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NUJ follow up: I’m still not convinced

February 12th, 2009

I’ve been doing some thinking about this whole NUJ thing. My post the other night reads very ranty — indeed, I guess it is very ranty — but I’m pleased to see that many readers of this blog agree with what I’m getting at.

And, from the defence, I received some rather predictable responses against my argument.

I’ll start with this point, from Joanna Geary (formerly Birmingham Post, now The Times):

I have much sympathy with your argument, although £13 a month for legal protection may be worth it and it is for that reason I am still an NUJ member.

Of everything I received (and blimey, there was a LOT) this was perhaps the most useful. £13 a month, as Joanna says, is very good to get legal protection.I can’t argue with that.

But it’s comments like this from ‘Chris’ (no link given) that remind me why I wrote that post:

But you wait till you’re staring down the barrel of redundancy – through no fault of your own, just because it happens that your team is being shut down.

Wait till you’re being forced to accept alternative work in a place you don’t want to live or in an area you have no interest in.

Wait till you’re summoned to meetings for a “quick chat” and end up facing four senior managers using classic intimidation tactics.

Then you’ll wish you had a union rep by your side to help fight your corner.

It’s always good to have a union behind you if you’re facing redundancy. Now, I underqualify myself here, as not only have I never faced redundancy, but I work for a corporation that is arguably more ’stable’. In other words, licence fees are still coming in. While not immune, we are safer.

But my issue is that while the NUJ are fighting a corner, it’s all rather pointless. Take this recent example of an NUJ ‘fight’:

The NUJ has strongly condemned the decision of Independent Newspapers to enforce three redundancies at The Kerryman newspaper in Tralee.

Séamus said: “This proposal represents a direct attack on the editorial heart of one of the oldest and most significant newspapers in Ireland. The inevitable consequence would be a poorer newspaper, which would not adequately reflect the community life of Kerry.”

At a meeting with the union yesterday, management announced its intention to make three journalists redundant. The NUJ chapel held an emergency meeting at which management was urged to rescind the decision, which staff say will have a detrimental effect on The Kerryman and Corkman titles.

My issue with this goes back to my ‘SAVE THE JOURNALISTS!” argument. The NUJ is pouring its efforts into protesting job cuts, when really they should be coming together — as a union — to offer more productive aid to their members. Advice on training, re-skilling and re-deployment.

Ed Hart’s comment:

As an objective observer on this one, I have had good and bad experiences of unions. If I had to sum up what I would want a union to do and be, it is to work on behalf of its members. The problem is that some unions lose touch with what this means, and see themselves as lobbyists, or big movers and shakers; when in fact their remit remains low key, but essential to those who really should matter – their members. Do they occasionally forget who the customer is, and what their customer wants?

Helps me counter this argument from ‘thatstheway’ (uh huh, uh huh, I like it!):

Someone so self-consciously hip like you could have some input into its digital media strategy if you weren’t so busy doing precisely what you accuse the NUJ of doing all the time, which is complaining, and making digital media sound like some big deal that’s going to require your special skills alone.

I feel I could contribute with the NUJ no more actively than I could to ASLEF, the train drivers union. Why? I feel I don’t have a connection with their outlook in any shape of form.

I’m all for protecting the strength of print. By doing so, we uphold the values that have made our profession truly great. But I’m also aware that, like the industry, a union has to change and adapt. Sometimes there are battles that cannot be won by standing outside a building with a placard.

I think it’s time for the NUJ to take a step back and reflect.

It needs to swallow a bit of pride and admit that just because journalism is online, doesn’t make it bad. In fact, it can make it very, very good.

It needs to stop posting videos like this, which show not only a devestating lack of understanding about online media, but also an aggressive “We’re trained and you WILL employ us” attitude that we just can’t afford to have anymore.

Maybe what we need to do is knock our collective heads together and search for ideas of how the NUJ can modernise and become the forward-thinking union we all need it to be.

Because here’s the thing: I want to join the NUJ. One commenter on my last post accused me of having no sense of solidarity which, and I hope my friends would vouch for this, couldn’t be further from the truth. If the NUJ can bring itself up to speed, I would love to get stuck in and get my hands dirty.

I believe in the future of journalism. I believe that journalists will be as important in 50 years than they have ever been. I’m preparing myself, and training myself, for a world without newsprint. It’s time the NUJ got ready too.

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Posted in Blogs, Comment, Debate, Multimedia, My Work, Newspapers, Regional, Student Journalism, The BBC, The Future, The Web, main

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US Election online watcher’s guide

November 4th, 2008

NOTE: This page will be updating regularly from now until God-knows-when. Send me your suggestions here or leave a comment on this post.

Exciting times, folks. The hysteria surrounding these American elections really does make the British politics system Palin comparison. Geddit? (Sorry.)

After a brief Twitter chat with a friend, I thought it would be a good idea to make a little guide to all the best places to follow news and opinion as the action unfolds.

So here we go. If you have suggestions of your own, please comment/Twitter/or email. This is by no means a complete list — more the places I’ll be keeping an eye on as the action unfolds. Items listed in bold are personal recommendations.

VIDEO (streaming) – I’ll try and update these on the night as/when they go live

BBC News Channel (UK ONLY)
BBC US Election special section (Video link to come once online. My colleagues on ‘The Editors’ have explained all the things they have planned)
Sky News – Deadline USA (it’s not online yet, but look out for a CoverItLive! page on Sky, it could be good)
Fox News (US ONLY? Not working for me in UK)
CNN Politics
Al Jazeera English (Al Jazeera is also running this Facebook app)
ABC News (potentially awesome. Loads of video, but no live feed it seems. Judging by the comments on their lead story — 26,000 and counting — ABC could be the place for heated debate)

SOCIAL MEDIA

Twitter Election 08 (good for an overall snapshot, although I’m convinced it’s going to go down during the night)
Digg Elections 08 (great for the more quirky/viral viewpoints)
Election applications on Facebook (official election day ‘event’ is here)
Wikipedia (dedicated section that could be a handy resource… or may descend into mindless vandalism)
TwitterVoteReport (this’ll be the grand old duke tonight. When it’s up it’ll be up, but boy, when it’s down it’ll be very down. Hopefully it can stay alive — fantastic idea)

PRINT

Times Online: White House 2008 (The London Times is so confident in its coverage it’s been forced to take out a Google ad. Ahem)
New York Times: Elections ‘08 (nothing too exceptional here, but it’s hard to knock the quality of writing in the Times)
USA Today: Politics (some real nifty interactive features here. And they’re in partnership with ABC News too, so expect some good video)

WEB

Yahoo! Elections (shaping up to be exceptional coverage. Forums, RSS feeds, blog feeds, interactive quizzes and applications. I’ll have Yahoo! open for much of the night. Hardly surprising they’re expecting a big turnout)
MSNBC Deadline Dashboard (I like the name of this… ‘dashboard’. A dashboard is certainly what it is. Change the page to your heart’s content. And turn the USA blue…)

OPINION + BLOGS

Huffington Post (heavily pro-Obama, but plenty of lively writing from big-name bloggers)
Caucus Blog (New York Times)
Guardian Comment is Free US (more of a group blog feel to it for varying viewpoints)
Guardian Deadline USA
Tomasky (Guardian)
Justin Webb (BBC)
Mof Gimmers (Shiny Media)

SATIRE

The Onion

OTHER

PoliticalBetting.com (have a tipple on the results) » Read more: US Election online watcher’s guide

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Posted in Blogs, Debate, General, Multimedia, Newspapers, Social Networking, TV, The BBC, The Future, The Web

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Selling the BBC licence fee to the public (and Terry Tibbs)

October 30th, 2008

A few media commentators have used the Brand/Ross fall out to take swipes at the BBC licence fee. I fear it’s a debate that will escalate even more now that Jonathan Ross has been suspended for 12 weeks, an admission that the presenter got it very, very wrong.

I feel I’ll struggle to show objectivity with this post, given my current career developments, but hopefully people who know me can verify that my admiration of the BBC has existed for a long time — not just in the past few weeks.

When I taught in New Zealand, I introduced the BBC website as being the greatest news organisation on earth. Several students expressed their envy at not having such a well-respected public broadcaster on their own shores.

So why do I constantly come across opinion pieces, comments and blogs rallying fiercely against the £131.50 yearly fee? Do we really believe it isn’t good value for money?

The fact that we pay the wages of both Brand and Ross seems to have added an unwelcome fuel to this current fire. Anyone resents having to pay compulsory fees for anything; even something we enjoy as much as television and radio. Surprisingly, though, millions upon millions of us think nothing of paying the fee amount three for four times over to receive Sky Sports. Ironically, if the licence fee were higher, BBC Sport would be able to compete in that arena too.

It’s not often I agree with Noel Edmonds, but a while ago he made a terrific point about the BBC licence fee. Here it is (from the Independent):

Edmonds claimed his one-man protest was against the corporation’s “we know where you are” ad campaigns against those who didn’t have a TV licence, which he argued were threatening.

Spot on my shoddy-shirt wearing friend. The TV Licensing adverts are disgusting. They’re said in the same grumped-up tone as the adverts on benefit fraud. The psychology is all wrong. The BBC shouldn’t just be telling payers that they have to pay, they should be shouting about why it’s good to pay. What am I getting? Where’s the benefit? Where does my fee go?

Fonejacker — brilliant show about, topically enough, prank calling — has a wonderful character named Terry Tibbs. Terry is your old-school business man. And, ridiculous as he is, he could have some choice words when it comes to persuading people that the licence fee is worth it. In one sketch, he says this about buying a car:

“Hang about. Look. We’re not talkin’ money jus yet. Alright? I wanna know a bit more about the car before we get into that. Come on, you gotta seduce me. You don’t just jump into bed with Terry Tibbs. You take Terry Tibbs out to lunch. You wine and dine him. You give him an oil massage, and then he gives you nineteen-fifty, if you’re lucky.”

Now while that may just be an excuse to mention Terry Tibbs in a blog post, I think if the BBC imagined Terry when pushing TV licence adverts, there’d be a lot more enthuasiasm for our public broadcaster.

Rather than: “We’ll find you.” They should be saying: “Look what you’re getting, isn’t it brilliant?”

Yesterday, I visited a friend in Norwich. While I was there, I went to the wonderful new BBC building. In it was a library, cafes, studios… loads of stuff. Around the floor, stalls sold products for charity or small business. It was packed out — on a Wednesday. It’s just one small example of the goodness an organisation like the BBC can bring.

Think of the licence fee as a tax on a nation’s intellectual well-being. We pay tax to keep our roads in order. We pay tax to keep our health service running. Personally, I think a tax that ensures knowledge, entertainment and world class journalism is just as valid. Let’s never forget how important it is.

Sure, you may not like Russell Brand. That’s fine. Millions of people, however, do like Russell Brand, making the money paid for his services justified. The same can be said for Jonathan Ross, too.

I don’t like Cash in the Attic all that much, but I don’t object to my licence fee going towards it because I know many people do.

If we can get the public to understand all the goodness that comes from the BBC licence fee, then the battle to regain faith is almost complete. The first step is some positive fee-related adverts. Seduce me.

7 comments »

Posted in Debate, Ethics, New Zealand, Newspapers, TV, The BBC, The Future

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Russell Brand: Analysis or overkill?

October 30th, 2008

Wowzers. Take a look at this list of stories on the Russell Brand fiasco, all taken from Media Guardian. There’s 49 in total — and that’s before the inevitable truckload of posts that will follow now that Brand has resigned. I predict we’ll hit the 100 mark by the end of the week.

None of the links I’ve added here have been online for more than four days. Can anyone honestly say there has been this many developments? I don’t think so.

There’s analysis, and then there’s just anal. Enough of this madness.

Web-savvy standup with a licence to thrill and offend
Puerile prank that left BBC stars and executives on the ropes
Suited and booted: fall and rise of a showman
Patrick Barkham on Russell Brand’s ‘Hare Krishna’ chant and temple visits
Georgina Baillie: the Satanic Slut at the centre of the Ross-Brand controversy
Video: Russell Brand quits as BBC radio host
John Harris: What they did was grotesque
Andrew Sachs: profile
Russell Brand resigns from BBC as Jonathan Ross apologises for ‘juvenile remarks’
Video: Andrew Sachs on Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand: ‘I’m not collecting apologies’
Maggie Brown: Suspension is not enough for Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand
Broadcast rules should have saved BBC
In pictures: ‘Sachsgate’ – who’s who in the BBC hierarchy
Media Monkey: more from Sachsgate
‘Sachsgate’ – who’s who in the BBC hierarchy?

Loads more after the jump…
» Read more: Russell Brand: Analysis or overkill?

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Posted in Debate, Ethics, Newspapers, TV, Tabloids, The BBC, The Web

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Why I can never trust travel journalism again

October 22nd, 2008

Trust in the media is something we talk about on a grand scale. The Queen having a strop, for instance, or the uproar over You Say, We Pay on Richard and Judy.

We dissect the issue of trust when there’s been a major breach. But what of the minor ones?

I’ve long since got over the fact that some content is magazines is made up. Those sex stories in lads’ mags, for example, are not really sent in to the title. Rather, some delightfully imaginative staffer pens out some filthy fantasy.

It’s a white lie. A fib. I can deal with things like that, because they’re damn entertaining to read. Not a problem if they’re not true — I’m not relying on Nuts for tips in the bedroom, thanks.

I’m a lot more concerned about something I learned just this week. Over on a forum I frequent, a member posted a dilemma. A press trip to stay in a hotel (for reviewing purposes) was all set to go ahead. Booked it, packed it, etc. But then the magazine folded. The now angry hotel wants the journalist to pay in full anyway. The journalist explains:

“The hotel (a very swanky expensive one) offered three nights on a comp basis half board plus four nights on a media rate.

I’ve promised them I will try very hard to get something placed elsewhere BUT they have come back and said the hotel now wants to charge me the media rate for all seven nights and it’ll only be B&B.

So the stay will now cost me around £600-700 extra. Not good news.”

Not good news at all. But by far the most alarming part of those paragraphs were the words ‘media rate’.

One member shares my concern:

“I might be missing something here but how can you review a hotel when the hotel knows you’re reviewing it?”

To which comes this reply:

“I’d love to be able to review in secret but given my editors aren’t in a position to pay my expenses, the only way most of us can do travel pieces is by being hosted on press trips of one sort or another.”

Which is backed up further by another member:

“Straight hotel ‘reviews’ are pretty rare in travel journalism, really…they’re much more likely to be just mentioned in the fact box, with maybe a name check in the text for letting you stay for free. The nature of the assignments (ie. they would cost several thousand pounds to do) mean that in fact almost everything within travel journalism is paid for by someone other than the journalist.”

Thus rendering them useless, no? If hotel staff know you’re there to review the hotel, you can bet you’ll be getting preferential treatment. Quicker food, the best rooms, friendlier staff. In fact, I bet in the staff rooms they’ll have a list of which rooms have people paying ‘media rate’.

One member points out:

“I wonder how many negative reviews are written by journalists on freebies. It’s no wonder sites such as Tripadvisor are proving so useful.”

Quite. It goes back to a post made by former-Press-Gazette-now-PaidContent journalist Patrick Smith, who questioned the validity of film critics:

“A more extreme and amusing example of obscure film-blurbism Guy Ritchie’s not-awful-but-completely-bewildering Revolver (about gangsters, unsurprisingly). The film was universally panned by critics, yet huge billboards appeared around towns declaring it ”Brilliant…Guy Ritchie back to his best!”

Fair enough if that’s what you think, except that the line is from The Sun’s online film e-zine Film First which had bagged a WORLD EXCLUSIVE interview with the director, as The Guardian pointed out at the time. Private Eye established that the “brilliant!” part of the quote was from none other than The Sun’s Page 3 girl Ruth (she makes a brief appearance in the film).”

Are journalists really going to pan a hotel when they know that if they big it up, they’ll probably get another free trip again soon?

Perhaps more worrying is this scenario from another member:

“I only adored one of the hotels (one was fine but naff, and the other was fine but austere) they only used the one for the hotel I genuinely loved. I still got paid for all my work.”

So not only can we not fully trust motives behind hotel reviews, we also don’t get to see the ones that don’t get a favourable write up. Why is this? If it’s a high-profile hotel which turns out to be a complete stinker, isn’t the press in place to provide the service of warning us?

From when I was in New Zealand, I recall Jim Tucker telling me about how he went around Wellington reviewing restaurants. This wasn’t a press trip, and I’m certain Jim didn’t let them know he was there to review the food. His reviews never saw the light of day. Why? Because he dared to criticise.

We often call for high-profile journalists to declare their interests. In fact, a member of the same forum that I’ve been quoting from here has suggested we produce a national register documenting those interests. Great idea, I say. And, let’s not forget Robert Peston who is being ‘looked at’ because of some of his financial coverage. I believe we’ll find that Peston is merely a brilliant journalist and an astute financial genius, but we just don’t know how cosy he is to the people he reports on.

They’re more serious examples. But why not apply this practice to all journalists? If a hotel review has conducted with the hotel’s prior knowledge, then I think we, as readers, have a right to know this.

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Posted in Debate, Ethics, New Zealand, Newspapers

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Regionals should get their houses in order before trying to stop others

October 21st, 2008

I don’t think it’s fair that some of the local press is getting in a strop with Sir Michael Lyon’s plans for better regional BBC content.

Read this article in today’s Times for a bit of back story:

Newspaper groups are unhappy about BBC proposals to introduce ‘hyper-local’ news websites, covering a town or county, which they believe will stifle their digital growth, at a time when their profits are crumbling in the wake of the economic downturn caused by the credit crunch. The plans, though, have to be approved by the BBC Trust, which Sir Michael heads.

That paragraph, on its own, seems to present a good point from the regionals. Why should the BBC juggernaut — and it is a juggernaut, despite its well-publicised hardships — trample on the local press with its own hyperlocal offerings?

Chief exec of Trinity Mirror, Sly Bailey, has been doing the rounds lately. She’s been here there and everywhere defending newspapers. Her interview in Press Gazette was especially interesting — but since it’s not online, nobody can read it. Figures.

She pops up again in the Times piece:

Ms Bailey accused Sir Michael of holding “outrageous views” and making “an astonishing attack on the local press” and said that “research shows consumers rate regional press as more trusted than any other media, including the BBC”.

I trust my local paper. Why would I have any reason to disbelieve that a school put on a production last week? Or that someone is now 100 years old? I’m not dismissing local press as being trivial here, but my point is that it’s a lot harder for the BBC to maintain that trust when they deal with far more complex topics.

Here’s my main criticism of Sly and co.’s argument:

If the BBC doesn’t go ahead with its hyperlocal plans, will it mean local newspaper sites will improve?

I think we all know the answer.

My two most local newspapers — The Hunts Post and Cambridge News — aren’t doing nearly enough to engage with their readers online. The Hunts Post is a great newspaper. It has a small team. Too small, I’d argue, but that’s another issue. I don’t blame them for not spending too much time interacting online, because the paper still has a very strong print audience.

But the Cambridge News? Cambridge is a city of early-adopters. I once read that, as a percentage of total population, Cambridge has more people registered on eBay than any other European city. Sorry I can’t verify that with a source, but anyone who knows the city well wouldn’t find such a statement hard to believe.

Cambridge is a home to huge centres for the likes of Microsoft. Does its newspaper reflect that? I’d argue no, not at all. Their ‘blogs’ aren’t even blogs at all. Why is there not a news blog? Or a sports blog? Or, considering Cambridge is a hub for science in the UK, why not a science blog that is written in the same style as Bad Science in the Guardian?

If the paper has a Twitter presence, it’s not publicised enough. If they’re on Facebook, they’re doing a pretty poor job at making themselves known.

Now, it’s all well and good saying what’s wrong with a site. It’s another to prove it can be done better. Well there’s proof in Matt Gooding’s Cambridge United Blog. Matt writes for the Royston Crow — another newspaper starved of any kind of progressive internet publishing. I wonder if they know they have the likes of Matt in their ranks? A waste of brilliant blogging talent.

More to the point, though, if Matt is doing his Cambridge United blog in his own spare time, for free, using tools that are available for no fee, then why isn’t the Cambridge News? They couldn’t possibly complain of budget constraints. You know, even if they just aggregated his blog. Or linked to it. Or ANYTHING that acts as a service to readers to let them know that some brilliant, opinionated writing is out there.

The moral of this whole tale, of course, is that regional press haven’t dealt with the internet. It scares them. They don’t know how it works.

A friend of mine was recently told not to mention the internet in a job interview with a regional because “the editor doesn’t like it”. The editor should be sacked this instant. When I mention this tale on Twitter yesterday, I got a load of replies saying ‘I bet it was…’. All were wrong. But it goes to show that it isn’t an isolated problem.

If I was to meet Sly Bailey tomorrow, I’d tell her to wake up. Rather than have a go at the BBC for moving with the times, why not look into providing better websites yourselves. It doesn’t cost much. The site I created for Whitireia Journalism School in Wellington, New Zealand, earlier this year proves that so much can be done with so little time, effort and money.

I’m biased, of course, but I’d say Newswire.co.nz is a far better local news site than Cambridge News. Newswire’s total cost? About £200, plus my wage. Cambridge New’s total cost? I dread to think.

What will be most telling will be the response to my criticisms. There won’t be any — except maybe from Matt Gooding and those at Newswire. Why? Because they’re in control of their online identities. The likes of the Cambridge News won’t be aware of anything I’ve said. I hope they can surprise me, I really do.

I’ve used the Cambridge News as my example, but to steal a Sarah Palin-ism, I think it’s fair to suggest that Cambridge News is a microcosm of the UK regional press.

Many regional papers would be happier if the internet didn’t exist.

But here’s the good news: There’s still time. It can still be turned around. There is enough money in the kitty, and enough readership to give any regional paper some online success. Whether they rise to the challenge or not is up to them. If they don’t they’ve only got themselves to blame.

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Posted in Blogs, Debate, Multimedia, New Zealand, Newspapers, Social Networking, Sport, The BBC, The Future, The Web

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J-school debate: The best route to success?

September 3rd, 2008

What is the best way to train as a journalist? The debate is raging over on Mindy McAdams’ blog.

It’s widely accepted there are two main ways of getting into journalism. Route 1: A degree course of three years or more. Route 2: A trade school (or polytech if you’re in NZ. Or in the UK, this would be a college, I guess) for a year or so.

The third and so far unmentioned route is the ‘go it alone’ vision. It’s no secret that the world’s best journalists have landed via this method, but I’ll be discarding this one. Argue if you must.

The question is, then, which route is best?

I’m in the lucky position to have experienced both. I studied a degree in journalism at the University of Lincoln until this year (I graduate next week, expect a photo or ten!), and I also taught on a trade school course, out in New Zealand, at Whitireia Community Polytech.

The key difference here, I don’t really need to add, is that I was on opposite sides of the learning experience in Lincoln and Wellington.

I was lucky enough (honestly, it was a great debate) to enjoy this argument in real life over dinner with Jim Tucker and Martin Hirst.

On one side of the table, Martin defended degree courses. Three years at AUT, he said, not only gave you hands-on skills, but also the journalistic mind.

Jim’s course, however, was an intense practical endeavour. Students are journalists from pretty much day one.

At the time, I sided with Jim. Although I’d spent three years of my life at uni, not to mention a load of my own and my family’s money, I came to a conclusion that a trade school is the way to go. The course had one goal: to produce journalists.

You could argue — unfairly perhaps — that the trade school approach has somewhat of a production line feel to it. What they produce is journalists based on the designs of journalists gone by. Where a trade school lacks, I believe, is in creating thinkers.

Why are we doing this? Where did it come from? What will it become? — all questions that are rooted in studying ethics and history in detail.

During that dinner, Martin made the point that I could only make such observations about the two courses and their use in the world because I’d be lucky enough to have enjoyed both.

And let’s not forget that my position in NZ came about from this very blog. Would I have been discussing journalism in this way had it not been for my university education? I’m not sure.

But still, I put contacts, skills and value-for-money over all of that. And so still the trade school was winning.

I thought back to my uni life. I founded and edited a newspaper. I had a radio show. In fact, I dipped my finger in every available journalistic pie going. There are opportunities that can only be created by universities because of one simple reason: budget.

But that budget has it’s own unique cost. Universities are determined to fill their lecture theatres. I know Lincoln certainly was.

I’ve no doubt that universities have terrific journalism tutors, but what value is a tutor of any quality when they have over 100 students to serve? It’s impossibl to do it well.

With the small, trade school-sized classes of 20 or so, a tutor can really gain good rapport with all of them. At Whitireia, Jim and I would be thinking about stories that were coming in. “Ah, xxxxxx would be good for that story,” we’d often say. We knew our students. We knew their personalities. We knew that Dave plays golf at the weekend. We knew that Jono loved rugby — and that his girlfriend was a hairdresser.

Isn’t that how newsrooms work? Isn’t that how JOURNALISTS work?

There are two sides to this coin.

On one hand you have the might of university. The prestige, the money, the time and resources to really learn your subject. Whitireia could never, for example, install a great big radio studio like Lincoln did while I was there. The money just wouldn’t be there for it.

But on the other hand you have trade courses that involve little time-wasting, less money (let’s not forget: journalists shouldn’t just be those who have enough money to study away from home at university) and — from my experience at least — better 1-on-1 teaching.

When a j-school is small, it can swiftly adapt to new ideas. Take Whitireia’s NewsWire website. Designed, implemented and live within four weeks. The amount of ‘you beat us to it!’ comments we received when we went live tells you all you need to know about the speed in which a university curriculum can evolve.

“We’re going to do this, we’re going to do that.” I hear it everywhere. I heard it in NZ, I hear it in the UK. Well if I was a journalism student I wouldn’t give two hoots about what you’re going to do. I want to go somewhere where it’s happening already.

And although I feel bad in criticising my own education here, I don’t think universities provide the best source of learning for journalists. Not by a long way.

6 comments »

Posted in Debate, My Work, New Zealand

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Young journalist blog ring now open

August 19th, 2008

Just a quickie to let you all know that the ‘Tomorrow’s News, Tomorrow’s Journalists’ blog ring is now open for business.

Click here to get involved and sign up.

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Posted in Blogs, Debate, My Work, Student Journalism, TNTJ, The Web

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Sign up now for the young journo blogging ring

July 30th, 2008

A week or so ago I wrote a blog brainstorming a few ideas for a young journalist blogging ring. It was inspired by Jessica DaSilva, the rather brave intern who blogged her way into a bit of a nightmare, but then pretty much blogged her way into a glistening career at the same time. Wonderful, I thought.

Anyway, it made me realise that I don’t really know many young journalists that are bloggers. Apart from either friends who I’ve bullied into starting blogs, or some of my NZ students…. who I’ve bullied into starting blogs too :-D

So here’s the deal. John Thompson, from journalism.co.uk, has set up a new section of the site for our ring. It’s a Wordpress-powered site (woo!), which we can all sign up to and post to.

Now I know what you’re thinking: Can’t I just post on my own blog and then get the lovely link traffic?

Feel free — I’ll be doing it with my posts, for sure. However, by posting onto journalism.co.uk I think this will become an effective, managed resource that can be searched and archived in one sole location, thus making a sort of young-journalist knowledge bank on the web. And of course, let’s not disregard the clout journalism.co.uk has in the online journo world. There are few places better suited to hosting all of this stuff.

One of the concerns from my original post was exclusivity. I suggested — wrongly — that I (and others) pick and choose bloggers who had already made a name for themselves on the web. Wrong. How would that work? The whole reason for this idea coming into existence was because of Jessica…. who I’d never heard of. So to exclude bloggers who weren’t already famous from contributing is just a really stupid idea. Thanks to all who made the point perfectly clear via comments and emails. We’re debating already!

But there will be some restrictions. We need to keep this focused in order to make it useful and interesting.

So, to take part in the Journalism.co.uk Young Journalist Blog Ring, you will have to be:

a) Under 30-years-old. I know there will be a couple of disappointed people out there with this restriction, but without it I feel we lose the point a bit.

b) You blog (or plan to blog) about journalism in some shape or form. Bit of an obvious one, this, but I think it’s important that we’re all coming from the same place here. I’m not bothered what stage of you’re career you’re at, so long as that career’s journalism.

c) You promote the ring! If we all bring attention to this by shouting it from the rooftops, then there’s no reason why this can’t become the best point for young opinion on the media on the web.

Finally… I can’t write ‘the ring’ without thinking of that horrible Gollum chap. So, anyone who can come up with a good, catchy name wins… wins… your very own DVD copy of Batman: The Dark Night!* Wow!

So, if you’re interested, please email me: davelee.mail@NOSPAMgmail.com . Obviously, want to be removing that NOSPAM bit. If you’ve already emailed me, please do it again… I don’t want to miss anyone out, and my Gmail inbox is busier than a Barack Obama gig campaign rally.

I’d like to add, of course, that any suggestions are still very welcome as to how the ring should work. I’ve set those three requirements as a means of getting the ball rolling. But please, ideas wanted!

(*Which you can redeem by waiting until it is released, going to the nearest DVD store and handing over your money. Tee hee hee.)

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Posted in Blogs, Debate, My Work, New Zealand, The Future, The Web

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It’s the journalism that counts, not the technology

June 30th, 2008

G’day and Kia Ora from Down-Under. (See… picked up the lingo and everyfink.)

*ahem*

Right, we’re verrrry close to launching the news website that I have built. It’s called NewsWire, and come launch day, you’ll find it right here: www.newswire.co.nz . Until then you’ll have to do with a little coming soon note. Unless you know your way around Wordpress, in which case you’ll be able to load the homepage with a bit of URL jiggery-pokery.

But you wouldn’t do that, would you? It would be like opening window 24 on the 1st of December. It’s just not the done thing.

Anyway. To the point:

I hit a dilemma today. How involved in the web process should my students be?

In a perfect world, they’d do it all. Gather news, write copy, take pictures, record audio, take video, produce multimedia packages and so on. And then plonk it all into a CMS ready to hit the web at the click of a button.

However, we don’t live in a perfect world. Some people won’t get it. It’s not their fault. I can safely say that I could be taught by the artist in the world — but I’ll never be able to draw. Slightly different, yes, but the principles are still there. We have to get used to the fact that not everyone will be able to be an online journalist to the full degree.

But that’s not to say they can’t do some of it.

It’s like when I do radio. I can edit audio, cue clips up, do all (most?) of the technical things. Not to mention all the newsgathering beforehand. Yet, I couldn’t present a sandwich, let alone a radio show. So I leave that to someone else.

For web, what skills should we be insisting students learn at least?

Well, me and my crack team (so that’s myself and two tech-minded students, then), have decided that every student should probably be expected tonewsgather (audio, pictures and video included), and then accompany that raw material with a written article.

Said article should then be loaded onto the CMS (as I said, we’re using Wordpress. A doddle?).

That, the team decided, should probably be it. Students will then email their multimedia to a special Gmail account (for the storage, you understand) for it to be prepared and then uploaded before eventually going live.

The people doing the uploading will be a squad of four. Jim (the program leader), myself (tutor) plus Luke and Aaron — the two tech-minded students.

The process that the normal students won’t get involved in — unless they show a desire to — is cropping and resizing images; cutting, compressing and uploading audio/video; and producingslideshows with Soundslides. And, they will also be spared the hassle of using all the custom field bits of Wordpress that are necessary to make sure our template works correctly.

This is good from our point of view. It’ll mean we get sorted quicker, and content will be clean, consistent and well-produced from the offset.

But am I doing the other students a disservice by not insisting they get involved with the WHOLE procedure?

I’m tempted to run a series of 2-hour workshops on Audacity, Soundslides and Windows Movie Maker (no comments on the software, please. That’s all that’s on offer. And anyway, it’s a good bunch). But in doing so I risk making the whole experience seem too complex and, as a result, very offputting.

For me, online journalism isn’t about what goes on inside the computer. It’s more about attacking stories with a certain state of mind. It’s about knowing that certain stories work better with video. It’s about knowing that audio just HAS to be downloadable if we are to know how that greasy politician really sounded. It’s about seeing news in a way that isn’t just printed or spoken word.

That seems the greater goal: Giving the students that bite for online reporting. Once that’s laid down, the technical expertise can come afterwards — if at all.

Am I right?

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Posted in Debate, Ethics, Multimedia, Social Networking, Sport, Student Journalism, TV, Tabloids, The Future, The Web