Entries from January 2010

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Prospective journalism students: the question I may not be able to ask…

Why on earth do you want to spend three years and £20,000 learning the ropes of what appears to be a dying industry? Well – dying in the sense of “very, very difficult to make a living in”. Yes, it’s student intake assessment today, and I get to play my part in deciding the fate of […]

Friday, January 22nd, 2010

Death of my Apple PowerBook power connector

Things have been quiet here on Freelance Unbound for a few days. Partly this has been me having a rest after the orgy of news:rewired coverage, and partly because I had to prepare for teaching an interesting course to journalism students at Solent University on online strategy. This ties in nicely with the entrepreneurial journalism […]

Tuesday, January 19th, 2010

Afghanistan journo death highlights tabloid rivalry

A week late, but still interesting, here’s the difference in stance of the two big red-tops over the death of war correspondent Rupert Hamer by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan. For those of you who missed it, The Sun‘s coverage is in that teeny column in the bottom left. Because he was a Mirror man, […]

Monday, January 18th, 2010

News:rewired – your handy guide

#newsrw Rather than adding too much to the slew of news:rewired reviews and analysis, here’s a handy guide to some of the coverage session by session. For all your Twittering and Flickring needs, check out the news:rewired site’s Buzz page. (Journalism.co.uk has prepared its own catch-up guide, which is doubtless better. They organised it, after […]

Sunday, January 17th, 2010

News:rewired session – crowdsourcing

#newsrw As reported elsewhere, the Crowdsourcing session at news:rewired was a fractious affair. Setting that aside – here are some lessons learned. Key question: Does crowdsourcing = crowd following? Make sure you’re doing what journalists normally do – go to where people talk and eavesdrop. Ruth Barnett, multimedia producer at Sky News, outlined some of […]

Sunday, January 17th, 2010

News:rewired session – multimedia journalism

#newsrw Some tips from Adam Westbrook on creating an effective audio slideshow. [vimeo width=”266″ height=”200″]http://www.vimeo.com/7742500[/vimeo]Why a slideshow? It’s cheaper and easier than video – and there’s less messing around. Can better focus on the story. Tips for success Focus on story and character Pre-interview your subject by phone – work out your story in advance […]

Sunday, January 17th, 2010

News:rewired session – making money online

#newsrw Some good lessons from the news:rewired panel on How can journalism support itself online? SoGlos deputy editor James Fryer offered the five dos and don’ts of starting up online. His prediction: quality, professional journalism is key to success and will see a resurgence in the next decade. User-generated content is not enough to attract […]

Saturday, January 16th, 2010

If only "professionals" should be journalists, why do they keep getting it wrong?

#newsrw Lots of excitement was generated by Telegraph digital media chief Greg Hadfield’s resignation announcement at news:rewired. But of all those tiresome bloggers and not-real-journalists Tweeting and wittering about the event – who was it who reported and got the facts wrong? Oh, yes. Roy Greenslade. In the Guardian. You know, one of those purveyors […]

Friday, January 15th, 2010

Big thanks to news:rewired team

#newsrw Yesterday’s news:rewired event did indeed prove to be worth 80 quid – good speakers, good panels, good audience (except in the Crowdsourcing session – get over yourselves, journalism “professionals”). Big thanks are due to Laura Oliver, Judith Townend and the Journalism.co.uk team. There’s a whole slew of material blogged and Twittered already (just check the […]

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010

Using research as the basis for a story: a guide

I slated recent BBC (and other) coverage of a survey on how children seem to be failing to learn to talk. Luckily for the media, here’s a handy guide from pressure group Panos on how to approach research to create better journalism. Panos has its own agenda, of course (promoting “the participation of poor and […]