My first impulse when I learned of Steve Jobs’ passing was to try to find

A mashup of the two stars of the 1999 TNT movie "The Pirates of Silicon Valley." Image via http://www.methamatrix.com/archives/210

“The Pirates of Silicon Valley” on Netflix streaming. (The trailer is available on YouTube.) Fortunately TNT read my mind because the channel will rebroadcast their 1999 docudrama tonight.

It’s not the greatest movie ever. It’s probably not an accurate depiction of who Jobs and Bill Gates were at the time. But it’s a movie I’ll always remember fondly because it served as my first introduction to the entrepreneurial spirit that drove both men and the computer industry.

In the movie, Jobs comes off as driven to the point of obsession. He provides awesome perks for employees because he never wants them to leave work. He doesn’t, so why should they.

While I know I could never be that obsessed, I admire his determination, and so should Apple fans and employees. Apple owes much of its success to its refusal to accept the status quo. That philosophy largely comes from Jobs. Daniel Lyons, the Newsweek reporter who once moonlighted as the Fake Steve Jobs, put it best in Vanity’s Fair’s “How the Web was Won” when he describes how Apple approached the music industry to create the iPod and iTunes store.

But I really think that Apple came along and took all the risk. Apple said, O.K., we’ll invest in making this hardware device and in making a store, and running that store, and making all these deals, and working with all you scumbags and assholes in the music business. We’ll put on our asbestos suit and deal with you people, right, to be able to, like, sit in the same room and breathe the same air that you criminals in the music industry … do, right?

The more I use my iPad, the more I realize Jobs was applying this same willingness to get down in the mud with the news industry. I still believe the iPad will do to the news industry what the iPod and iTunes Store did to music, and I welcome the change. It’s too bad Jobs won’t be around to see it.

As I watch the film tonight, I’m going to be looking for clips I can share with my students that will convey that same wide-eyed idealism I felft more than 10 years ago. Journalism needs more people willing to forego the saftety of big media conglomerate paychecks to strike out on their own. In fact, those people might represent the brightest hope for the industry.

Editor’s Note: I shared some of these reflections with Ryan Clark, a reporter from the Ohio University Post.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

The timing of the latest Carnival of Journalism couldn’t have been more fortuitous for me. I’ve been conptemplating the future of online video since the beginning of summer, when I started designing an experiment to test the effect a reporter’s presence has on credibility. I’m running participants through my experiments as we speak. (Want to take the study – Click on the surveys link above!)

I have an idea where the results will take me, but I can’t be not sure because it seems there’s such a dicotomy in how news organizations approach online video.

Byron Reeves and Cliff Nash wrote this influential book in 1996 that asked why people find TV news more credible than print, even when the content is so similar.

Previous studies suggest seeing a reporter on screen is important. In fact, Byron Reeves and Cliff Nass say one of the main elements of TV news credibility comes from seeing a familiar face on screen. Broadcast news outlets with an online presence, such as CNN, ABC, and ESPN, showcase online videos that would be a home on their TV networks, complete with standups and voice overs.

On the other hand, non-legacy video outlets such as NPR, Media Storm, and newspapers, such as the Columbus Dispatch and the Cincinnati Enquirer are producing top quality videos where no reporter is present on screen. The videos allow the participants to tell their own stories without a reporter’s intervention.

My first question was if this is a product of the medium. Is connecting the audience to the video’s source more important on the Internet than in other media? Do online audiences reject traditional video presentations after watching so many amateur YouTube videos or are newspaper reporters just camera shy?

As we ponder the future of online news, I think discussing the reporter’s role is vital. So many of last weekend’s messages from the Online News Association’s annual conference (#ONA11) stressed the need for reporters to establish their brand. Credibility is central to that brand, and online video, the research suggests, can be a great way to both connect with audiences and establish one’s authority.

With this in mind, I can’t say I know what the future holds for online video. I can say I definitely think video will always play a role in online news. In fact, I think reporters should look to use it more to establish themselves as expert sources on which audiences can rely. If YouTube has taught me anything it’s that you don’t have to be the most polished presenter with the highest production values. You just have to have compelling content. The more I play with it, the more I realize that online video can be some of the most compelling and most credible information available.

Editor’s Note: Information about this month’s Carnival of Journalism and links to other posts is available from this month’s host Andrew Pergam.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

It has been a while since my last update, but I’ve been inspired recently. Here’s why:

• I’m teaching J314/514: Online Journalism Fundamentals again. I force my students to blog twice a week. I guess I should practice what I preach.
• 1,000 Awesome Things had this nostalgic post a few days ago that helped me remember why I got started in journalism. There’s something ultimately satisfying about seeing your words in print. Online I don’t have to wait quite as long.
• I’ve returned to editing the videos from Skype conversations from the previously mentioned online journalism fundamentals class, and I have this clip of Tom Merritt, of the TWiT network, talking about the relationship of podcasts and traditional news. More clips to come …
• Finally, I decided at the last minute to pay the late registration fee, brave the overpriced Boston hotel rooms and panicking Red Sox fans to attend the Online News Association Conference this weekend. Where else can you learn how to use social media in journalism directly from the social media network representatives themselves. I’ve followed Vadim Lavrusik for a while, and I use many of his Mashable articles in my classes. I cheered when Facebook hired him as its journalist program manager. Already, he has reached out to journalism educators online. I’d like to hear his tips in person.
• I’m also attending ONA to examine the possibility of starting a student chapter of the organization at Ohio University. Raquel Harrah is spearheading the effort on the student end, so contact her if you are interested.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

I made a lot of goofs in my newspaper career, as I’m sure we all did. My biggest one was almost single handedly getting the owner of the Detroit Red Wings kicked out of the NHL. I identified Michael Illitch in a photograph, where he supposedly was discussing building a casino in Barstow, Calif., not realizing 1) it wasn’t him, and 2) NHL owners will lose their franchises if they are involved in gambling ventures. We corrected the photo the next day, and the Illitchs were actually pretty understanding. I guess they didn’t expect much from a small-town journalist.

But this, in no way, was the biggest failure of my journalism career. In fact, I can’t choose any thing in particular for that dubious distinction. My biggest failure as a newspaper editor was not pushing hard enough. The instances that haunt me the most are the times I buckled under pressure and backed down from a big story. I tell my students now that I regretted not being more dogged in the pursuit of truth, more diligent in chasing sources, more bold in publishing what I had found.

During this Carnival of Fail, especially as we face an uncertain future for journalism, I hope to learn how not to make the same mistake again. Forging the pathway for journalism to survive in the 21st century requires people willing to take chances, not people who’ll bow to the pressure. Someone a lot wiser than me said the key is to “fail informatively.” David Cohn, founder of Spot.Us told participants at the Momentum Conference in September 2009 …

“Journalism needs 10,000 startups. Of those 8,000 may fail. 1,900 may teeter for a couple of years. Maybe 100 will come out as the digital equivalent of the New York Times. Spot.us might be one of those failures, but it will fail informatively. I think that’s the key. On the web right now is this stage of experimentation, and if we can all fail informatively – if I can go down and put up a big skull and crossbones and say don’t go this way, here’s why – then at least I’ll feel there is a success.”

The story I began with above is a good example. We had the information before the big announcement. We knew someone was going to propose an Indian casino to the city council, and we even had a pretty good idea who it was. The paper’s reporters busted their asses chasing down every lead, working every source so the Desert Dispatch could serve its readers by revealing the subtle machinations of the city and the developers. But I crumpled like a discarded tissue when my publisher and the mayor called me back from a quick weekend trip to Utah.

To this day, I’m still not sure why I did. I was confident of our information. I felt strongly our audience needed to know. But I guess I wasn’t willing to stake my reputation on it. In essence, I was afraid of failing, but my inaction ended up creating arguably the biggest failure of my career.

I know I apply this to my online journalism teaching sometimes. I’m reluctant to blog, thinking I’m not half as smart as any of the bloggers I follow. I fear pushing my students to try new things online or in social media because I don’t feel 100 percent comfortable in those arenas myself.

What I have to remember from my failures as a newspaper editor is that if I always waited until I was 100 percent sure of all the information I published, I would have never published anything. That’s why Cohn’s quote really sticks with me. I thought of it immediately when he suggested this month’s topic. I wish I had his conviction that a failure is a success as long as it’s informative.

This should serve as a warning to my students at Ohio University then. If you take my classes, expect to fail. In fact, I want you to try to fail. Don’t go for the safe projects. Go for the crazy ones because you won’t regret the failure. You’ll regret never trying in the first place.

PhotoCredit: I had to dig through my old box of clips to see if I could find the offending photo, and I think it was fate, because it was right on top.

Editor’s Note: This post was my fourth in the monthly Carnival of Journalism. This month’s topic was the following:

What: A failure in your life (personal or professional) that has lessons. It must be your failure and you must  take responsibility. But this will be a safe space to discuss our failings and what we can learn from them.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Like so many people, I turned to social media last night when I learned the U.S. had killed Osama bin Laden. Frankly, I learned more from my friends tweets, retweets, photos, and posts than I did watching an hour of NBC’s coverage.

I told my online journalism class about Storify, but I hadn’t used it yet. It just entered open beta last week. I thought this was a perfect chance to practice what a preach while creating a record of a historic event that I didn’t ever want to forget.

By no means is this comprehensive. It represents only the messages that came under my radar, but I’m excited about the possibilities Storify presents, and what a service such as this means for traditional reporting. This could be one way to create collaboration between reporters and audiences through the application of journalistic principles, while also preserving the audience’s voice.

Let me know what you think.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

I should have let one of my students write this month’s response to the Carnival of Journalism. For Ian Bowman-Henderson, who developed an innovative way to use QR Codes to disseminate location-specific news with Nick Salontay,  technology does not drive innovation. Rather, innovation starts with a simple question and ends with an elegant solution. The more specific the question, he argues, the better the innovation can be. It’s a philosophy I know I need to learn and emulate, and it makes me wonder if educators and organizations, such as the Knight News Challenge and the Reynolds Journalism Institute, will drive more journalism innovation if they ask for solutions to more specific questions.

Ian’s philosophy and mine hit head-on when I asked for his advice on my proposal to buy a number of iPads for students at the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. I assumed just giving them the tools would be enough. Many were already pounding down my door for advice on how to start an online publication. Some had already used tools such as MyVirtualPaper to create Web-based magazines.

What Ian told me was that while teaching students about tablets was a good idea, buying a bunch of iPads wouldn’t do it. In fact, I would be making the same mistake as the newspaper leaders I decried in my classes who approached the Web in desperation. Editors asked reporters to blog, Tweet, update Facebook pages and moderate  comments because they think it’s innovative.  It’s what everyone is doing. It’s the next big thing.

What those editors and I failed to consider is why. What makes Facebook valuable to the news? How can reporters use Twitter to do their jobs better? In the end, the big question is how does technology and the innovation it inspires really help us to fulfill the mission of journalism better?

Ian encouraged me to go back to the students and ask them what they really wanted to do. What kind of audience did they want to reach? What kind of journalism did they really want to create? The last question should be how technology can help, not the first.

Ian and I have resolved to develop a course that examines the key questions surrounding digital publishing while also teaching students how to use the tools. I’d like to see more organizations, such as the Knight News Challenge and the Reynolds Journalism Institute do the same. Too often, I think the calls for participation are vague. Organizations say they are looking for innovators without really defining what direction they want them to take.

I can understand why uncertainty is part of a process like this. It’s hard to know where innovation will come from. What journalism needs is not more blanket calls for something new. We need people who are willing to take a stand, who will go out on a limb and specifically identify the most important questions facing journalism today. Questions along the lines of how can journalists use social media won’t get the job done because they focus too much on technology. Instead, let’s ask how we can reach specific audiences.

Knight and Reynolds are in unique positions to drive innovation. Their focus on journalism as central to a democracy will ensure that whatever innovations they sponsor will serve communities. But they must go beyond simply funding projects. They need to drive innovation by drawing upon their vast experience and resources to suggest the course innovation will take.

I learned this lesson the hard way as an educator. It’s not enough for me to hand my students a toolbox without telling them what I expect them to build.

PhotoCredit: This is a screen capture of my using my iPad from WOUB’s NewsWatch Wednesday night. I was featured in a story about the New York Times’ paywall. It starts at about 6:40. Had to get a little plug in …

Editor’s Note: This is my third post as part of the Carnival of Journalism. I think I was a bit more obvious in this post than the last two, but again you can follow the discussion through the #jcarn hashtag on Twitter.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

A ‘third place’ is not home. It’s not work either. It’s the place where we hang out to connect with others. It’s the coffee shop, the book store, the public library. It can be the mall or the market. About a year into my career, I learned the third place was vital for journalists. It allowed me to expand beyond the official sources that were easy to find. It allowed me to see what real people had to say about the issues I was covering.

I still teach my students about ‘third places’ in my news writing classes. I still use the same Pew Center video that introduced the concept to me. (I’ve embedded part of the video below.) But we always wonder aloud, where are the third places in the digital age? Are they still in the coffee shops, the markets, and malls? Have they migrated online as well?

One of the best ways I’ve found to teach students about reaching out to unofficial sources is asking them to approach the Web as a third place. The more they immerse themselves in the digital forums where people hang out and discuss, the more surprised they learn about their communities. More importantly, they expand the number of sources they use and paint a more vivid and relatable picture of the news.

One of the best examples of how the Web can function as a third place is Flickr. I love searching through Flickr for anything that relates to my hometown. It’s one of the first things I encourage journalists to do. The people who are willing to photograph and share the sights of their hometown have the kind of passion journalists crave. They may not be physically involved in every news event, but they’ll know the issues and be reasonably able to comment on them. I’m continually surprised at home many of the communities, in which I have lived and worked (Hesperia, Barstow, Columbia, Athens), have Flickr groups. If there isn’t a group, create one. It’s an easy way to use the Web to reach out to those you wouldn’t normally reach.

The same holds true with other social media. I’m surprised how few of the journalists and journalism students I meet have Google alerts set up for blogs about their beats. Even fewer have created or search hashtags on Twitter. Sites such as What the Hashtag or Hashtag.org are great places to start to find what people are saying about a community.

I’m sure these tips seem simple, even obvious. Just like walking into a coffee shop and approaching a stranger for a comment, it takes some guts to use them. We have to work to overcome the stigma attached to Web content. Not everyone who opens himself up online has an axe to grind or is a shameless self-promoter. Most of them are average citizens who love where they live and work. They get together online, just as they would at a real world third place, to connect with others that feel the same.

Journalists need to be part of that conversation.

PhotoCredit: Thanks to kelly bone who posted this great photo in the Cafes, Coffee Houses, Burger Houses, Food Carts group on Flickr.

Note: The following post was the second in the Carnival of Journalism, an ongoing discussion about how to improve journalism. The topic this month was the following: “Considering your unique circumstances what steps can be taken to increase the number of news sources?” To follow the discussion, search for the hashtag #JCARN on Twitter or visit the Carnival of Journalism blog Friday for a roundup.

ThirdPlaces

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Chris Barr, the senior editorial director of Yahoo! News, visited our news writing classes at Ohio University on Tuesday and gave our students valuable advice about how to publish on the Web. I shot a series of short videos of his lecture that I almost trashed when I learned the school’s director interviewed Barr with the school’s more sophisticated rig. Instead, however, I threw together the basic video you see below because I realize I need to practice what I preach. I need to keep trying the video editing techniques I share with students.

As I was cobbling the best quotes from Barr’s nearly hour-long presentation, I also realized that Yahoo! News was also putting its money where its mouth is. I believe Barr when he says the goal behind the Yahoo! Style Guide is to improve Web content across the board because everyone will benefit. I’ve been critical of Yahoo! News before on this blog, especially when I had a hard time finding some of the great original content they created in the past. It’s only fair that I take the time to highlight some of what they are now doing to democratize and curate news.

Yahoo! recently purchased Associated Content, a site that has been lumped in with other content farms, such as Demand Media’s eHow. I’ve read a lot about how eHow is only trying to dupe the search engines. For example, check out the Daily Finance’s funny list of some of the dumbest advice eHow has published. Before talking to Barr, I had a similar opinion of Associated Content.

But as Yahoo! has expanded their original news offerings once again, I think they’ve set new standards for citizen journalism. The Style Guide is a first step. Sure the guide has a lot on SEO, but Barr repeated over and over again to students that no one should write for the search engines. I agree. It leads to the kind of articles Slate’s Farjad Manjoo describes. Barr also assured us that all members of the Yahoo! Contributor Network work with editors.

The movement to improve user-generated content online has to start somewhere. I’m glad to see it may be starting with a pioneering Internet company, who has a decent track record for contributing more than just news aggregation. So far, I’m pleased with what I’ve seen. I really like The Upshot, a blog on the main site that provides a different and balanced perspective on the news. I’m also encouraged by what I’ve seen on the Yahoo! Contributor Network so far. Today’s top story on how Christa McAuliffe’s hometown is remembering the anniversary of her death. It’s hard to believe it has been 25 years since the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded, killing McAuliffe, the first teacher astronaut, and six other crew members. I found the reflections of people who knew her moving. Some of the other articles show promise as citizen journalism as well. They offer a more personal approach to the day’s news, which is often missing in mainstream media coverage.

This is not to say the site is perfect or that some of the contributions don’t need major editing. But it does bear watching how Yahoo! will work with citizen journalists. At this early stage, it seems to me Yahoo! is embracing one of the findings of my dissertation – working with your audience to craft the news without stealing the audience’s voice can enhance connection and credibility.

PhotoCredit: Chris Barr speaks to students in J231A: News Writing at Ohio University on Jan. 25.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

In my rush to beat the posting deadline yesterday, I forgot to mention what I was doing. It’s such a unique opportunity that I think it deserves its own post. Yesterday, I joined scores of other bloggers, educators, journalists, and researchers to discuss “the changing role of Universities for the information needs of a community” as part of the Carnival of Journalism. David Cohn, founder of Spot.Us and a Reynolds Journalism Institute fellow this year, organized the effort.

It was gratifying to see the amount of participation based on Cohn’s first summary post. A number of friends, colleagues and former students at the University of Missouri responded. What I appreciated most about the carnival, especially after reading most of the first 50 or so posts, is how Cohn is encouraging us to practice what we preach. He brought so many people together from so many different places that I’m confident positive change will come from our discussion. I know I will at least make better contacts and add some new ideas to the way I teach journalism. I’ve added at least half a dozen new blogs to my Shrook account.

For example, Erica Zucco and Juana Summers, two former Missouri students,  stressed the need for media literacy to start well before college. Zucco underscored that young people today consume more media than ever, and Summers emphasized it’s vital to reach young people before they are overwhelmed.

If we wait to teach the foundations of digital and media literacy until students reach college, we will lose a generation of thinkers and innovators to the information overload. We also leave behind the tens of thousands of students who might not ever see the inside of a university classroom.

From the industry side, Brian Boyer, a Chicago Tribune news application developer, referenced Battlestar Galactica and classic cyberpunk novels to conceptualize the journalism of the future.

And it’s where we’re headed. Totally immersive immediacy. I don’t know what the technologies will be. The data will ride on my 3d goggles and my conductive underwear, or my surround-view Kinect room, or my sensory deprivation in-ear headphones and holographic display… whatever the medium, I’m gonna *feel* it.

Brian, I suggest you add Extras by Scott Westerfeld to your list.

I haven’t met Megan Taylor before, but I love her idea:

What if the school news outlets were open to anyone in the community who wanted to participate? Much like the idea of the newsroom cafe. Since these are teaching systems as much as they are journalistic endeavors, someone from the outside could easily participate. Most student-run news organizations within universities are open only to students, which limits both the quantity and quality of output.

Those examples are the tip of the iceberg. Other posters and friends include Carrie Brown-Smith, Seth Lewis, and Jen Reeves. To follow the conversation, visit the Carnival of Journalism online or search for the hashtag #jcarn in Twitter.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

When I first arrived in Barstow, Calif. I couldn’t have told you the difference between a gymkhana and gymkata. But I quickly learned as the editor of the Desert Dispatch because those who ran the amateur rodeos in town were great providers of community news. They were so good, in fact, they made me question if we needed to alter our policy of shoehorning their results, tips and photos into our community section on Mondays. I took this question to graduate school with me because I realized as the editor of a small, and eternally short-staffed daily, I’d never have time to address it.

Within weeks of my first classes at the University of Missouri, I started realizing a solution. I joined the staff of MyMissourian.com, one of the first citizen journalism news sites in the United States, modeled closely after the Northwest Voice, and understood my audience in Barstow deserved a chance to tell their own stories. I needed to do more as an editor to provide that. Giving a voice to the voiceless is one of the hallmarks of journalism.

But I never would have realized this outside of the university setting. I would never have had the guts to try something this while staring at budget spreadsheets with rapidly decreasing EBITDA numbers. Whenever I think about the role of universities in the future of journalism, I remember the lessons from MyMissourian and Dr. Clyde Bentley: Universities need to push the journalism envelope when the industry cannot.

They need to test the innovations because they can afford to fail. Failure is often a good lesson for students. To make it all worthwhile, however, universities must do a better job reaching out to the industry and providing more than an ample supply of interns. Journalism researchers and professors must overcome our fear to step back into the newsroom. We must realize the industry is hungry for what we have to offer.

I learned this firsthand over the winter break. I provided one day of social media and writing-for-the-Web workshops for the Evansville Courier & Press. The editor Mizell Stewart asked me to share tips with the newsroom and the findings of my dissertation, which suggested that providing a platform for citizen journalism can enhance the credibility of the news organization, with the senior editorial staff. Before the presentation, I was nervous. I remember how I dreaded the corporate trainers Freedom Communications would send because they had no way of understanding what I went through each day. I peppered my presentation with as many war stories from my journalism career as possible, even including photos of my hot dog eating content loss.

What I found, however, was a newsroom hungry for guidance. I gave the Courier & Press credit for what they’ve tried already on their Twitter accounts and Facebook page. The staff members and editors loved hearing it. I heard from them and from other friends I have in the industry that so much of what they do online is guesswork, and they appreciate it when someone validates it. They appreciate even more simple ways they can tweak. This is what I can offer, and I tried to steer them to as many other information sources as possible. I’m surprised how few reporters and editors follow Mashable.com, for instance, or know what organizations such as Spot.Us or The Center for Public Integrity or even TPM: Muckraker are trying to do.

As I approach my second year on the faculty at Ohio University, I’m more committed to encouraging my students to innovate. I’m lucky to work with a couple teams who are pushing the boundaries of how organizations can deliver the news online. Jamie Ratermann and Jordan Valinsky created their own online publication, Thread magazine, using Virtual Paper, and this quarter we are trying to find ways to include more interactivity in the publication, while expanding its reach through other digital publishing outlets, such as applications like Zinio. Ian Bowman-Henderson and Nick Salontay are using QR codes to deliver location specific news to anyone with a camera-enabled smartphone.

In addition, I’m committed to reaching out to journalists more, and that’s something that I think universities aren’t doing well. The distrust academia and the industry have for one another is largely in our heads. We are both hungry for what the other has to say. We just have to step outside our comfort zones to do it. For me, that meant analyzing the reasons I went into academia in the first place. I wanted to have time to find the solutions for people like the dedicated gymkhana organizers in Barstow. I’m failing them and myself if I don’t.

PhotoCredit: Yes, that’s the embarrassing hot dog eating contest picture I mentioned early, shot by my good friend John Galayda.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.