Invisible Inkling

Ryan Sholin on the future of newspapers, online news and journalism education.

All About public-forum

Debunking the coulda-shoulda-woulda myth of online news

January 21, 2008 – 7:18 am

I’m trying quite hard to stay out of the business of chasing after curmudgeons with a laptop in my hand, shouting “But you got it all wrong!”
Trying. Quite. Hard.
So let this be just a generic blanket response to a common misconception about the business of online news.
The premise, as laid out in hand-wringers [...]

Keep your code of conduct out of my communication medium, thank you kindly

April 9, 2007 – 7:04 am

Let’s be clear, here: There are trolls everywhere. On the letters to the editor pages of our newspapers, on every daytime television talk show, not to mention most hours of cable news, at the table next to us at the coffee shop, the halls of Congress, and yes, in the blogosphere.

Comment trouble at the Arizona Daily Star

December 13, 2006 – 9:14 pm

Danny Sanchez points out an explainer from the Executive Editor of the Arizona Daily Star on why comments were deleted from some stories:
“While we created the reader comments feature to give readers a place to talk, StarNet is still our house. And our editors and staff simply do not want guests [...]

How to juggle multimedia and Digg interactivity

November 17, 2006 – 9:35 am

In two back-channel online news discussions this week, folks have been debating how newspapers should be gathering video and how they should handle comment moderation.
The video discussion among Howard Owens, Mindy McAdams, and others, is notable because the question is no longer IF newspapers should be running video online (Yes) or HOW they should be [...]

The truth about online community building at newspapers

September 14, 2006 – 9:36 am

Let’s get something out of the way here.
From an idealistic, do-gooder, journalistic point-of-view, building a community around/at/affiliated with your newspaper’s Web site is all about giving people a place to talk to each other, find like-minded individuals, debate, discuss, share, and participate in local and far-flung news.
That’s great. In fact, it’s so great that [...]