Ron Nurwisah, Boy Reporter

Hey, buddy, can you pass me the sports section?

Image from Flickr Commons/Nationaal Archief

This was a presentation I gave to George Hoff’s multi-platform journalism class at Centennial College. For all of you who are already blogging, tweeting and Facebooking (or Linked-inning) this is old-hat. But for the journalism newbie, students, etc. this might be useful.

Blogs, Facebook, Twitter: Using social media as a journalist

Most journalists should be active in one or more social media tools. Not only because of the benefits but at least to understand how these tools work and how they can be used in journalism.

Personally I use these social media tools to generate story ideas, improve my profile, gain exposure, network and gather news.

1. Blogs

Probably the most time-consuming but the one that has the most potential reward. I’ve listed some great examples of journalists who use blogs to great effect.

Mathew Ingram

Former communities editor Globe & Mail, now at tech blog GigaOm. Mathew was a great advocate for social media/web 2.0 at Globe. He’s now at the frontline of tech reporting with GigaOm.

David Akin

Canwest Parliamentary correspondent, uses social media to enhance day-to-day work. Note how David has used Twitter, Facebook, etc. on his blog to give you a sense of how active he is on social media.

Corey Mintz

Corey’s blog is very off-the-cuff but gives his readers great personal insights into his process, outtakes from his column. It shows off his personality, and creates a great relationship with his readers.

What do these blogs all have in common? They extend a personal brand, they give you more insight into the person behind the work, it’s a platform for writing, ideas, stories that might not fit in a traditional media format (newspapers, magazines, wire stories, etc.

Blogs and traditional media
Blogs do things well that traditional media don’t: opinion, curation, aggregation. It’s why we at the Post really like them. We probably run 10+ blogs. Here are a few examples from the Post.

Full Comment

A blog that’s home for our opinions/columnists/editorials. Started because the Post saw a gap in right-wing commentary/blogging in Canada. As a result Full Comment has become very popular among this comunity. The blog gets lots of comments, thousands of page views a day. More importantly, we’ve got tons of buy in from our more senior writers AND younger writers.

Posted

Our news blog lets us experiment and do things and chase stories that we wouldn’t traditionally be able to do. Our blog is a lot less rigid than our normal story pages, so we can do things like embed videos and maps, add more links, images, etc. Also, it’s a good repository for off-kilter stories non-traditional news, etc.

Many other outlets do something similar. A few good examples, the NY Times’ City Room blog, NPR’s the Two Way.
Continue reading…

I added a few of my friends to the blog roll on the right and took out some old links. Boing Boing and the Sartorialist don’t really need my links, they know I love them and everyone reads them anyway.

I do want to highlight three new additions to the blog roll. Three women whose friendship and intellect I’ve enjoyed over the years. In no particular order.

Without a Yard

Meghan Warby is probably one of the smartest (and probably coolest) PR people I know. Hell, if more flacks were like her, journalists wouldn’t be annoyed by them so much. She doesn’t just get social media, she thinks about how all that Facebooking, tweeting, blogging can be used for good. The fact that she knows all the cool music and can shake it on the dance floor are also pretty damn hot.

Through the Looking Glass

My former co-worker Sarah Millar is one hardworking, dedicated journalist and an inspiration for any young journalists out there who are despairing about their career or the industry. The fact that she earned the respect and admiration of a roomful of boys at the National Post sports department also counts for a lot.

Canadian Girl Out and Aboot

Journalist and poet Alexis Kienlen has a pretty sweet life and I’ve always admired how after a long day of journalism she manages to find time teaching writing to teenagers. Also her dispatches from the heart of Canada’s food industry are fascinating reading.

Obviously magazine companies aren’t doing that badly considering five very big ones, Conde Nast, Meredith, Hearst, Wenner Inc, Time, all have $90-million lying around to spend it on advertising why their print products are so fantastic and you should totally stop reading blogs and websites and all that online crap to read precious, precious magazines.

I’m going to repeat that figure again. $90-million. For print ads. This is after one of the big five (Conde Nast) had their belts forcibly tightened by McKinsey, shut down a bunch of titles, including the beloved Gourmet. I am sure those laid off staffers totally appreciate this responsible use of funds.

The ads are appearing in around 100 publications in print. Which to me is preaching to the converted at its finest. Why not take that cash and spend it on improving your websites. I’m looking at you Hearst, Esquire deserves better. Or at least spend that cash online, where apparently all of those readers have buggered off too (which apparently they haven’t).

I agree with paidcontent.org’s Rafat Ali here. This is a $90-million middle finger to the online teams at these publications.

Oh, well. Here’s their chipper little video.

Kat Tancock, who writes the useful Magazines Online blog, wrote this brief post about the care and attention of your web staff.

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the latest CSME mixer at Bar Italia, with speakers from Homemakers, Today’s Parent and The Hockey News. One of the best takeaways was from Jackie Kovacs, deputy editor of Today’s Parent. And it was a simple one: “Love your webbies”.

Kovacs’ analogy? “Your website is like your Quebec. It’s part of the family, but distinct.” A fun analogy, and an apt one.

It’s a huge topic and seeing how Kat and I are in similar situations I thought I’d throw in my two cents. It’s five points, so lets call it a nickel. Continue reading…

That was a lot of fun guys and gals. See you in London.

Photo from the Drake Hotel’s Flickr feed.

52 in 52 is a project to read a book a week in 2010

[Note: I'm actually not behind in my reading, but I am behind in writing about these books. Whoops.]

Nicolas Dickner’s Nikolski was the only book that grabbed me from this year’s Canada Reads list and after giving it a read I want it to win the whole damn thing.

Nikolski is the story of three young people drawn to Montreal and the book explores ideas of personal identity, family, history and place. Leavened with the author’s healthy obsession with marine life, archaeology, maps and pirates. It all sounds heavy but Dickner’s playful writing makes it a real joy to read.

In fact, all these themes are why it makes a perfect candidate for Canada Reads. Immigrants, long-time Canadians, First Nations, Quebecers, non-Quebecers, Western Canadians, Eastern Canadians, all have a stake in this book and in some small way are all represented. This is a big country and Dickner tries to cram it all in, to strange yet beautiful effect.

One of the key objects in the novel is an odd book made up of parts of three others stitched together to create a unique object. I couldn’t think of a more beautiful metaphor to describe this book or the country that it’s trying to sum up.

Note: Pal Nic Boshart is defending this book as part of the Keepin’ It Real Book Club. Go Nic.

Food52 is an ingenious publishing idea thought up by Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs. Each week Amanda and Merrill pick a different theme and then allow a community of home chefs and food enthusiasts to send them their best recipes. They’re tested, judged and then voted on by the community. The winners get included in a book that’ll be published by HarperStudio.

It’s a brilliant idea for so many reasons. Amanda and Merrill have plenty of food writing experience, having written books, for the New York Times and a number of magazines, but letting the crowd have input means they get to tap into the food expertise of hundreds if not thousands of people.

The open and crowdsourced nature of the project also means the book is building the kind of pre-publication buzz that any publisher would kill for. It’s not just the winners that’ll be telling their friends and family about the book, a lot of those who submitted recipes will undoubtedly do the same.

The model won’t work for a lot of books, a crowdsourced novel will probably suck, but crowdsourced photo anthologies, how-to-books, craft books, etc. would be exceptional.

Pals Jesse Brown and Ian Daffern put together this great video on why the newspaper deserves saving… or doesn’t. Be sure to check out Jesse’s great show Search Engine.

What do Facebook, Wal Mart and Apple have in common? Other than the fact they’re worth oodles of cash? Fast Company considers them some of the most innovative companies out there. Lots of good reading here from FC.

Robot bartenders! The future is here! If you don’t tip him he’ll shoot you with a laser.

Finally, birds and guitars. Thanks @helenspitzer for the video.