That guy you know from the Internet, probably.
A few familiar social bookmarking icons can now be spotted on stories at NYTimes.com. Just look for the Share heading in the Article Tools box. Click on it, and Digg, Facebook, and Newsvine buttons drop down, along with an all-important Permalink option that issues a linkrot-proof way to blog about the story in question, no trip to the RSS feed or old Link Generator page necessary.
via TechCrunch
Wow.
A great study by Northwestern master’s student C. Max Magee surveys Online News Association members and other online journalists to find out which skills are most important for aspiring Web-native producers and managers.
Some of the findings are pretty standard: Attention to detail, multitasking ability, and communication skills are high on the list. That should go for any reporter or editor.
When it comes to technical skills, HTML, CMS use, and Photoshop are the big three, with Web usability in fourth place. I’m not sure if we’re talking about accessibility or UI, but I’m glad to see that folks think it’s important, either way.
At the bottom of the list? Javascript, database administration, and Flash.
Hmm. I’d like to see those last two a bit higher, but perhaps the majority of papers take a walk-then-run approach, which makes sense in many, many ways.
Skills that aren’t mentioned at all? RSS and blogs.
Interesting.
via pretty much every blog I read, but here’s a link out to online news squared, the source of this bonus link:
The video editor at the New York Times answers questions from readers:
“…we don’t consider video journalism to be a ‘cyber-fad,’ or ‘an after-thought.’ Nor would we concede that television stations’ journalism is better produced than our own; in fact we have an advantage in being able to create a new form without being constrained by time limits or Nielsen ratings.”
Take that, broadcasters. Note to self: Production values are crucial…
[Ed. note: I normally stuff interesting job postings into the del.icio.us feed that runs down the right rail of this blog, or in your feed reader, but this one is too interesting not to point to from here.]
The New York Times is hiring a WordPress developer.
The job is posted on the PaidContent new media list, and I imagine it’s elsewhere as well. This is pretty high up there on the list of jobs I want, in about a year or two.
I don’t read the NYT blogs – I think some of them are behind the TimesSelect paywall, but I never stick around long enough to figure it out.
But still, there must be a dozen highly qualified WordPress developers out there who would drool at a gig like this.
Oh – note to J-School students – learning this stuff does, in fact, get you hired.
I haven’t seen it for myself yet, apparently not being one of the chosen 5,000 beta testers, but the New York Times aggregator/personalized news page called MyTimes is live.
Reviews, analysis, and gripes are up at TechCrunch and PaidContent, including screenshots for the curious.
It looks like a flawed but good effort from what I can see. The best part, or at least the most pleasant bit of functionality might be the sharing of your list of feeds with other users. Of course, their angle is more like “Read what our journalists read,” but the potential should be there to have a list of “friends” and be able to see their list of sources and easily add them to your own page, sort of Netflix-ish. Does Rojo do this? I think it might, but I don’t have any personal friends who use it, so it’s not something I’ve pursued.
What I know I like about this is that it’s a newspaper rolling their own RSS and social networking play, without hooking themselves to a MySpace or a NewsGator (Ed. Note: both of which I use with great frequency and abandon).
If more newspapers can make more of their own plays in the send-the-users-away-so-they-come-back-for-more department, they’ll be one step closer to becoming a destination for information rather than just one source of many.
Looks like I won’t be spending any quality time with Nick Kristof anytime soon. Casey Parks, a j-school grad student at the University of Missouri, won the trip to Africa with the New York Times columnist to report/blog/videoblog for NYT and MTV.
“One Day Soon, Straphangers May Turn Pages With a Button”
The New York Times reports on the move some newspapers are already making to e-paper:
“This is only one test of new e-paper devices competing to become the iPod of the newspaper business. Other e-paper trials are being undertaken by the paper Les Echos, which is based here, by the newspaper trade group IFRA in Germany and, in the United States, by The New York Times….The International Herald Tribune, which is owned by The New York Times Company, is also in discussions to make subscriptions available later this year for the same e-paper devices used by De Tijd, according to Michael Golden, the International Herald Tribune’s publisher.”
Engadget provides some recent updates on the technology.
Here’s my little futurist riff on the topic from a few weeks ago.
I’m having fun reading the headlines on all the blog posts that refer to a New York Times story from a few days ago. The story, which sported the headline “This Boring Headline Is Written For Google,” sort of half-explained the fact that online editors are now writing their headlines to specifically appeal to a wider audience on the Web that might not know exactly what they’re talking about when the headline is taken out of context of its home paper.
Oh, and this helps things like Google News find your stories, too.
A few amusing blog post headlines from a quick spin around the Web:
And thus, (a little bit late, I know), I’ve written a blog post about bloggers writing headlines about the New York Times writing headlines about writing headlines for search engines.
Meta.
The New York Times launched a redesigned home page yesterday, with Multimedia and Video high enough on the page to make me happy, and a cute little “Most Popular” tabbed box that includes the stories getting e-mailed and blogged the most, as well as the top search terms on the site.
It gets better. Click on an article, then scroll down to the bottom of the story, and you’ll find direct links to “Related Blogs,” as well as related stories (although anything older than a few days is hidden behind the Times Select paywall) and searches on the keywords from the story.
I was about to moan and groan that even after buying Blogrunner, the company behind the Annotated New York Times, the redesigned site hadn’t started self-annotating. Of course, I would prefer the blog links to be a little more high profile. Hey Mr. Apcar, how about creating a little logo bug for the “NYT Annotations” and placing those “related blog” headlines a little higher up on the page, a la WashingtonPost.com. Take a look at this article on trends in Internet traffic and notice how easy it is to find the blogs. Then again, my eye is drawn to the familiar little green Technorati logo.
The most intriguing link on the new NYT site is right on top of the page, just to the right of the “Home Page” button. It’s the one that says “My Times.”
Whoa. That looks like a New York Times personal homepage, or maybe an aggregator, or more likely, a memetracker. The tagline is “Where the best minds in journalism help you edit the Web.” Hmm. Interesting. You can even sign up for the beta to be notified when the service goes live. How very Web 2.0.
More along these lines:
“That’s right. It should abandon newsprint and force everyone to the Web. It should make a stand against Google, using its About.com division—something with real growth, and which is actually working out despite the $410 million in debt taken down to buy the thing—to lead the way. Maybe it should even take the revolutionary step of blocking Google from accessing its content, something no one else is willing to do. Or maybe it should at least say, “This is the deal: You want our stuff, you must share much more with us than you are willing to share with others.” It is worth it to preserve value for the future, to make it so our kids don’t think, Let me go to Google for all the news that’s fit to print. Heck, in another couple of years they won’t even know that the New York Times exists as anything but private-label news source for an Internet portal.”
What would your dream newspaper homepage look like? (And with that, I admit that I daydream about this sort of thing. Sigh.)
Commonwealth Club event at San Jose City Hall: Who Needs Ink?
Who’s here?
[ooOOh: There is free wifi at City Hall. Go figure… By the way, the SaveTheMerc folks were at the registration table.]
The Future of Newspapers is pretty timely at the moment, with the future of the Mercury News (way) up in the air, along with the 11 other KR orphans.
Oh, and I don’t have my camera with me tonight, but for nostalgia’s sake, you can check out this shot of Dan Gillmor with a couple SJSU faculty members from last year. (I am not a photojournalist.) If anyone took pictures tonight, I’ll happily link to them. (Steve Sloan’s got a shot here)
Okay, enough preamble…questions are being asked by Bettinger.
[Ed. note: If it’s not in quotes, it’s paraphrased.]
Do investors think the business model is broken?
Can the Web revenue grow fast enough?
Are newspapers dinosaurs? Slow, lumbering and tiny-brained?
How has Salon been profitable?
Verification before publication, or publication and self-correction?
The Google/Yahoo News question – aggregation vs. creation?
Audience questions:
Has the print industry outlived the business model?
Is the long form feature story dead?
How many audience members read a daily newspaper?
What should J-Schools be doing to prepare students for the future?
Tom Paine + Ben Franklin = blogs? Death of newspapers is okay, right?
What direction should news orgs be “sprinting” to in search of the new business model?
Why print out Web stories to read them, fellas?
Local weeklies, dailies?
Vision/Mission statement for a new print paper?
Last question: What’s the most important journalistic value that needs to be preserved, and how?
(For the answers to a few more questions, check out Edupodder Steve Sloan’s podcast, recorded last night after the panel discussion.)
My take: First one to figure out a new business model for newspapers WINS.
Personally, I think the print newspaper should either be a luxury item or a rock-bottom bare-bones tabloid. Perhaps both, eh? Charge more (alot) for the fat luxury version, and charge advertisers more (alot) to reach the demographic that can afford it. In the tab version, print just top national news, more local news, sports, and the funnies. Make the tab free, with appropriate ads for the demographic it reaches. The luxury version is what subscribers get at home, the tab is what you pay 50 cents for at the newsstand, and the online edition is completely free, with lots of multimedia, audio, video, opinion, blogs, forums, and comments are on everywhere. But that’s just me.
Win a trip to the developing world with Nick Kristof.
What?
And you won’t just be watching. I want you to report as well – probably in a Web log or video blog on the New York Times Web site, maybe in some other way. I’m open to other ideas as well, but I want you to convey reactions to what we encounter to the Times audience. You won’t be practicing tourism, but journalism.
We’ll be traveling with Naka Nathaniel, who is legendary at The Times for his multimedia presentations on the Web. He often travels with me to produce video specials from my trips, and he’ll work with you as well on your presentations and help you file them by satellite phone.
Okay.
Ryan Sholin 
