What’s a Wiki?

Continuing from the last blog post, here’s the second part of digital journalism terms and definitions.

If I’ve missed any terms please email me (wired@sfu.ca) and I’ll add it.

Mobile Optimized: A mobile optimized website is a website that is optimized for mobile devices. Meaning, it has been designed and formatted to read and navigate easily on the small screens of mobile devices – Yellow Schmello.

Mobile Web: The mobile Web refers to the use of the Internet through handheld mobile devices. Increasingly, smartphones and other devices with wireless data access structures access the same “full” Internet traditionally accessed on desktop or laptop computers – Techpedia.

Multimedia journalism: The collective use of many media types–such as text, audio, graphics, animation, video, and photographs–to convey information –The Multimedia Journalist.

Open Newsroom: Open newsroom involves inviting online readers to become a part of the story process – Columbia Journalism Review.

Paywall: A system in which access to all or part of a newspaper website is restricted to paid subscribers – Dictionary.com

RSS: Really Simple System allows subscribers to receive updates, such as news headlines and blog entries. from websites and blogs.

SEO: Search Engine Optimization is the use of methods and techniques to improve the visibility of a website. It uses natural means to achieve natural listings on search engines – SEO Best Tools.

Smartphone: A cell phone with built-in applications capable of Internet access.

Social Media: A variety of Internet-based tools and platforms that allow users to share information and interact.

Tag: A common type of metadata used to describe a piece of content that associates it with other content that has the same tag. Tags can be specific terms, people, locations, etc. used in the content it is describing – Poynter.org.

Wiki: A wiki is a website which allows its users to add, modify, or delete its content via a web browser usually using a simplified markup language or a rich-text editor. Wikis are powered by wiki software. Most are created collaboratively – Wikipedia.

To learn more about digital journalism, enrol in the New Media Journalism Certificate program offered by Simon Fraser University Continuing Studies.

For more discussions and articles on digital journalism, go to SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitterand Facebook .

Apps for the digital journalists

A digital journalist using a smartphone to record U.S. President Barack Obama.

We previously mentioned the iPhone or smartphone being essential to the digital journalist, but what kinds of apps and software should you have loaded on your mobile device?

Obviously you need the basics like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, but there are so many more. You’ll need an app to take notes with, record and edit video, upload to a cloud server and other functions that have become important for digital journalists.

The Wired Reporter has come up with a few lists of essential apps. Here’s one from a U.K. journalism site, another from the National Association of Black Journalists, and this one from the Poynter Institute.

The one and only tool a digital reporter needs

Just think what you can do if you were a digital reporter armed with an iPhone on the night the Titanic sunk? Your news outlet would drown in the great coverage you would supply.

Recently the Gannett media company in the U.S. purchased 1,000 iPhones for its reporters. The Wired Reporter doesn’t think it was because they wanted their journalists to be trendy. We all know it’s impossible for reporters to be cool.

No, Gannett’s bulk iPhone purchase is a strategic move to take advantage of the technology found in the iPhone 4S and some of the other high-end smartphones.

Let’s consider the latest iPhone and other current smartphones. They’re armed to the teeth with features and there are thousands of apps that add even more functionality.

Let’s say the Wired Reporter were onboard the RMS Titanic on that ill-fated night on April 15, 1912 and just happened to have his trusty iPhone. The first thing a cracker-jack reporter would do is use that smartphone to snap some high quality still images of that iceberg that strayed in our path. We’d then crop and edit the images before posting them to our news organization’s website, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and 500px.

We could then use the phone to shoot HD video of the Titanic’s crew assessing the damage and passengers playing shinny with chucks of ice sheered from the iceberg. We’d also turn the camera on Capt. Edward Smith to get his reaction to the collision. The video clip would be edited using an app and uploaded to the news site and YouTube.

The hard-working Wired Reporter would also be writing and posting an article at the same time, updating the story as things progressed. I could also use my smartphone to record audio interviews with John Jacob Aster IV, the wealthiest passenger on the Titanic, then edit the file and send it off to a news radio station in New York (just pretend the Internet has already been invented).

Get the idea? Every digital reporter is now a one-person multi-media reporting team, complete with post-production facilities.

Here’s a great article that outlines some of the skills and techniques involved in live digital reporting.

To learn more about digital journalism, enrol in the New Media Journalism Certificate program offered by Simon Fraser University Continuing Studies.

For more discussions and articles on digital journalism, go to SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook .

Smartphones, tablets and the Olympics

If you want to get ahead of the technology curve, or at least ahead of most people using technology, think mobile.

The mobile web, which we access using our smartphones and tablets, is the fastest growing part of the Internet. That’s because smart companies and organizations know that sometime before 2014  most North Americans will access the web with their mobile device, and not their personal computers. Heck, the sale of smartphones now outpaces the sales of computers on a unit by unit basis.

Newspapers and digital journalists must be early adopters of mobile by making sure their websites are mobile optimized and taking advantage of mobile tools like SMS (short message service), QR codes and Near Field Communication. The Wired Reporter’s favourite mobile-ready newspaper websites is www.bostonglobe.com. The site was created using responsive web design so it will fit any screen size perfectly.

With the London Summer Olympics about to begin, now is a great time to learn about the mobile web. The major TV networks, news agencies and content providers covering the Olympics will likely be making the mobile web a dominant communications platform. The evidence is there that consumers will use mobile to consume their news. During the last Olympics, the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, NBC’s web pages were viewed more than 58 million times during the 11-day games,

For more discussion on the mobile web as it relates to news organizations, check out this article in 10,000 Words.

To learn more about digital journalism, enrol in the New Media Journalism Certificate program offered by Simon Fraser University Continuing Studies.

For more discussions and articles on digital journalism, go to SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitterand Facebook .

Invasion of the techno zombies

Ever been in this scenario? You meet your favourite peeps after work for appies and drinks and discover they’ve turned into techno zombies.

They’re iPhone obsessed or addicted to a Crackberry. In other words, they suffer from iDisorder – an obsession with mobile media technology.

You realize your friends require an intervention because their eyes flutter back and forth between you and their smartphone as you’re talking to them. When there’s a break in the conversation they mumble,”Jus a sec.” and start emailing or texting someone.

When the discussion resumes, they start talking about the time they lost their iPhone on SkyTrain.

“I felt so naked without it. I panicked,” they say.

Their admission gets sympathetic nods from the other zombies.

“I once took a cab home at lunch because I forgot my phone when I left for work in the morning,” admits your lawyer friend.

“I can’t function without it,” adds the social media specialist.

The worst one in the crowd is your buddy who’s a journalist. That’s because she has two obsessions, her iPhone and breaking news. She’s constantly checking headlines from various news outlet websites. When a news story breaks, her fingers are a blur as she tweets the latest story on her smartphone.

The growing number of techno zombies is a good reason to support a Technology Sabbath. Once a week we all need to reconnect with ourselves, family and friends. That’s not something you can do face to screen with your smartphone or hypnotized by your tablet or computer screen.

There’s a great article about unplugging from technology on the PBS MediaShift website. You can also learn more by reading the Technology Sabbath manifesto and the Huffington Post has a great article about smartphone obsession.

I would recommend you read these articles and then go for a walk, meditate, talk with others or anything else that doesn’t involve technology.

To learn more about digital journalism, enrol in the New Media Journalism Certificate program offered by Simon Fraser University Continuing Studies.

For more discussions and articles on digital journalism, go to SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook .

Print dollars replaced by digital dimes

Newspaper print advertising is down, according to the 2012 State of the Media Report.

The financial crisis for newspapers is not a viewership crisis. It is a revenue crisis.

That’s one of the points raised in a webinar this week that featured Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Pew Research Centre’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. The webinar, hosted by the Poynter Institute, discussed the findings of the 2012 State of the Media Report.

Let’s not go into lengthy detail to discuss the report, but instead, here are some of Rosenstiel’s interesting remarks:

• This is Year 16 of the digital revolution.

• People are accessing more news from news media sites as a result of mobile devices.

• People access news sites more frequently and longer on mobile devices than PCs.

• Newspaper websites see a spike in traffic between 10 p.m. and midnight, as viewers take a longer, more in-depth looks at news stories.

• Tablets like the iPad provide us with more of a print experience.

• Online subscriptions are gaining traction, with the New York Times boasting 400,000 subscribers.

• The high cost of printing and circulation will result in many newspapers offering online-only issues during the week and just one print issue on the weekend.

• 15 newspapers a year vanish.

• Online advertising is not growing at the rate print advertising is declining. As a result, newspapers are trading print dollars for digital dimes.

• The number of people who consume news using social media is low.

• Companies like Yahoo and Google could start becoming news content producers as traditional news media newsrooms shrink.

To learn more about digital journalism, enrol in the New Media Journalism Certificate program offered by Simon Fraser University Continuing Studies. Click here to register for a June 23 information session on the program.

People consuming more news with mobile devices

Two ways to access the web when you're mobile. The first method requires regular visits to the chiropractor.

The Pew Research Centre’s 2012 State of the Media Report has been released and the highlight for digital journalists is the public is consuming more news, more often and for a longer period of time. However, they’re using mobile devices (iPhones, smartphones and tablets) to do so.

So should we be praising Apple Inc. for selling wonderful web-serving mobile devices which, you could argue, kicked off the mobile web revolution?

Perhaps, but credit should also go to news organizations for realizing the importance of the mobile web. Most prominent news media outlets now have a mobile app or mobile-optimized website so smartphone and tablet users don’t have to zoom in and out to read headlines and articles. Traditional media have been leaders in recognizing the future dominance of the mobile web and quick to embrace it.

They know that by 2013, people will spend more time surfing the web with mobile devices than desktop and laptop computers. We’ve seen the shift coming as smartphones now outsell PCs.

So… the moral of the story for news outlets that haven’t caught on yet: get mobile or get left behind.

To learn more about digital journalism, enrol in the New Media Journalism Certificate program offered by Simon Fraser University Continuing Studies. Click here to register for a June 23 information session on the program.