Written on Friday, November 6th, 2009 at 4:08pm by Christopher Smith | 5 Comments

Video – Journalism Panel Discussion

I’m efforting some way to get this into an more easily viewed interface and maybe cut it into smaller chunks.  Until then, enjoy.

Some thoughts on the panel discussion graciously hosted by Buffalo Spree Magazine:

  • Journalism itself is NOT on the brink, content delivery mechanisms are changing and old paradigms are sunsetting.  Interestingly, it seems that people in the newspaper industry conflate the newsprint on which journalism is delivered with the journalism itself.  They have trouble seeing a way in which news will continue to be reported without the support of the print product.
  • We need to stop thinking that online media and journalism is an evolution of the newspaper industry.  They are completely different animals.  Applying the same methodologies for monetizing print publications to web journalism is a ticket to failure.
  • Niche players will report; large outlets will curate and distribute.  That’s the new paradigm.  Reporters must take input from multiple sources, including bloggers, subject matter experts and the readership in order to produce content that people want to consume and share.  Once upon a time, editors at print and broadcast outlets were able to determine what information was important, how it was reported, when it was reported and to whom it was reported.  That’s all over now.  Open the process and be inclusive to make a better product.
  • Stop worrying about how many people come to your website.  It just doesn’t matter.  Make your content ubiquitous, place it in as many places as possible, remove barriers to entry.  Build a community and advocates first, monetize later.

If you were in attendance at the panel and have questions or thoughts, please leave them here.  I’ll add more thoughts when I have a bit more time.

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5 Comments

  1. Kevin Purdy says:
    November 6, 2009 at 6:00 pm

    I have a longer-form response to the panel I’ll hopefully get to writing. In the meantime, I’d have loved to have asked this question of the panelists (you included, of course):

    If you had a squadron of web geeks who could do pretty much anything, and a full week off to address the problem, how would you fix, or improve, your commenting ecosystem?

    Reply
  2. Marc Odien says:
    November 7, 2009 at 3:54 pm

    that’s a good question. I’d have to think about it for a bit, but I would start by adding a log in section to comment and tie it into open social or facebook connect for starters.

    Reply
  3. Christopher Smith says:
    November 9, 2009 at 12:58 am

    Before I respond to what I would do with an army of geeks, let me give some quick background on my comment philosophy…

    - Comments on my site have usually stayed on topic and mildly interesting, primarily because I tend to write longer pieces and those who comment on them have an evolved position they’d like to discuss. After all, the comments you get are a reflection of your writing style. If you write throwaway articles, you’ll get throwaway comments. If you challenge people to think about an issue from a different angle or demonstrate you put thought into your post, you’ll usually get thoughtful comments back.

    - I treat my comment section like a garden, I remove the weeds before they overgrow the garden. If you’re not on topic and if you descend into personal insults, attacks or dabble in libel or racism, I’ll edit or delete the comment. I can’t have a site filled with angry invective greeting people who are coming for the first time.

    Now, if I had an army of geeks at my disposal, I would immediately implement OpenID and Facebook Connect commenting. I want people to generate and expend their online social capital here, not just operate in anonymity. I’d also add nested comments which allow users to respond directly to one another. I might also experiment with the Salon-style comment management system wherein the comments go into a separate part of the site rather than co-mingle with the article. I know there are WordPress plugins that do some of this, but they have been resource intensive in the past and our site is already a whale. I don’t need more MySQL limiters.

    Most importantly, I’d like to find a system that rewards quality comments with game mechanics. Moderators for the site elected by the audience to dole out karma points for solid contributions and take points away for negative contributions. Users would also generate points for Re-Tweeting our articles and linking to them on various social networks (which could be tracked with OpenID and FB Connect)

    At the end of each month, people get to level up with new titles, new features and SWAG. Incent good contributions, get good contributions.

    Reply
  4. Marc Odien says:
    November 9, 2009 at 1:26 am

    can you get that band a geeks together immediately for us kevin… Thanks…!!! :-)

    Reply
  5. Kevin Purdy says:
    November 9, 2009 at 12:19 pm

    @ Marc: Sure thing. I’ll need some ether, cotton rags, and a windowless EconoVan, plus a UB parking tag.

    @ Chris: Thanks for the thought-out, intriguing response. I’m especially intrigued by your enthusiasm for game mechanics in commenting.

    Reply

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