Online Journalism

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Several weeks ago I wrote a review on Mindy McAdams article “Is your story actually a story.” In said article I discussed McAdams beliefs on novice journalists and how they have difficulty finding actual stories. I never, however, came to a conclusion on how to create or what constitutes a good “story.” In her more recent article, “Teaching about storytelling,” McAdams elaborates on creating a good story, and what separates student journalists from their more experienced adult counterparts.

You might be wondering why a journalist is able to find a story anywhere he goes, when you can’t find a story no matter how hard you look. McAdams explains that professionals are so adept to finding stories because “they are curious about the world, about people, about things they see. They aren’t walking around thinking: “Damn, I have to find a story …” They’re thinking: “Wow, I wonder who made that? I wonder why she’s doing that? I wonder how that got here?” The only way that we can create truly exceptional stories is if we are curious and if we find the answers to questions that nobody else asks.

Rather than fretting about the beginning, middle, and end of a story, beginner journalists should “think about what they want to end with — the point of it all.” According to McAdams, “if you can’t tell me that [why a story is so important], then you do not have a story at all.”

After determining your objective, all that you need to do to create a story is analyze:

1. How effective your story is

2. Why it will grab a reader’s attention

3. How the story will hold a reader’s attention

4. How you come to the point of your story

5. How well you conclude the story
If your story determine that your story is effective, and will grab and hold your readers’ attention then you have graduated from elementary level journalistic reports and are well on your way to writing news stories comparable to those of professionals in the field.

“A timeline is a useful — and helpful — type of information graphic, and fairly common in journalism,” Mindy McAdams

When creating packages for the Internet, we often become caught up in using a one size fits all formula of a written story by accompanied several photographs, a video, or maybe even a short sound clip. As reporters we need to remember that not every story is effectively conveyed in this manner, and explore the other formats for story telling. In her article, “Timelines in journalism: a closer look,” Mindy McAdams examines the way a timeline can be used for our articles.

Before using time-related formats in our writing, it is important for us to realize the difference between a timeline and a chronology. According to McAdams, a timeline shows actual spans of time, with proportional measurements for decades, years, days or hours, depending on the total time involved.

A chronology, however, “shows the momentum of a series of events” and is best conveyed in a list format. The Washington Post perfectly executed the chronological format in the following article about the Watergate Scandal: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/onpolitics/watergate/chronology.htm.

Now that you know the different time formats, it is important you understand when to use them. McAdams suggests that we answer these questions before drafting our timelines:

1. Is this a story about hours, days, years or decades?
2. Should equal periods of time be represented with equal space? (Example: 100 pixels equals one year.)
3. Are parallel time periods required? (Example: While this was happening in India, this was happening in China.)
4. Does it make sense to combine the timeline with a map or a line graph?
5. Should photos or other images be added to the timeline to help tell the story?
6. How much text is necessary to make the story understandable — and satisfying?

After you answer all these questions, it is important to decide how to convey your timeline. The most obvious way to present the information is with a line and events going from left to right. With online journalism, however, we do not have to stick to such a conventional method and we are free to explore more interactive formats. The Guardian did an excellent job with an interactive timeline in their article “Arab spring: an interactive timeline of Middle East protests. Some tools that you can use to help you create an interactive timeline similar to The Guardian’s include Dipity and Simile.

After creating the timeline either through your own coding or through one of the aforementioned websites, and before uploading it to your website, you should answer the following questions:

1. Will people like it?
2. Is it helpful, easy to understand?
3. Is it confusing?
4. Hard to use?
5. Does it add something that text alone would not convey?
6. Does the graphic need to be a timeline — or would a regular slideshow (or map, or whatever) be equally effective?

If you answered yes to a majority of these questions then you are ready to upload your timeline to your website! Congratulations on your mastery of this simple yet extremely important story format!

To read McAdams full article, click here.

In class this past Thursday, guest speaker BJ Koubaroulis had plenty of great things to say.  There were a lot of valid points he made, as it is tough to know when to start.  Koubaroulis is a correspondent with The Washington Post and the Play-by-Play Voice of High School and College Sports for Verizon FiOS1 Sports. He is the host and producer of “Verbally Committed” – a CBS radio show on Washington D.C.’s 106.7 The Fan and a featured blogger with Sports Illustrated.

The first thing he pointed out was that if you want to be successful, you must start out at the very bottom and work your way up.  In this process of working your way up, you learn a lot of things and ideas that will help you in the long run.  Small experiences help teach you what you need to know and learn these things.

To be able to compete in the field of media, you must take on an extra skill, such as video.  The more you know, the easier things will be.  You should also invest in yourself, as you are your best ally.

Koubaroulis really stretched the need to get involved in more than one interest.  Once getting involved in the media, you need to know most, if not all of the pieces that go with it.

A big message Koubaroulis ended his discussion with was this: Love media, but do not rely on it.  What I took from it was to respect all of the qualities it has, but do not trust it.  So do your own thing, and do what you have to do in media to be successful here.

According to Mark Potts’ “Recovering Journalist,” there’s a rule today that every media-business blogger has to weigh in on the New York Times’ finally announced online subscription plan.  In this blog article, Potts goes over this plan, and looks at an analysis done by Felix Salmon.

The New York Times introduced this plan on Thursday.  The idea of this plan is to begin charging the most frequent users of The New York Times’ Web site $15 for a four-week subscription in a bet that readers will pay for news they are accustomed to getting free.

In the analysis, Salmon discusses how the paywall won’t even cover its own development costs for a good two years, and beyond that will never generate enough money to really make a difference to NYTCo revenues.  According to Salmon, this move makes no kind of financial sense for the NYT.  The upside is limited; the downside is that it ceases to be the paper of record for the world.  No one would take that bet.

Potts completely agrees with Salmon.  As Salmon says, it doesn’t appear this is going to make a material impact on the Times’ finances.  There seems to be no point in all of this, except maybe to make some sort of “we must be paid” statement.  Potts’ message is this: Just wanting to be paid does not a business model make.

4 uses for Foursquare for journalists

Foursquare is primarily for letting your friends know where you are and figuring out where they are. Its basically a location-based social networking game. Secondarily, it’s for collecting points, prize “badges,” and eventually, coupons, for going about your everyday business.

I have been using foursquare for just over 3 weeks now and it is addicting. Every time I visit a new place, I am eager to check-into the establishment on my mobile phone using the foursquare application. In just 21 days out I have 141 check-ins and 11 badges!

Finding contacts

• After checking into an establishment on foursquare, I am alerted if any of my friends are also checked into the same place as me. It’s also great when friends are looking to meet up for lunch. They can see where I am eating at and join me or stop in to say hello.

Tips

• Users can add ‘tips’ to locations – a feature which is currently underused but has potential for leads as well as. Now when you enter a restaurant you have never been to before and ask the server what tastes the best, you can get another answer other than, “everything tastes great”.

Distribution

• This new feature to foursquare will greatly increase it’s marketability. Foursquare has already signed deals with Metro in Canada, Bravo TV and the FT. The potential is obvious: content directly relevant to your location. The big issue for Foursquare is whether it can achieve the scale that most publishers need. Award discounts and promotions to users would frequently shop or check in to the establishment.

BJ Koubaroulis, founder of Synthesis Media Productions, visited our class on March 31 to discuss the importance of video to enhance journalistic stories.

Koubaroulis graduated from George Mason University in 2004 and eventually became a sports writer for The Washington Post. He emphasized that he fell in love with following high school level sports as opposed to following college level or professional level sports.

“[High school level sports] is where you get the most access and get the most real people — people who really enjoy what they’re doing, and it’s not for the money,” Koubaroulis said.

He recommended that students first start working at a small newspaper organization so that they have the opportunity to learn what kind of stories they like and don’t like to cover, and so that they can learn to make mistakes. In Koubaroulis’s opinion, it is better to make mistakes at smaller organizations rather than larger ones.

Koubaroulis became a superstar at The Washington Post in 2010 when he posted a story about a student’s ‘homeless odyssey.’ His story stood out amongst others because he added video to his text.

“Video gave me the clout to demand more space for a story,” said Koubaroulis.

Nowadays, the use of video and other multimedia platforms have become very important for journalists, therefore young writers should start learning how to produce various multimedia platforms in order to catch readers’ and potential employers’ attention. Koubaroulis’ young interns at Synthesis Media Productions actually produce multimedia packages within 2 hours of covering a story!

“Media companies want to hire people that can do the job of 5 people,” Koubaroulis said. “Do radio, television, video and learn how to use the web — learn all if it!… If you’re not going to change, you’re just going to get left behind. Do all of it, and don’t limit yourself.”

Student journalists need to be able to multi-task and produce stories that contain video, audio and user-participation platforms in order to be valuable. Student journalists can no longer just be a writer because any other person out there can be a writer, but it is difficult to replace a writer when he or she can perform so many other functions.

Koubaroulis said that there are 4 things every student journalist needs, which are:

1. A camera
2. A computer
3. A microphone
4. The desire to work hard

While technology is very important these days, Koubaroulis warned students to not rely too heavily on media.

“Love it,” Koubaroulis said, “but don’t count on it.”

Like most up-and-coming sports journalists, B.J. wanted to cover the biggest and best pro sports teams. But after covering high school sports, he fell in love with it because HS sports offers “the most access and the most real people.”

B.J. Koubaroulis

Video has been a life-changing experience for him; one guy wih a camera can make a difference and produce quality content. Individuals can harness the power of video now as compared to when you used to need a crew.

Prior to his ability of working with video, B.J. said he didn’t think the editorial staff at the Washington Post found him as attractive.

The unique thing that B.J’s company, Synthesis Multimedia Productions,  provides is that when they do game story video packages, the stories are usually turned in around 2 hours after the game.

B.J. has done a lot of things: radio, television, web, writing, video. And he recommends trying different things to learn what you’re good at. Invest in yourself.

You’re not just a writer or broadcaster or radio host. You are a media person. Don’t peg yourself into doing one thing. Do all of it and you’ll be able to do what you want to do. If you’re not going to change you’re going to get left behind and if you only do one thing, you are easily replaceable.

The most important thing for someone that works for him, is for them to be, at heart, a journalist.

The four things you need to do the kind of backpack journalism that B.J. talks about:

• A computer
• A camera
• A microphone
• Being ready to work hard

The #1 thing for B.J. is that you learn things by doing it.