Written by Jonathan Walker
Media organisations could encourage journalists to embrace new ways of working by making it easy for them.
For example, articles can frequently benefit from the inclusion of related links. One method of getting those links to readers would be to create a del.icio.us account and direct readers to it.
But a simpler method would be simply to input them with the story itself. This would also allow the business to make better use of them, as the links would be associated both with an individual journalist and with a specific story, as well as being stored on the organisation's own servers. (Links from a journalist's del.icio.us account can be accessed as an RSS feed but I think it would be technically difficult to associate the right links with the right stories this way).
One of the obstacles to journalists doing this is frequently the content management system they use, which may not be designed to accomplish what the media organisation is trying to do.
Media businesses should take the initiative and develop systems designed to make it easy for staff to achieve what they want them to achieve.
I also believe that, while it makes sense to use whatever applications and web services are out there for the taking, it would be a mistake to rely on them. We should deciding what we want to do and then doing it - inspired by what other people are doing, rather than depending on them.
Below is a dummy front end (for authors) of a content management system which I think would be easy to use and accomplish some of what a multimedia news organisation should be trying to accomplish.
The front end is a vital part of any CMS, but a small one. And what is below is only for illustration - it doesn't work. And it is probably missing things. It's simply an attempt to illustrate what I mean when I talk about making it easy.
But I guess the solution is easy - I'll take a screenshot of it looking the way it should and place that in the article instead of the actual form (once I get home).
Thanks for pointing this out. Also, thanks for your other comments - you sum up the point I was trying to make pretty well!
2 days ago
Totally agree with you and, I think, a lot of media organisations are moving towards incorporating just this sort of capacity into their processes.
I also agree that we should only be using those tools that can offer value to our audience and shouldn't be dictated by the tech that's out there. I think there's value in experimenting with what exists for free, but you're right that it needs to return results and the case for its value needs to be made.
One of the things I think newspapers really need is more market intelligence on how their readers are responding to new digital products.