Category: engagement

Cutting the contributions budget could really cost us

Alison GowLeave a comment

In my reporting and newsdesking days I sometimes got asked by a caller ringing in with a tale if there was any hope of us paying for the information. In the regionals I’ve worked on, we never paid for information although if the story was likely to sell, and good enough, we’d help arrange syndication and the subject would get a cut.

We bought did pay freelance photographers and writers for their work but the freelance budget has shrunk down to the barest of bones in recent years; I suspect most freelance writers now view regional newspapers as a lost cause, and freelance photographers probably wonder if the fee will cover the cost of the fuel getting there.

Yes times are hard, but a slashed contributions budget is a frustrating and humiliating thing for a newsroom. We want those dramatic rescue photos but can we pay for them? It’s not that we won’t, it’s that often we can’t.
Believe me, when you have to say “sorry but we don’t have a budget for that” to someone who has captured something of real local significance you feel cheap, and you sound cheap.It’s making local newspapers look bad at a time when they can ill afford it and invites ‘price of everything, value of nothing’ comments.
Newspapers have taken for years, and known the value of what they were taking. In the future, we’d better be a bit more accommodating.

Discovering the joys of FriendDeck

Alison GowLeave a comment
Anyone who follows me here or on Twitter may have picked up on my ‘like it but keep forgetting to use it’ attitude towards FriendFeed.
I mean, I see the purpose of it, but I’m always forgetting to log in to the website – it’s not an essential part of my network yet.
So I was intrigued when I noticed a tweet from Liverpool software developer @PaulKinlan (of twollo.com and the late, lamented Twe2.com fame) referencing something called ‘FriendDeck’. I sent him a message back asking what it was and he responded with a very modest:

He added it was also available as an Adobe Air client too. It took me a few hours but I eventually found time to go an explore FriendDeck, and already I really like it.
I’m still playing around with it but on first impressions I’d have to say it works well – it’s very fast, user-friendly, looks like Tweetdeck (which is a good thing) and has the ability to share, like or open the original link.
This is the one I set up to try it out (click to enlarge the image):

Good isn’t it? It also has (but I’ve got the thing to large for them to show on the grab) my FF thread, groups I belong to, and my friends FF thread – all in one handy app. And that solves the problem I’ve had with the FF website – I have to flip backwards and forwards between my groups, my friends, me…
Plus I can post direct from it, and close off columns as I wish, and add new ones.
Anyway. If you want to try it you can find FriendDeck here.
I think I’ve finally found something that will make me use FriendFeed regularly.

My online identity

Alison Gow3 Comments
I’m speaking at the Art of Digital event in Liverpool tomorrow.
The topic of the learning lab is The Personal which (according to the accompanying blurb) is

“all about the role and influence of people and organisations. We have recently seen the emergence of the self at the heart of online communication, placing the individual at the centre of digital culture.”

Anyway, I’ve been given the theme Identity 2.0, and I have an hour in which to expand my theories. Which is a good topic for me as I’m prone to telling anyone who stands still long enough that journalists must develop and grow their own digital identities if they are to compete in a rapidly expanding arena.

I wasn’t going to do a powerpoint, I was just going to talk it through; then I realised my digital life is a bit more eloquent than I am. So I’ve put a few slides together, and I’m also going to borrow from the ‘year of the blog‘ posts I wrote earlier this year.

My digital identity

The slide that sums up the issues around where the professional ends, and the real person begins, I think, is the Twitter one. At 7.18pm I tweet about not giving “a shit about Spymaster”, and at 7.19pm I inform the world of the wonderful online election coverage available on our websites. A complete fluke, and I only noticed when I was trawling back through Twitter looking for good and bad examples of my tweeting habits.
Professionalism, ur doin’ it rong…

I really hope, I don’t mess up tomorrow. Wish me luck.

Reporter tweets being shot

Alison Gow2 Comments
Talk about making your own headlines! It’s true; the deputy business editor of the Post & Echo was caught in crossfire this weekend and – like the news trouper he is – tweeted what was happening to him, from the ambulance.

In a nutshell, (teetotal) Tony McDonough was unfortunate enough to be downing a diet Coke in his local Liverpool pub when armed bikers opened fire on the doorway in a “ride by” shooting. Some of the pellets hit him in the face, and he ended up needing an ambulance ride and hospital treatment.

But, in his own words:

He was taken to hospital for treatment, and his updates then continued:

and…

How dramatic is that? Tony isn’t the most active Twitter user so I asked him why he’d decided to tweet the drama, rather than texting or ringing friends.

“I just wanted to tell people” he said. “I wanted to say what was happening – I sort of forgot I don’t have many people following me!”

There’s a lot of information in his tweets – from his own condition…

…to an update on the incident and some background:

His final tweet describes his plan to turn in for the night, having had well enough excitement. If you want to read the news story (and he was today’s Echo splash) it’s here.

This, for me, is one of the best examples of why Twitter can work for journalists. People are hardwired to want to share stories; at times of crisis we all want to tell someone, and I guess a number of people in the pub that night texted or phoned friends to share the news.

Journalists want to get news out too, and they want to get it out fast and first to as wide an audience as possible (probably so we can then say “I was first”).
Tony, as a Twitter user, knew he had a good way to reach multiple people and used it. He also is one of those in the office who really ‘gets’ liveblogging, and I suspect the two are linked – after all, liveblogging is all about urgency, communication and sharing information.
Oh, and of course, he also has the perfect response next time someone says all Twitter is about is “people saying what they had for breakfast”…

Yet another ‘why journalists should use Twitter’ post

Alison Gow5 Comments

Twitter, is an integral part of my job as a journalist. So it was something of a surprise to learn this week there are still some journalism colleges that don’t show its potential benefits to their students.

I was talking to some J-students this week about how newspapers and journalists can use Twitter when one of them told me it wasn’t on the syllabus she was studying, as it was perceived to have no value.

“Why?”I asked her.”And who else on your course is using it?” Turned out, she was one of only a few tweeting, and her college did not see Twitter as adding value to a journalist’s toolkit.
This baffled me. I assumed most journalists – hell, most people (apart from Oprah and look how she’s caught up) – had heard of or tried this micro-blog lark. I assumed that J-students across the country were being taught it, experimenting with different ways of using Twitter and finding out how to being conversations, crowdsource and engage with audiences online.

Er, no.

Why, when there is so much competition not only to get a job in journalism but to simply get the story and be first, or just to be the one people engage with, would a lecturer would not give their students access to as many useful tools as possible?
So, while the Twitter canon is extensive enough without me adding to it, I thought I’d lay out why I think journalists should use Twitter. Just in case my J-student needs some extra ammo…

1. Twitter makes you build a network. There are no shortcuts; you have to think about who to follow, what you can discover from them, who they follow and why. You have to initiate conversations, engage with total strangers, put in some effort and maybe head up get some blind alleys, before you start seeing results. If you’re a journalism student, I’d say that’s a pretty fair introduction to your first few weeks in the ‘real’ job.

2. Breaking news gets tweeted, often, and with links and, increasingly, with photos. Twitter is not always first with the news, and I wouldn’t take all tweets as gospel, but it gives journalists who use it a very useful edge on those that don’t, as well as access to people at the centre of the maelstrom. Plus there’s a certain satisfaction in telling your newsdesk about a big breaking story they don’t know…

3. Sometimes its hard to know who you’re writing for – it’s not your newsdesk, or your editor, but these might be the loudest views you get to hear when you start out in a newsroom. Then there are mosaic groups selected by your marketing department, your print readers, your online audience, the casual reader to consider. Using Twitter you get to talk to a cross-section of all of them, find out what’s important to them. Do that and, along with your other external networks, it will give you an idea of what’s relevant to your readers, rather than what the office thinks is important.

4. By engaging with people you learn – whether it’s individuals, communities or simply geography, Twitter helps you gain knowledge.
Find out what what blogs and websites people you who inspire you enjoy have or simply read, who they admire/loathe and what they view as emerging trends. What is important to them; it’s like having a personal shopper to help you pick out what suits you best.

5. You get to engage complete strangers on Twitter, in an informal and open way. You have to get to the point in 140 characters or less, and that means people tend get to the point. It’s often easier for me to send someone a DM than an email and it just feels more like natural conversation. Twitter can enhance reputations (#followfriday), gives you access to some experts in their field, or question politicians (and see what other people are asking them). And, should you care, you get to see where all the Showbiz reporters on the nationals are nicking their ‘exclusives’ from, well in advance.

6. Using Twitter to crowdsource often means you can seek opinions on issues, even if you aren’t near a computer. I used it during a product development meeting this week:

…and got 10 replies in less than two minutes. Really useful.

7. Journalists who get stuck in the office with only each other and press officers to speak to can sometimes get isolated from reality. But online conversations – blog comments, forums, tweets – are great levellers. If you’ve built up a good relationship with your local network, they’re probably going to come to you with tricky questions occasionally (Why has your paper gone up 5p? Why didn’t you cover x-story?) and these are on a public timeline. You can’t ignore them – if you do, you’re not engaging with your network – and others will be watching for your answer so you have to draw on untapped wells of tact and diplomacy. Believe me, it’s a good skill to acquire.

So that’s my take on the subject. Three J-students have asked me this week why Twitter is important to newspapers and, although I’d say the real question is ‘why is Twitter important to journalists’ I think it’s a shame their colleges aren’t helping them find the answers too.

Newsrooms – who needs ’em?

Alison Gow2 Comments

The ‘Newspapers are dead’ discussion looks set to drag on (and on) without any real conclusion or particularly illuminating insights but there is a side debate that does interest me: Do we still need newsrooms?
I read the Journalism Iconoclast blog regularly and was intrigued by a post there recently that suggested: Telecommuting can replace the office. Basically, it asks why we still need expensive newsrooms in a networked age.

And it’s an interesting question; I confess that I look around my newsroom sometimes, as I sit on our new central hub in the Liverpool Daily Post & Echo HQ, and wonder whether we all need to be physically ‘at work’ to be at work.
Newspapers have already discovered they don’t need to have their HQ in a city centre. It’s a thorny subject, but I have no issues with journalists being based in purpose-built, modern unit by a ring road any day; it’s not geography that connects us with our audience – it’s how we engage with them, and our willingness to do so.

How would a newsroom operate in a virtual world? Theoretically, I don’t think it would be particularly tricky; the biggest challenge would be convincing people it could be done.
You could conduct news conferences and meetings via webinars, use Skype to talk to colleagues/contacts for free, log into the system remotely – whether you’re a designer working at home or a reporter filing from the town hall – chat to colleagues via Gtalk, hold group discussions in Friendfeed rooms, use Yammer, Ning, Twitter, Seesmic to interact and add that important social element to the working day. Of course you’d need an office base of some description, and there would always be some hardy souls who would have to use it, for real-world meetings, training, appraisals and other mundane workday issues.

But would workers accept it, perhaps even welcome it? There’s the argument that says, you get creative people in a room together, add a bit of banter and gallows humour, and you get better newspapers. And then there’s the argument that says better newspapers come from being connected to the issues that affect those communities they serve.

Personally, I’m leaning more towards that latter argument as time goes on. I’ve never done the telecommute thing in earnest (just on odd days – usually thanks to the weather or transport problems) but I know journalists who have, and who found it made them more productive.

So in considering the question, I have to try and separate what I think could be a working future for journalists from the nostalgic glow I have for newsrooms. Because they can be the most bizarre, wonderful places to work – I’ve seen typewriters thrown through (closed) windows, found reporters sleeping under desks after a night out and witnessed an impromptu whippet race on a lull in an election night. I have also sat and learned from some of the wisest, most tolerant and generous journalists that ever made a shorthand outline.

I would be sad to see newsrooms go the way of the office pub, but I think it’s inevitable – and we will see it start happening within the next couple of years, as the economy picks up and property prices begin to recover.
The loss of the newsroom bubble could be the catalyst that really gets journalists using online social media, becoming more like beat bloggers in their respective patches (be that geographical or specialist subject) and engaging with communities.
I don’t think anyone would mourn the loss of a newsroom if it meant journalists, and the newspapers that employ them, were more connected, successful, interactive and aware of the issues affecting their readers.

* By the way, if you like the cartoon it’s from this site.

Why protect your Twitter updates?

Alison Gow13 Comments
I’ve found my Twitter followers are growing quite rapidly recently, probably as connectors such as Mr Tweet and Twellow become more widely used.
I follow quite of lot of them back (unless they only update via an automatic feed telling Twitter they’ve blogged) as I like having a widening conversation circle – but there are a couple of things in the way of ‘Twetiquette’ that I find irritating:

1. Auto DMs that say something along the lines of: “thanks for the follow. Find out more about (insert pointless marketing opportunity here) by visiting my website”… I love the excellent “Click on My Junk” post by Amber Naslund, which sums this up perfectly

2. The other irritation is this:

So this person is already following me – but how do I find out about my new follower if I can’t see their Twitter stream? Yes, I can click on their profile’s website link but often that won’t tell me if we share friends, if they converse or simply broadcast, or whether they are following me because we live in the same area or work in the same field.

In fact, it irritates me so much that I ended up (once more) turning to Twitter for the answer.

I got some interesting responses.

In the “I don’t do it but understand why some might” camp:
@Torgwen Yes to have small group of friends/for work etc. whereas now any unknown nosey b***r like me can read what you write!
@davidbartlett1 maybe if you say “I’m going to America for three weeks” you fear someone might break into your house?

In the “They’re missing the point” camp:
@editorialgirl I don’t get it either. Some of my followers have protected updates – so I have no idea if they’re worth following back or not
@foodiesarah & what exactly are they hiding? even more ironic when bio says “social networker”. umm, that’ll b on a one-way social network ?

And there’s the “life is too short to bother with lurkers” camp:
@louisebolotin I block unknown followers who have protected their updates!

Confession: When I joined Twitter I protected my updates for about 2 weeks; I stopped because it felt wrong and … precious. Nothing I tweeted was so interesting that it merited forcing someone to ask permission to follow me. Why did I protect them in the first place? Just to see if it worked. Well, it did. I got no new followers for that fortnight, and I switched it off pretty smartly.

Personally, if you protect your updates, I feel as though you’ve already placed limits on our potential conversations and future networks.
It would be interesting to know if many of those who padlock their updates are newsbies to social networks. Do you protect yours? If so, why? Is it because you are fed up with spammers? Block them if it bothers you that much.
Social media is about opening conversations, sharing, linking, building networks; if you put up barriers and police who can follow you too rigidly, you are going to miss out on a lot.

Links and the marketing of Darren Farley

Alison Gow1 Comment
This video of Scouser Darren Farley running through his LFC impressions, filmed by a mate on a mobile phone, went up on YouTube on 10 October 2008…

And within just 10 days this has happened…

Today, searching Google, the man is all over the web; from fan sites and bloggers, to the Post & Echo websites, Sky Sports and Radio 5 (where an upcoming interview with him is one of the homepage promos)… Frankly, Darren Farley is inescapable.

The interesting thing is, his star was rising to ascendancy before the media really picked up on him. The Post & Echo sites posted a video interview with him last Friday but it had taken all week to track him down and then find an opportunity where he was free. It shows just how much our online users can influence the content newspapers serve up for their readers.
Thousands of people have already watched him on YouTube, commented on his performance and even sent VT responses to him; they didn’t need the media to point them at it.

I guess the Football Factor shouldn’t be ignored in the rise and rise of Darren Farley – LFC is, after all, one of the biggest clubs in the world with an international army of fans – but the Magic of Linking would seem to be the real key to his success.
His YouTube video has been linked to from fan blogs, fan forums, fan websites, by YouTubers who favourited it, sent it on via Facebook et al…
The majority of those linking to it credit where they found the clip too.

How often do you hear the phrase ‘the media built X up just to knock them down’? Now people can build their own icons (or individuals can build their own brands) without going near a corporate news outlet, whether newspaper, TV, radio or online. It’s free and it’s extremely easy.

People marketed the Darren Farley brand without him even having to ask them. He’s clear that he wants his impressions to become a career, and by posting his video he got the greatest recruitment agency in the world acting on his behalf; the Web 2.0 collective.
It would have cost a fortune to market himself; if he’d rang Radio 5 and offered his services I’m betting the phone would have gone down within 30 seconds, now he’s one of their ‘must listen’ interviews – thanks to the Internet community using links.

So, what does it mean for newspapers? For me, it underlines how imperative it is for journalists to use social media sites to spot trends and stories. Dipping into forums, using Twitter as a matter of course (not just when you’re covering an event) and following blogs should be viewed as essential. I think reporters need to view it in the same light as they do the on-the-hour phone calls to the emergency services.
There are a wealth of stories on the web, we just need to know how to find them. And how to let other people find them for us.

Why the deadline isn’t ‘Now’

Alison Gow3 Comments
I suspect most of us find it comforting to work to a deadline; it’s satisfying to cross a mental finishing line and feel a job is completed. But a deadline is a also a mindset… and that’s not the most useful thing for a journalist to possess right now.

Dictionary.net has this to say about the word Deadline:

Now, I wasn’t aware about the shooting issue (although I know some subs who would be happy to see the reintroduction of this) but I think “1. the latest time for finishing something” is part of the problem.
It says that, effectively, a deadline is a limit – a point beyond which the work cannot and must not continue; something that marks ceasation of a thought process, an action, an inspiration, a possibility. It is a restriction.

There are two phrases relating to internet journalism that seriously drive me mad – “The deadline is now” and “First, second or nowhere”.
I hate these soundbites (that’s all they are – no one really talks like this when they are being earnest) and I want everyone else to as well. This is why:

The Deadline Is Now
This is the phrase most likely to be uttered by the person who believes it least. It the last resort of an online humbug; someone who doesn’t understand a fundamental truth about the internet – the deadline isn’t now because there is no deadline.
A story should be growing all the time, changing all the time, and if the newspaper is working with the online world well enough the story has, in some shape or form, been out there since the first seed of an idea was planted. The internet community has been a part of the article in some way (a poll vote, a web forum, a Twitter stream, whatever) and plays as important a role as the reporter writing it.
Deadlines hold us back; they make us think we’re first with the story when really we’re just the the first we know about with the story. Whether it’s someone from the public gallery in that big court trial broadcasting the outcome afterwards on the bus, or a local blogger with the right connection to the right person at the right time, someone else always knows. And they always, always share that knowledge. It’s just newspapers that hang onto knowledge until we judge the time is right to share; we are Knowledge Misers and the public will no longer accept us doling out snippets when it suits us.

First, Second, or Nowhere
The phrase ‘First, Second or Nowhere’ is often linked to ‘The Deadline Is Now’ and, chillingly, may even be used in the same sentence.
Yes SEO is important but so is being honest and providing exactly the information your readers are looking for, not luring them in like some kind of online Anglerfish, only to disappoint them with some spurious link or half-baked optimisation phrases. I think SEO is what the great Dilbert would describe as a ‘weasel‘ word; it sounds good while not really meaning much at all.
From my point of view, I’d rather talk about online clarity, as in: Is it clear to visitors what this story is about? Search Engine Optimisation sounds good but what it means is that you’re playing to the bot’s rules – you are colluding with Google or your audience’s browser of choice to entice readers.
The shortest route to the top of the Google search ranking is to publish what you know as soon as you know it and to label what the story is about with as much clarity as possible. Then link to whichever external sources are relevant, create a Google map or embed a YouTube video if it helps tell the story (Google likes helping friends of Google), and encourage as much interactivity around the story as you can, so more members of the online community are linking back to you.
Thinking about attracting people rather web crawlers when we plan our articles and upload them should improve the quality of hits to the site, as well as the quantity. After all, I get at least 10 hits a day from people looking for cartoon avatars to use on Twitter, but it doesn’t mean my blog post is of the slightest use to them.

Those are the two phrases that I’d like to ban from a newsroom (hmm – maybe I should think about calling this blog something else?) but it would be good to know what other weasel words are out there…

Fair comment

Alison Gow1 Comment
Finding intelligent, reasoned reader comments on newspapers’ online sites can sometimes feel like a Snark hunt.
I’ve noted my thoughts on why newspapers can fail to encourage a flourishing online forum community before, and had some interesting feedback both here and via Twitter and Plurk.
Personally I don’t believe newspapers forums will ever succeed unless time and real effort is set aside for looking after them; too often they degenerate into name-calling, adverts or conversations between two posters that would make more sense conducted via instant messenger.
But I also don’t believe it is beyond the wit of newspaperkind to host intelligent, interesting and relevant forums for debate and comment – we just have to care enough that they succeed, rather than chalking them down as a ‘must-have’ on our online checklist.
So, having followed a Twitter link from Paul Bradshaw to Derek Powazek’s blog post on 10 Ways Newspapers Can Improve Comments I have some new thoughts to mull over.
Some of what he says chimes with what Mark Commerford suggested to me (regarding forums and the ability for users to flag comments which they perceive to be good or bad) and I’m also intrigued by his suggestion to scrap anonymity. All in all, lots to consider…