Two-way roads are the future for newspapers that once hogged one-way streets.
Toronto is about to become a giant wireless hot spot.
The website Technorati was tracking 30.2 million blogs and 2.1 billion links at mid-afternoon Friday.
Cheap, often free and easy-to-use Internet tools and a panopoly of choices have flipped the balance of power from traditional publishers to no-longer-happy-to-be-passive audiences.
Learning how to drive in the new world means rethinking some of the rules that governed the old. The hardest will be sharing the road.
Some of the unease centres around control. Newspapers are used to having it.
Journalists operate under rules that govern reporting and writing and editing so that readers can trust what they’re reading.
In a newspaper there is finite space for reader opinion. About 13 letters fit on a page. The paper chooses the letters and edits them. About one in 10 submitted are published.
How do you edit a news “paper” with infinite space and no deadlines?
How do you satisfy the readers’ appetite for a conversation and protect the credibility of the information you’re selling?
People who don’t work at newspapers aren’t worrying about that. They’re already carpooling and enjoying the trip. So like it or not, it’s embrace the open road or be road kill.
Bill Kovach, a former New York Times editor and a journalist for more than 40 years, told an industry convention last fall that “too many journalists, especially journalists of my generation, remain in a state of confusion about the challenges of the new media environment and remain dangerously passive about the opportunities presented to traditional journalism by the new communications technology.”
Many of the new Web tools will help the paper do what newspapers have always done: tell people stories about each other, inform and entertain, be a watchdog, serve the community.
The Star first experimented with blogs a few years ago at major news events (after the writers patiently explained to editors what blogs were) and long ago abandoned discussion boards dominated by a few people who called each other names.
The best blogs invite comment. They’re informal, opinionated, conversational, sometimes intemperate conditions that make editors nervous.
But the editors and writers who are experimenting with blogs and online forums now are finding not only do they open a door for readers, but they themselves are benefitting in ways they did not anticipate.
Tyler Hamilton is a technology reporter for the Star; he also blogs about emerging trends, technologies and investment opportunities in the clean energy sector and writes a column on those themes every two weeks.
He’s found the blog complements his newspaper work in a variety of ways. Because it’s subject focused, it pulls in readers who might not otherwise visit the Star website.
Stories that might be too technical for the paper find a place there. Interesting research that might someday be useful in a story can be posted. People with expertise in the subject area make potential contacts and comments to the site have generated story ideas.
Blogs are natural territory for columnists because many sites thrive on the exchange of opinions.
At the end of May, 2005, media columnist Antonia Zerbisias started the first, ongoing Star blog and now that she has started, she can’t stop.
She loves the interaction with people and the freedom. She can write 20 words, 200 words or 2,000 words if she chooses.
Civility has not been an issue. She finds people are more polite than they are in emails, because they know their comments will be public.
Comments to Star blogs are vetted by either an editor or the blogger before they’re added to the site. Very few are rejected.
Chris Carter, the senior editor of the Star’s website, said traffic to the blogs and comment areas of the site are increasing.
“We’re being told that readers don’t want to consume news anymore, they want to use it.
“We’re moving in stages,” he said, and looking for ways to invite readers in.
Podcasts were added recently.
The education forum is going crazy this week because full-time teachers at Ontario colleges are on strike.
Editor Kris Rushowy invites a guest each week to anwer readers’ questions about education and this week’s guest is Colleges and Universities Minister Chris Bentley.
Sports writer Chris Young offered live Web commentary on the Canada-Russia Olympic hockey game; Zerbisias did the same for the Oscars.
Damien Cox is blogging now.
The forum and all Star blogs can be found at http://www.thestar.com.
Nascent steps down a two-way road.
If you have ideas about Web features or forums the Star could offer, please send me an email. I’d be happy to hear from you.
