I can has news crowd-sourcing filter in journalism?

I Can Has Cheezburger‘s Scott Porad has written an interesting article for Journalism 2.0 about how it has evolved the crowd-sourcing ideology of sites like Digg to a filtering process that gives it the best of both worlds of receiving citizen content and using an editorial team to choose what’s the best.

The journalism world is facing the same challenges as does his media outlet, albeit without adorable kitty cats, he says. The challenges have changed: once, reporters struggled to find good sources. Now, there’s so many sources, one has to filter out the best.

By way of example, let’s refer to the recent “man overboard” report on a Washington State Ferry. Within moments, Twitter was alive with real-time reports. All the news reporters had a million sources, including the US Coast Guard which was tweeting events as they happened.

But that didn’t mean they were all quality sources: yes, a report was made, helicopters were dispatched, and a search was on. But, there was no man overboard; it was a false alarm. Suddenly, the job of the news reporter changed; no longer was it “where or how can I find someone who will tell me what’s going on aboard the ferry?” Now it was: “of all these people reporting what’s happening on the ferry, who is telling the truth?”

Is crowd-sourcing alone the future, or should an editorial team help pick the best content? Should we even consult the crowd at all, or are experienced journalists best for choosing the most important content? Or is Porad dead on: should news orgs use both methods to create the best editorial product?

Will copy editing be lost online?

As I promised in class Wednesday, here is the link to the Vanity Fair executive literary editor chopping to pieces Sarah Palin’s resignation speech. Let’s leave partisan politics aside and realize this for what it is worth: a great example of the integrity that we as journalists must to strive to uphold in light of the fast-paced online publishing world.

This post at Eat Sleep Publish, which discusses copy-editing disappearing out of the picture quicker than AOL, is scary to me. A snippet from the story:

“[B]logging mogul Jason Calacanis of Weblogs, Inc. (and now Mahalo) once pointed out that he doesn’t fix typos on his blog posts because it helps convey the immediacy of his thoughts.”

Does Calacanis, who is well-regarded as an innovator in the online media industry, have a point? Or will we end up missing out, albeit, with many people (whom don’t necessarily appreciate or care about clean copy) never realizing the loss?

Mexico at War

The Washington Post’s Mexico at War: Journey Along the Border is a multimedia article about how towns across the US border are being affected by the current war on drugs. The article mainly focuses on the human aspect of the war and how people’s lives have been drastically changed since the start of these drug wars.

The story incorporated video, flash, and HTML very well to compliment the text. The piece profiles 13 different towns across the border and the people living there. On the top of page there is a Google Maps image of each place the reporters have visited and the routes they took to get there. The links to each story are set up in same way that Google Maps would give you directions. When you click on the small blue dots you are taken to story about that particular town.

Spliced in between the text are either photos or videos. This way immediately after you read about something you are able to watch a video or see a photograph that brings it to life. Combing all these different types of media the story is able to really set the scene and capture the mood of the people living in these towns. If this story were to be presented in a traditional format there would no way they be able to present this much information in one place.

I personally feel that stories like this are going to be the future of journalism. Journalists are now able to combine broadcast and print journalism into one place. The reader now has a much greater chance to fully grasp whole story than ever before.

One of the best aspects about online journalism is the fact that readers are able to comment on the story. Literally the second after a story is posted on the internet any person from any walk of life is able to comment back and say exactly what they think about the piece without going through any filter. I feel this is a really cool way to get people more involved in the news that they read.

At my first glance I was not able to get through the entire piece because there was so much information to sift through. It is different than a lot of online journalism that you. Most of the stories online I have come across were intended for the reader to give a cursory glance and then goes on to something else. This story on the other hand is extremely in-depth and does an amazing job in capturing just how devastating this drug war is. How this whole ugly war is destroying towns and thousands of lives while the average American has no idea it is going on right under their nose.

If mainstream media can’t break news, what can it do?

Here’s a quick article about the changing landscape of breaking news. Stories are being published faster with new social media platforms like Twitter, but more notably, they’re getting published faster because publications aren’t afraid to run with one source leads. This leaves fact-checking virtually out of the picture.

Mainstream media has long relied on breaking stories like this for eyeballs. If they can’t provide breaking news, how can news organizations attract people to their products?

Andrea HTML Outline link

http://astro.temple.edu/~tub79963/andee/fleamarket.html

Las Vegas Critique By Andrea

“History of Las Vegas,” is a project by the Las Vegas Sun that illustrates how Las Vegas came to be the “entertainment capital of the world,” through a multimedia look into the history of the town. The project includes over a 150 stories, 30 video and slide shows, audio commentary, interactive maps, infopraghs, timelines, archives and much more. There is an endless amount of information on just about any topic relevant to Las Vegas.

The site utilizes html and Flash. Flash is used in almost every element of the site. Obviously, it used to play videos and in the interactive pieces, but it can also be found in many print pieces. There are slide shows that play on the pages that house the articles. Some of the Flash elements used are very simple and some seem very intricate.

The main header image uses Flash. A slide show runs behind a transparent image and if you run over an image of the famous Las Vegas neon sign, the lights on the sign will flash. Directly under the image are 3 images that link to different featured aspects of the site. One link takes you to an interactive map of “The Strip.” You can see all the casinos that are currently on the strip and alter the map by selecting different decades. If you click on a casino a window will open with history, information, stats, pictures and links to articles about that particular casino. The graphic allows you to change to a map of downtown or the valley as well. This was one of the most impressive parts of the site. Another aspect of the  site that was striking was the sheer amount of information and media that was collected, gathered and presented. There are video profile pieces of many prominent  figures  including, Elvis Presley, Hank Greenspun, the Rat Pack and more. There is video of casino implosions, a twelve part history of Vegas and much more. Other interactive aspects of the site include a graphic that shows you Mob history, how mobsters were connected, what casinos they were connected to and their history.

There are many great aspects of this site that work so well to provide an in depth story of the growth and transformation of Vegas. It does not work like a normal print story, instead it allows you to interact with the information and follow it through all the different connections that you select.

Some of the pieces did not work as well as others. For example, the mob history interactive, was lacking in some aspects. For some reason the images they use are fuzzy. One of video pieces was about Elvis impersonators. The particular piece was not very well done. However all and all, the site as a whole had so much to offer and did a great job showcasing all its data.

The flash elements all worked well and were seamlessly incorporated into the pieces. The other technical and organizational element were strong and functioned correctly and quickly to make navigating the site easy and fun.

Andrea’s Web site

Punk Rock Flea Market 

 

http://astro.temple.edu/~tub79963/andee/trailmar.html