07newsroom

From Iceland to Boston

     A publisher from Iceland is starting a free newspaper in Boston with a heavy dose of user-generated content. Writers can sign up for blogs, photographers can sign up on a designated photo-sharing service, people who shoot video will be invited to contribute, too. If it follows the plans being discussed so far, all this will bubble up from the cyber world and the editors of the print publication will harvest the best stuff each day for the fiber product. A Google news search turns up nothing, but a blog search turns up many postings. For example, the top managers are running a blogspot blog about the project, where this post says (in part): "BostonNOW wants to encourage active participation in our online and print community, so interested contributors will only need to follow a few steps to be considered for the print publication. As soon as the BostonNOW website (bostonnow.com) goes live (scheduled for Monday, April 16; the day before our first paper is published), you would create a BostonNOW account."

Are they testing a new Nokia camera phone? This post shows the view from the BostonNow office.

Steve Garfield at Off On A Tangent blogs about a meetup: "I went to a meeting tonight about the new free paper that's launching in Boston soon called BostonNow. In this picture, Editor-in-Chief John Wilpers is talking to bloggers about how they can contribute to the paper. We had a far ranging discussion with lots of ideas shared from everyone."

Newspaper Innovation has some details: "The paper is financed by Icelandic media company Dagsbrun. Russel Pergament, former publisher of the Boston Metro and Am New York is running the operation. He is also CEO of the American branch of Dagsbrun, called 365 Media USA, which has plans for free dailies in other US cities as well. Chief editor is John Wilpers (Washington Examiner, Boston Globe, the Boston Herald and Boston Metro). Wilpers to PBS: “I was the editor that took it [Boston Metro] from about 150,000 readers to 500,000″."

Content and value

Bambi Francisco of MarketWatch has the investor take on the new media business strategies, including this: "One new business model is in the economics of sourcing content and talent. At least for now, new sources of content can be bought cheaply -- meaning free. At some point, however, the 1% of those who create the majority of the content that's retaining an audience will demand some form of incentive."

Meetings are content, text version

The editors of the Spokesman-Review in Spokane post a blog about the news meetings, with a tone of candid informality. Here's a sample:

"We scrambled on an A1 centerpiece yesterday and ended up moving Mike Prager's daylight saving time story forward a day; it was originally scheduled to run Saturday. Now we're scrambling for Saturday. Such is the news biz. But Prager had a delightful turn of phrase in his story, calling the hoo-haw over potential electronic meltdowns from daylight-saving time "Y2Kaylight."

Once again our Sports department pulled off something of a miracle, getting a nice package on the Cougs beating the Huskies on their cover, despite the late ending of that game.

Becky Kramer turned a routine earnings story on Coldwater Creek into a forward-looking piece. But it didn't answer the burning question: why doesn't Coldwater Creek have a store in Spokane?"

News meeting is content, video version

In Spokane, the news meeting is content. Twice a day, the Spokesman-Review editors gather and discuss the day's news and what they plan to do on line and in print. It's all on streaming video and there is a handy dandy guide to what's what in the room for anyone who wants more information. The editor, Steven A. Smith, did this Q &A with Poynter. Excerpt:
"Will anyone actually watch? We have the technology, but we don't always have the drama. Will our competitors gain an advantage? Will our staff be as open in public as in private? If the experiment does not further our goals, does not help us do our jobs more effectively, we'll stop. The technology is being used for many other purposes so the modest investment is not wasted."

From America East, Nora Paul

Good examples courtesy of Nora Paul, from the Institute for New Media Studies in Minnesota. If the old model is a journalist explaining something, digital allows newsrooms -- commands newsrooms -- to help readers experience a story. One example Nora noted is this MSNBC report on baggage security at airports. It's a two-minute interactive visual test of your abilities. Suddenly, you are the baggage screener. As I looked for it today, I couldn't call it up on a search at MSNBC.com but a Google search called up the Digg posting on it. As cool as it is, it should be linked from more MSNBC security and travel coverage, including from this great page of travel links and tips.
Other ideas -- and maybe someone is doing them: how a new electronic voting booth works.
Another example, also from Nora, The Seattle Times "balance the budget" game. They call it Ax and Tax. Some very cool extras with that, as you try, for example, to cut teacher salaries. The institute has collected plenty of other examples. These two and seven others of the same genre are posted here.

The need for programmers

Mark Glaser writes for PBS about steps newsrooms are taking to hire programmers, not just traditional journalists. In the Glaser piece, he includes a list of tasks one programer checked off at The News-Tribune in Tacoma, WA.

"In his time as an intern last summer and as a full-time hire since January, Ritchey has accomplished the following tasks for the News-Tribune:

> Built an interactive map of all the free Wi-Fi spots in the South Sound area near Tacoma, which users can update with spots the newspaper missed.

> Created a survey generator so that reporters or bloggers can poll readers, something the restaurant blogger has utilized.

> Created a searchable database and interactive map for a Northwest Hiking Guide that lets people search for hikes according to difficulty, elevation gain, destination and round-trip distance.

> Built online databases so people can input and search vital statistics in the community such as births, deaths, marriages and news businesses.

> Created a “Wire Cleaner” application so the print newspaper staff can input sports box scores from wire copy without having to spend hours reformatting it."

Video examples

Three papers, The Miami Herald and The Wilmington News Tribune, produce daily TV-style video news reports. The daily feature from Miami uses high production values and a zippier, more youthful presentation with two anchors and five news updates. Notice the story frame has banner ads. Wilmington has an AM and PM newscast, with video ads and banner ads in the story frame. The Wilmington report more closely resembles a local TV news report. The Roanoke Times calls its report TimesCast, and it launches every weekday at 3:30 PM. A sponsor report starts each cast.

In Florida, The Naples News presents a menu of video selections. Viewing one sample (prep basketball report) opens a new window with a well-produced report on a single story. No obvious ad support. The Sarasota Herald-Tribune, with its TV partner News 6, has a similar menu of video stories, each introduced with a short sponsor reference. Roanoke, in addition to the TimesCast, has video reports, with a simpler story presentation, also with ads in the story frame.

It's harder to pull together something about the resources or training each of these newsrooms devoted to make this happen.

Video caution

Will Sullivan's video warning is worth repeating: What’s up with all these new video initiatives that can’t stream. Standard ‘broadband’ across the nation is capped at 256k.  256k! 256k ON A GOOD DAY WITH NO NETWORK HICCUPS. Until we can break from the telecom monopoly, rates drop dramatically or the telecoms decide to offer more bandwidth for free (HA!) we’re stuck at 256K. I’m fortunate to be on a 4 mb pipe at home, but at work I have trouble streaming many of these new projects. At the library, don’t even try! Dial up at Mom’s house? I’ll eat glass before I try that. There’s a great technology chasm. Let’s work for some standards. Yes, ‘broadband’ is growing. But it’s DSL speed broadband right now. Common (non geek) users like my mom are not going to wait for something that keeps studdering and won’t play straight… Buffer once, then it better flow. She’s going to leave something for that before she leaves because the video may not be the crispest HD, ever in the history of the planet earth. If you can’t figure out your codecs or offer multiple versions, please put it on YouTube, Google, Revver, Brightcove or any of the dozen decent other video streaming services and stop wasting users time and bandwidth.