There's been an emergence of online alternative journalism sites during the last two years.

Kudos go to many news media websites for embracing digital journalism and staying current. But if you’re interested in sites that push the boundaries of digital journalism, there are some sites worth following.

Hordes of content aggregation, content curation, citizen journalism, news crowd-sourcing, multimedia and long form journalism sites have sprung up in the last two years. They’re worth keeping an eye on if you’re a new media journalist wanting to stay current and ahead of the pack.

One example is Storify,which started up in 2011. It allows journalists and others to filter and decipher through the abundance of online information covering events, issues and other news. It’s sources are mostly social media channels such as Twitter, YouTube and Facebook, but also the mainstream media, bloggers and professional journalists. As a result, stories are often dynamic and multimedia.

NowPublic, based out of Vancouver, was the predecessor to Storify. It is described as a “multimedia online news magazine where you can make, break, shape, and share international news as it happens.” The site has five million monthly readers, covers technology, the environment, sports, health and whatever else is trending and is maintained by contributors all over the world.

Now Public has 5 million monthly readers, and its content covers everything from technology and environment, to health and sports. Articles are written based on the ‘trending issues of the day’, by contributors who add in background information, photos and videos. Contributions come in from citizen hacks in over 160 countries.

Then there’s MediaCooler.com, a digital content marketplace that lets publishers sell content to media outlets and buy features and columns a-la-carte from professional freelance journalists. It’s not really pushing the boundaries of online journalism but certainly fits a niche.

Scoop.it is a content aggregation site that journalists and other users can make use of. The site trolls the web and social media for articles dealing with subjects you may be interested in.

If you thought longform journalism was dead and been killed by 140-character tweets, there are a few sites devoted to long form narrative journalism worth visiting. You can get your longform fix at Longreads, Byliner, Atavist and a number of others keeping the art form alive in the age of short attention spans. Also checkout Matter, which is devoted to science topics.

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 .

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 .

Reddit user compiles first-hand report of shooting

Twitter Journalism

Old school journalists will freak when they read this but anyone who’s grown up with social media will probably think, ‘Yeah, Duhhh.’

Recently when two people were killed in a Toronto shooting, Reddit ran an interesting article on the incident, full of first-hand reports and comments. There was even some background about the gang affiliations of those involved. The story was online within hours and all of the reporting was done through Twitter.

Reddit user BitchSlappedByLogic compiled the report. Here’s a sampling:

“Apparently, it was this guy’s party, as he says here. He’d been planning this party since July 7th. This guy apparently anticipated that problems might happen at the party. This girl, too. This guy too. So this could be the result of a pretty well-known beef. This person was shot. As was this person. This person was also shot — twice. This person was also shot, according to this tweet. This may be her in recovery, though I can’t be sure.”

As you can see there are no names, only links to tweets and Twitter accounts.

Gigaom has a great post on the article and it’s journalism implications.

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 .

How one newspaper chain ruined its future by living in the past

Photo courtesy of The Failed Estate.

Just last month Fairfax, Australia’s largest newspaper chain, announced it would reduce its workforce by laying off 1,900 people.

Financial journalist Jim Parker has written an insightful blog entry about how Fairfax has been the author of its own demise. The company has bumbled and stumbled trying to stay current during the digital era. Parker blames it on clueless management that has never grasped the importance of keeping up with its readership.

Parker’s insights can be found on his blog The Failed Estate.

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 .

Do not feed the trolls

News websites protect online forums from trolls like this scary cave troll from the Lord of the Rings.

“Why don’t you write a letter to the editor,” used to be the automatic response from reporters when a member of the public took issue with an article they had written.

It was a polite way to say “Leave me alone. I’m on deadline.” But it was also the only way the public could get their viewpoints published.

Online forums on news media websites have changed that. Don’t like the way a labour strike was reported? Got your own viewpoint on the latest conflict in the Middle East? No problem, forums let you have your say and hold the news media accountable.

Unfortunately, some people are going to abuse this opportunity  – lacing their comments with four-letter words, rascist and sexist remarks and statements that make lawyers cringe (or smile). These people are sometimes referred to as trolls. Despite some of the negatives of online forums, news media websites keep them up and running as they try to build and facilitate online communities. That’s why news organizations hire editors to moderate forums and keep things civil.

AdWeek has an interesting article on the important role of the online moderator.

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 .

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 .

Food for thought

Photo courtesy of Winnipeg Free Press

Who ever said there was no such thing as a free lunch, never spent time with a news reporter.

Public relations folks know this and attract hordes of journalists to press conferences and media events by including six little words in a press release: “Food and beverages will be served.”

You’d think members of the fifth estate were half-starved street urchins. But the truth is, and this is my theory, reporters are always around when free food is served because it’s one of the few perks of the job. Ethically journalists can’t accept anything for doing their job, with the exception being what you can take away in your stomach (as long as it’s not a meal).

So what does this have to do with digital journalism? Nothing really, other than food.

The Winnipeg Free Press has taken the concept of an open newsroom and added its own twist to it. They operate a cafe in the heart of the city’s downtown. The paper’s multimedia editor, video reporter and social media reporter all work out of the cafe and other reporters are assigned weekly to work out of the establishment.

The public has a chance to speak to reporters, holding them accountable but also feeding them the odd story idea. Events are also staged there, including political debates, and also live-streamed through the Free Press website.

Deputy online editor John White says the cafe is a way to make the Free Press a physical community hub, which he hopes will translate into the digital realm.

The website 10,000 Words has written about it and you can also find coverage of the cafe at the Knight Centre for Journalism in the Americas.

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 .

Not all statistics lie

Click on the image for a larger view.

Journalists need to be picky when it comes to data.

Radio and TV reporters often have just 45 seconds to tell a story, so they don’t have the time to explain how each demographic group is affected in a story about the latest unemployment rate.

If you’re a newspaper reporter and you include all of the data in an article, the editor will curse you for writing a 300-inch story and then cut it to 30 inches so it cut it fits on the page. And that can be frustrating, especially if the editor chops the compelling paragraph about Grade 10-educated males who worship Ninhursag, the Sumerian earth and mother goddess, face 50 per cent unemployment.

Digital journalism is changing how we report large chucks of data like demographic studies.New types of journalists are telling stories using data visualization, also known as information visualization. They endeavour to display large chunks of complex data in an aesthetic, functional, intuitive and narrative format. It can also be interactive if it is presented on the web.

Have a look at The Jobless Rate for People Like You, published in the New York Times in 2009. This data visual uses just four demographic indicators – race, gender, age range and education level – to interactively show how various groups were effected by unemployment.

An example of a more complex data visual is The Top World Cup Players on Facebook, Day by Day, also published in the Times.

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 .

Digital journalism challenging the old school rules

The News of the World in England published its last issue after it was learned reporters had hacked into the mobile phone voice mail box of a missing 13-year-old girl who was later found murdered.

Not all reporters are fond of digital journalism because they see it challenging the ethics of journalism.

The best example is the sanctity of the newsroom. In the pre-digital newsroom, the news stories being produced for future issues were like trade secrets. Reporters who discussed stories in progress outside the newsroom walls risked being hauled into the editor’s office and berated or, worse case scenario, fired.

In today’s digital newsroom there are no walls. News is not protected until it rolls off the presses. Instead, articles are instantly posted to the news outlet’s website and shared through social media channels. Increasingly, journalists will use their own social media to develop a story. I know of one reporter who routinely tweets that she is about to interview a celebrity or CEO and asks her followers what questions they would like her to ask the individual, a practice known as crowd sourcing.

The web-first news approach and experiments in open newsrooms are a result of the changing media ecosystem. News outlets today compete against bloggers, tweeters and citizen journalists, who instantly post news. As a result we are seeing Ivory Tower journalism crumbling and journalism ethics evolving – yet many old school reporters are reluctant to change and cling to the past.

There’s been a great deal written about this topic. Here are a few of the better posts on the subject.

• Social media poses digital dilemmas for journalists – Journalism Ethics for the Global Citizen

• Ethical Challenges for Digital Journalism – Richard Gingras, head of Google News Products

• ‘Rules of the Road’: A conversation starter on digital journalism ethics – Steve Buttry, The Buttry Diary

• Online Journalism Ethics – Poynter Institute

• A Revolution in Ethics – Center for Journalism Ethics, University of Wisconsin-Madison

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

Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook for more discussions and articles.

Publisher sees nothing but upside in digital era

Here’s a great quote worth sharing about the future of digital journalism:

“This is like a Gutenberg moment. We’re reinventing storytelling on a digital platform. Suddenly, we can use every form of storytelling in one place — pictures, graphics, words. If we need an interactive map, show me the map. If it’s a plane crash, show me the video. We see a new art form that’s going to be a much more dominant form of storytelling. That’s the exciting part for me.”

The quote is from Larry Kramer, former senior editor at The Washington Post, who just became publisher and president of USA Today. Kramer, a multi-millionaire, is taking over a financially-troubled USA Today but he sees nothing but upside.

Here’s a Politico.com blog entry on Kramer’s appointment, some background on Kramer in Poynter.org and an article from The Washington Post.

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

• Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook for more discussions and articles.

How some newspapers attract page views

Content about kittens, celebrities and super models is a form of traffic bait to increase page views.

More and more the role of many newspaper websites seems to be pimping out fluff news or, as I call it, news porn.

In a quest to garner page views, newspaper websites post links to videos of cute cat antics, photo slide shows of beach beauties and content from the latest celebrity red carpet extravaganza or scandal.

However, when you read the print version of that same issue, it’s unlikely you’ll find any of this news porn or traffic bait. Instead, much of the ink is devoted to teacher strikes, tax increases and other news that actually affects our lives.

Online editors know a good thing and are reluctant to change this practice of soliciting page views because it works. Students at the Harvard Nieman Journalism Lab conducted a brief study showing how this practice succeeds. It’s not because it generates more clicks – their study found hard news stories and news porn were equivalent in click ability. It’s because content about celebrities, kittens and super models is cheaper to produce, delivering a higher return on investment.

Here’s a link to the Nieman study. And here’s another link to an article that offers an opposing argument. It’s a posting from Gigaom that discusses how hard news is better than traffic bait because it attracts more clicks on advertisements and how advertisers would rather be linked to legitimate news.

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

• Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook for more discussions and articles.

Digital Journalists must find new ways to protect sources

There’s a great example in the Columbia Journalism Review of how digital journalists need to find new ways to protect their  sources. The digital information we collect while reporting, such as video, recorded interviews and cellphone records, offer scrupleless governments a bread crumb trail back to the sources we may be trying to protect.

This example is a bit extreme and not something most reporters will ever have to deal with. It involves a British journalist conducting interviews with underground activists in Syria. Given the bloodshed unleashed by the Bashar al-Assad’s regime, any member of the press has a moral responsibility to protect individuals they interview.

In this case, things went sideways and the reporter was arrested, his digital information seized and used to track down the activists. Some disappeared while others had to flee the country with only the clothes on their backs.

Here’s the link to the article.

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

• Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook for more discussions and articles.

Digital journalists create their own online brand

Spuzzum is beyond Hope in the Fraser River Canyon.

Digital journalists understand what it’s like to be a reporter in a small town, something the Wired Reporter was exposed to early in his career.

When you work in places like Spuzzum (past Hope), Horsefly or Skookumchuck you never lack for opinions on the news you report, especially if you work for a newspaper. Each issue is read cover to cover by townsfolk and the news of the day becomes talking points until the next weekly rag rolls off the presses. Subsequently, small town journalists find themselves constantly accosted by opinionated  townies – in the coffeeshop, lined up at the grocery store checkout or while buying underwear at the department store. There’s no place to hide.

The same is true for digital journalists using social media accounts as their personalized news feed. But perhaps the biggest difference is they encourage audience involvement.

Many digital journalists brand themselves through their own Twitter feeds, blogs and other social media by sharing news reports, plus other relevant content, with the goal of creating a community (kind of like a small town). As a reaction, audiences consume, comment and share the content, which can help the reporter advance the story and sometimes results in a lead on another story. Reporters build relationships with these audiences through the buffer of social media, or, as Forbes puts it, “…building a bridge to connect… our traditional media heritage with the dynamic nature of digital publishing.”

You can read more on how Forbes connects with digital audiences by clicking here.

• 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.

• Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter and Facebook for more discussions and articles.

Tulisa, Twitter and the reporter

Tulisa and some rappers.

Being part of the crowd is not a bad thing for a journalist, especially if you use it to verify and collect information.

A recent buzzword in today’s digital talk is crowdsourcing. It sounds complicated but its not. Think of it as interviewing a group of people using social media. It can be a very powerful tool for journalists.

Let’s say you’re assigned to interview British singer Tulisa, reputed to be the sexiest woman in the world. The only problem is you don’t have a clue who she is. Many reporters would just conduct online research to fill in their knowledge gaps. The problem with that is most of the information will have been duplicated over and over, and probably originated from Tulisa’s publicist.

However, the savvy digital journalist crowdsources her fans by reaching out to them through Twitter and other social media. By using @officialtulisa (Tulisa’s official Twitter account that her fans read) in your message, you could tweet that you’re interviewing the singer and ask fans what questions they would like you to ask her. Of course, many of the questions will be lewd or just plain lame but some will be insightful. If you take things a step further, you could interview those knowledgeable fans using Skype to get even more details.

This is a simple way to crowdsource. For some more advanced techniques for journalists, read this great post at Poynter.org.

• 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.

• Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter for more discussions and articles.

New ideas needed to bring in new readers

I resent this article I found on Poynter.org.

The article, 8 strategies for reaching elusive young readers, has some great ideas. However, the second point – Hire young people – strikes me as a bit of ageism. It would have been better to phrase it: Hire young-thinking people.

Normally this sort of thing wouldn’t bother me but I’m getting cranky in my old age.

D’oh!

Anyway, great read. Here’s the link.

• Don’t forget to visit SFU’s New Media Journalism on Twitter for more digital journalism discussions and articles.

• 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.

A first for digital journalism

The Pulitzer Prize medal.

If digital journalism needed an official endorsement, it got it Monday (April 16) when the online-only Huffington Post and reporter David Wood received a Pulitzer Prize. Wood’s series Beyond the Battlefield took the honour in the national reporting category. The series delved into the challenges faced by severely wounded American soldiers after returning from Iraq and Afghanistan tours.

The Huffington Post’s win represents the first Pulitzer for a digital only news outlet. But it’s not the first time they’ve recognized online journalism. In 2010 the Seattle Times received the prize for breaking news as a result of its coverage of the shooting deaths of four police officers in a coffee shop. The Pulitzer singled the out the Times for both its online and print coverage.

The Pulitzer Prize board, to its credit, has not separated digital and print journalism. Instead they have melded the two together in awarding its prizes. Good journalism, according to the Pulitzers, can be found in both formats.

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

Another tool for reporters

I came across this journalistic tip searching Google… no surprise.

Search engines like Google have long been a journalist’s best friend. Not only do we use these algorithm-powered web crawlers to help research issues and people, we’ve started using more advanced search features to get the jump on our journalistic competition.

For example, reporters were quick to take advantage of tools like Google Alerts, which alerts you whenever new content is posted that matches search terms you’ve previously input. For example, I’m alerted by email when content is posted using key words and phrases like ‘digital journalism’ or ‘new media reporter.’

But here’s a new tool to add to your online toolbox.

Web analytics, which we normally use to track visitors to our websites, can also search out potential stories. Chris and Laura Amico, who run the crime news website Homicide Watch D.C., rely on analytics to scoop the competition on previously unreported murders in Washington, D.C. What they do is run analytics to find out what search terms are being used by visitors to get to their site. Then they compare those search terms to their website content. If a search term doesn’t match up to the content, they assume visitors are searching for information on an unreported homicide.

Next they search the web using those terms. If they get a hit it’s often on Facebook and Twitter, where people are quick to post digital memorials and inform family and friends of the bad news. The Amicos call their technique online shoe-leather reporting because they’re listening to what people are chatting about.

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.

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.