Thinking & Working#DigitalFirst

Steve ButtryPark Record

January 10, 2012

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#DigitalFirst journalists …• Work & think first for digital platforms• Experiment & take risks• Try new tools & techniques• Join community conversation• Engage the community (digital, print, IRL)• Are optimistic about journalism’s future

Questions for any beat• What stories should I cover live?• How should I use a beatblog?• What are regular sources?• How do they like to communicate?• What digital sources should I follow?• How should I crowdsource?

Questions for any beat• What data can help my coverage?• How do I engage the community?• How should I use video?• What content & links should I curate?• How do I report unfolding stories?• What are beat priorities?

Court reporter• Live-tweet from courtroom (narrative,

not a transcript)• Feed tweets into liveblog• Big development: Text news alert to

editor• Write summary or analysis story for web

& print

Court reporter, no trial• Traditional rounds: lawyers, judges,

clerks, filings• Add #DigitalFirst rounds: monitor tweets,

search Twitter, Facebook groups & pages• Tweet/alert/blog big filings• Video clips in interviews• Scan or download docs if not online

Visual journalist• Shoot first w/ smartphone & post• Shoot w/ camera for slideshow & print• Shoot video• Record ambient sound, interviews• If disaster, shoot some after shots for

before/after

Sports journalist• Live-tweet or liveblog game• Color commentary/analysis, rather than

play-by-play (especially if on TV)• Interact w/ fans (polls, answer questions)• Livestream post-game press conferences• Post-game chat

Sports, not game day• Video clips of interviews• Frequent blog updates & tweets• Data visualization of stats• Alerts of breaking news• Webcast and/or live chat

Beat reporter• Beatblog• Liveblog meetings, hearings, events• Tweet/alert/liveblog breaking news• Live chat on continuing stories• Data visualization• Curate community conversation

Beat reporter questions• How to crowdsource story?• What terms, hashtags should you search

(routinely & for each story)?• Regular/special hashtags to use?• People to follow? New FB pages/groups?• Other social media to search (YouTube,

Flickr, Foursquare, Google+ …)?

Gathering news on the beat• Video• Links• Databases• Monitor officials, agencies, sources on

Twitter, Facebook, G+, YouTube, etc.• Source documents to upload• Map, timeline

Assigning editor• Monitors social media as well as wires,

scanners, etc.• Staff questions guide digital journalism

(data, Twitter search, hashtags, crowdsourcing)

• Urgency for breaking news, live coverage• Edits digital content for print

Senior editor• Listen, join & lead community

conversation (blog, social media, chats)• Lead staff in trying new tools &

techniques• Digital focus to daily meetings• Post daily news budgets online

Copy editor• Social & Google searches to question &

verify facts• Writes strong SEO headlines• Crowdsources print headlines, news

judgments

#DigitalFirst journos think:• Story is, as Jeff Jarvis says, a process, not a

product• It’s great to be first w/ story or the idea, but

otherwise link• Community = collaborators• Lots of RTs or a prominent link are better than

front-page story

#DigitalFirst journos think:• Obstacles = war stories, not excuses• How can you use new tools to do better

stories?• What are good search terms to use in finding

people discussing this story/event on Twitter?• Journalism has a bright and boundless future

Read more about it• stevebuttry.wordpress.com• slideshare.net/stevebuttry• @stevebuttry• jxpaton.wordpress.com