Posted in "Journalism Next" Chapter Blogs with tags , , , , , on February 12, 2010 by

Journalism Next by Mark Briggs Chapter 1 blog

In Chapter 1, author Mark Briggs broke down the nuts and bolts of the internet. He dives right into the parts of the internet and computers that well… confuse the living daylights out of me.

Mark Briggs broke down

  • The weight of files
    • How much you should send in an email
  • Internet nuts and bolts
    • I found this the hardest to grasp, but once I read it over a few times I got it. Now I understand web addresses are the URLs and the IP address is basically the directions for the web server to get to the page.

From here Briggs began to focus on how things are shared across the web. He explained what an RSS is (Really Simple Syndication) and how you can interact with them.

  1. RSS online that pops up when you log into a web page
  2. Stand alone RSS that is downloaded on to a computer

“To understand the difference,” Briggs explains, “…Contrast the Hotmail-Gmail system with Outlook or Entourage, which you can use only on your computer.”

Briggs then explained how computers transfer files from one to another, through FTP or File Transfer Protocol. It is also the way that web pages can be published to web servers.

Briggs then expanded his horizon and went from web pages to HTML, which is the code that creates the web page.  If you know enough code, or have a little cheat sheet book you can customize a web page to anything that you want it to look like.

Then by discussing HTML, Briggs discussed the easy ways to get around major HTML hassles by using CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) or XML (Extensible Markup Language).

“CSS makes Web sites look cool” according to Briggs.

I don’t really understand what it looks like to do a CSS, but it lets you edit around the original HTML and fix problems within it.

XML “describes what data is, not how it should look (like HTML does),” says Briggs.

I now understand how the Internet becomes the Internet.

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