1. Sharing sharing sharing

Unlike other blogging platforms (eg. WordPress, Blogger) sharing is built into the DNA of Tumblr. It takes one click to repost a great image, quote or video from one Tumblr blog to yours. This rewards blogs that have great and well-defined editing, aggregation and curation. If you find great content and post it, it’ll get shared. Find enough great content and you’ll make yourself a destination.

Example: The Daily What. The popular blog finds the best, funniest and wackiest stuff online — odd videos, funny headlines, gobsmacking stories. Getting something on the Daily What pretty much means you’re getting reposted, liked and commented on by dozens if not hundreds of people.

2. Showing off your editorial voice

A number of publications use Tumblr as a great platform for their editorial voice by finding and posting a mix of self-produced content and things from other publications. Others trawl the seemingly endless waters of the internet for great finds. For a new publication, or one without a big recognizable name Tumblr is another way for you to show potential readers what you’re all about.

Example: Worn Fashion Journal‘s Tumblr. An indie fashion magazine out of Toronto, the Wornettes find photos, illustrations and articles that inspire them. It gives the magazine a way to keep their magazine out there and I get the feeling that it helps the editors, contributors and interns sharpen their ideas. (Disclosure: I’ve contributed to Worn)

3. Visuals

Most CMSes and blogging platforms are designed with text in mind. It’s understandable considering that text is the dominant medium for many media outlets. Tumblr, on the other hand, is great for visuals. It actually seems to be designed with photos and graphics in mind.  There are tons of templates that are designed for photoblogging and it’s easy to design (or find) a template that’s visually rich and striking.

Example: The National Post Tumblr. We started the blog as a way to get the Post’s beautiful graphics, illustrations and photography on to a space where it could really take centre stage. Tumblr was the perfect fit. Want another great example? The New York Times’ T magazine Tumblr has pictures so big you probably want a 24′ monitor to really make it work.

Other notable Tumblr blogs:

The Washington Post‘s Innovations Tumblr cherry-picks the best digital journalism out there and gives us an inside glimpse at some of the great things their online team is doing.

A visually-heavy blog from a radio network? NPR’s Tumblr picks the best stories and lots and lots of images. A smart way of inserting yourself into the Tumblr community and conversation.

I would also be remiss if I didn’t include Newsweek‘s Tumblr, the granddaddy of media Tumblrs. Reading Newsweek’s Tumblr feels like a conversation with the smart and cosmopolitan writers and editors who work there.

If you’ve been reading this blog you’ll know that twitter is a huge part of my personal and professional life. On Friday, I reached a pretty big personal milestone and sent out my 10,000 tweet. Yes, it means I tweet a lot. Some of it is inane, but I try my best to keep it entertaining, informative and relevant.

I’ve had the chance to talk to journalism students about using social media to build their practice and I can’t stress how useful twitter is. So in honour of 10,000 tweets I want to reiterate the three things I’ve learned about twitter:

1) It’s a great way to ‘meet’ people in journalism

In a recent post, I expressed my admiration for the Atlantic’s online strategy. Through some odd game of six-degrees of separation, one the online editors for the Atlantic, Jared B. Keller introduced himself. I’ve had the chance to trade jokes with him and swap ideas with someone working at one of the most interesting outlets in journalism today.

I’ve also found it easier to go up and introduce myself to fellow journalists and editors who I’m already following on Twitter. Hey, at the very least you can ask them about that link they tweeted a few days back instead of engaging in small talk about the weather.

2) It’s a great way to keep up with the news

If you follow the right people and sources on twitter you’ll pretty much always have something to read. If you’re a freelancer looking for an idea, twitter can help find an idea for your next story or at least keep tabs on what other publications are doing. If you’re a beat reporter follow other people in your beat and relevant publications to have a curated stream that’ll keep you on top of what’s happening.

3) It’s a great source of breaking news *

The Mumbai terrorists attacks, the miracle on the Hudson, Toronto’s G20 protest, the Egypt revolution. I used Twitter as a news gathering tool when covering all of these stories. It’s an imperfect medium, and it won’t replace actually having reporters on the ground, but you can’t ignore it anymore.

* Except of course, when it isn’t. Hoaxes can spread easily on Twitter, so remember to verify before retweeting.

A few things I learned from the piece:

1. Stop blaming Google for your woes newspapers

Blaming big bad Google for “stealing” all that content is a popular past-time for certain news executives. It’s just plain wrong. Google News lifts abstracts from pieces and doesn’t slice, dice and repackage news like other outlets. Also, you can easily stop Google from indexing your sites. Why wouldn’t you do this? The traffic that Google brings to your site is simply too valuable.

2. The classified ad model is broken

This has been said over and over again, but why anyone would pay for a classified ad when you’ve got eBay and Craigslist and dozens of real estate and auto sales sites is beyond me.

From the article:

The most obvious cause is that classified advertising, traditionally 30 to 40 percent of a newspaper’s total revenue, is disappearing in a rush to online sites. “There are a lot of people in the business who think that in the not-too-distant future, the classified share of a paper’s revenue will go to zero,” Cohen said. “Stop right there. In any business, if you lose a third of your revenue, you’re going to be in serious trouble.”

Important to note that the online entities doing the most damage to newspaper classifieds, Craigslist, job sites, eBay, are not owned or controlled by Google. Newspapers also haven’t whined about how these sites are “stealing” their ads.

3. The bundle is broken

Hard news gathering doesn’t make money. Real estate, car sections, style reporting and entertainment journalism makes cash for newspapers. So papers bundle a Sunday Homes section with that 15,000 feature on rebels in Fallujah.

But the internet (and Google, especially) allows people to break this bundle. Looking for a new car, forget buying the paper and reading the auto section. A quick search can take you to any number of auto sites.

4. The print business is expensive and inefficient

According to the article, editorial staff accounts for 15% of a newspaper’s budget. Newsprint costs, printing, distribution, etc. costs a lot of money, which newspapers are no longer recovering.

From the article:

“Grow trees—then grind them up, and truck big rolls of paper down from Canada? Then run them through enormously expensive machinery, hand-deliver them overnight to thousands of doorsteps, and leave more on newsstands, where the surplus is out of date immediately and must be thrown away? Who would say that made sense?” The old-tech wastefulness of the process is obvious, but Varian added a less familiar point. Burdened as they are with these “legacy” print costs, newspapers typically spend about 15 percent of their revenue on what, to the Internet world, are their only valuable assets: the people who report, analyze, and edit the news.

5. Online ads will become more profitable

It’s clear that print ads are more valuable than online ads. But as more people get their news online Google is assuming this equation will tilt in favour  to online ads.

The three pillars of the new online business model, as I heard them invariably described, are distribution, engagement, and monetization. That is: getting news to more people, and more people to news-oriented sites; making the presentation of news more interesting, varied, and involving; and converting these larger and more strongly committed audiences into revenue, through both subscription fees and ads.

6. A thriving journalistic culture helps Google

Google needs the quality content generated by newspaper journalists, columnists and photographers. Like a thriving ecosystem, every newspaper and magazine that fails is another source of content that Google can’t help you find.

Of course, that doesn’t preclude bloggers, citizen journalists, etc. from creating good content. Google will help you find that too. But how many blogs can field City Hall bureaus or are experienced business reporters?

7. Experiment, experiment, experiment

The internet has disrupted print journalism more than any other technology before it; more than radio, more than cable TV and the 24-hour news cycle. The old business model is broken and you won’t be able to humpty-dumpty it back together again. Which means it’s even more crucial that you push forward and try new things.

“We believe that teams must be nimble and able to fail quickly,” Josh Cohen told me. (I resisted making the obvious joke about the contrast with the journalism world, which believes in slow and statesmanlike failure.) “The three most important things any newspaper can do now are experiment, experiment, and experiment,” Hal Varian said.

Or in the words of Samuel Beckett, “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.”

In media and publishing interns are integral and a lot of excellent places wouldn’t function without their interns. But just as it’s important for an intern to be professional and keen to work, it’s equally as important for editors and managers to treat their interns respectfully and responsibly. A few quick tips:

1) Have clear goals and expectations

What time do you want your intern to show up? What time can they leave? What kind of work do you want them to do? These are simple questions, but sometimes these aren’t communicated well to the intern. When expectations are set out clearly then both intern and editor are on the same page.

2) Always have work ready

Interns are there to learn and an unproductive intern is a waste of time and effort for the both of you. Ask yourself, is there research that needs to be done? Writing that can be started? Special projects, etc.

3) Learn how to delegate

If you’re a perfectionist or a control freak, this is going to be tough. But it’s necessary. And giving your intern a bit of trust and responsibility can really go a long way and stop you from going crazy.

4) Train them properly

Spend a bit of time at the start of the internship showing the intern how things work. This investment of time at the start will recoup itself in no time.

5) Make them feel like a part of the staff

Grab coffee with them, let them join in during meetings, introduce them to your co-workers. Your workplace can be intimidating, particularly if it’s a large office, dispelling some of their anxiety is just a nice thing to do.

My co-worker Adam McDowell has decided to try out the caveman diet and blog about it.

He will not be chasing down woolly mammoths and grappling with sabretooth tigers. They’re not very common in downtown Toronto. I blame climate change.

From his caveman blog:

Starting Wednesday I’m undertaking a one-month experiment in adding aspects of a paleolithic man’s daily round into my 21st-century urban existence. I want to see how far I can travel in the footsteps of our Stone Age hunter-gatherer ancestors — at least in terms of the way I eat and keep fit — while making a living as a writer for theNational Post, a daily Canadian newspaper based in Toronto.

Photo from Adam’s caveman blog.

So while these things are still fresh in my mind, I’m going to write a few quick hints and tips for those who are interning. These aren’t hard rules, internships can vary greatly from place to place, but follow most of these and you can make the most of even a bad internship.

1) Don’t say no to work

Yes, I know it’s an unpaid internship. Yes, I know you came to learn about how a newspaper, magazine or publishing house works and it looks oh, so glamourous on TV and in the movies, but most of the time it isn’t.

There’s stuff that needs to get done, listings need to be typed up and checked, packages need to be mailed out, mailing lists needs to be updated. Suck it up and do it. And when you’re done ask for more. Don’t huff, don’t roll your eyes and complain. Almost every editor and writer would’ve had to do this at some time and they’ll tell you that they remember the interns who don’t want to work or think it’s beneath them.

2) Do your work fast, do it well

Internships are tryouts. Do your best work at everything, even if it’s something as tiny as checking facts or writing a 200-word sidebar, or mailing out packages. We notice stand-out work. Do it fast. There’s always more work around the corner. Do both of these things and we’ll love you forever.

3) Think, think, think

Dissect the publication you’re working at. Look at what they do and if you think you’ve got a better idea, don’t be afraid to mention it. Many times, publications get in a rut because of familiarity AND because tired editors just don’t have time to do things a different way. Showing that you’re thinking critically about a publication gets noticed.

4) Look at the competition

Read other papers, other magazines and blogs. See what great ideas other places have? Is there any way you can ‘steal’ some of these ideas? Showing initiative and interest is appreciated. There’s tons to read and check out and having a keen pair of eyes scouring for good stuff is always appreciated in any newsroom.

5) Don’t be afraid to ask questions

Don’t know how to do something? Ask for help. Editors often forget that interns don’t actually know how to work on the obscure content management system in the newsroom or the arcana that is the office media list. Forgive our addled brains.

Sometimes we’re also really shitty at giving directions, so it never hurts to ask for direction.

In a few days, for the sake of fairness, I’ll post rules for editors who are managing interns

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.

2. Facebook

I actually don’t use Facebook too much profesionally. It’s more of a personal tool for me to keep track of my friends, family and colleagues.

But for a publication Facebook can be very powerful and in fact crucial.

The National Post fan page

A Facebook fan page lets users incorporate the Post into their Facebook experience. People spend a lot of time on Facebook, so it just makes sense that we’re there too.

The ability to share interesting stories is also key. Facebook is one of the top 5 ways of referring links to news sites (e-mail, Google, Twitter are some of the others). When a user shares your story that’s a great thing, it’s extra clicks, it’s exposure, it’s buzz.

Finally, it’s also an easy way to do a little community building and gain more interaction with your users

Some other great examples:
Mashable Look at the number of fans! That’s 100,000+ people who may share, comment and talk about your articles!
the Walrus Magazine Look at how they extend their real-word product into Facebook, changing up their profile image to match their current covers, mentioning real-world events, etc.

3. Twitter

I started using Twitter about two years ago and it’s tough for me to overstate how useful and rewarding it has been. I use Twitter in two very different and complementary ways.

a) Twitter in
I use it as a personalized news wire by subscribing to news sources I like.
Eg. I do a lot of writing and have a personal interest in books… so I follow a lot of publishers, authors, book publications, etc. The Twitter list function makes it a bit more manageable.

I also use it as a way to see what people I like, respect, and have crushes on are thinking about.

Many, many examples:

@susanorlean (an amazing New Yorker writer)
@jeffjarvis (author, J-school teacher at CUNY)
@cshirky (NYU j-school prof, tech advocate)
@walrusmagazine (large mammal, also a great magazine Twitter account)
@ivortossell (tech writer, pal, drinking buddy)
@xoxsnp (Fashion writer, go-getter, up and comer)

b) Twitter out
I use Twitter as a way of communicating and developing a personal profile.
I sync up my blog to Twitter, I also use it to promote things I’m doing, even ideas that I’m thinking about. I think it’s how your professor found me.

@boyreporter is my personal Twitter account. Follow me if you want. I’ll try not to bore you.

How the Post uses Twitter:

No big surprise, but we’re on Twitter and we love it. Here’s a few reasons why.

a) News gathering and dissemination.
Twitter is fast. Blazing fast. In the last few months alone, Twitter has helped us cover stories like the Fort Hood attack and the Haiti earthquake. Twitter gave us almost real-time updates from people on the ground, whether they be local media, eyewitnesses or officials.

@nationalpost our flagship account has about 7,600 followers and we use this as a way to spread our stories, they often get retweeted and spread virally which, of course, means more traffic for us.

@npbooks, which is an account that I help start and run is a niche books/literature account for our books blog. It’s very targeted, has a lot of personality and people love it.

So a few parting notes:

Work social media into your daily routine

Checking Twitter, blogging, Facebooking all takes time and if you’re working, going to school, writing, etc. You might not have time to do all this. Try to work some of these things into your daily routine. Use a program like Hootsuite, which allows you to embargo your tweets, to plan tweets in advance.

Blog in spurts, write two or three posts, and then push them out later in the week. (Hint, hint, the author of this blog might do this once in a while)

Don’t overshare

Not everything needs to be and should be public. Remember, most of the time, you get to decide what goes up online. Writing about that bad break-up on your personal blog might not be a good idea… unless you want a career as a relationship columnist, in which case, it’s probably pretty brilliant.

This stuff won’t replace basic skills

You can be a social media guru, tweet like crazy, blog like an overeager 15-year-old girl and have a thousand Facebook friends, but they don’t replace basic journalism skills like writing, reporting, research and interviewing.

buy Enough

After much nailbiting and prodding, we finally launched the new books blog at the Post. Yes, ladies and gentleman, I’m one of the editors of the Afterword (I’m in charge of the blog’s twitter feed, follow us @npbooks).

American Beauty divx Brad and Mark felt that the books coverage in the Post was actually getting lost in the pop culture heavy Ampersand blog. It’s tough to read about the new Murakami book and then get bombarded by a story about Britney’s latest meltdown.

• Shania Up! Live in Chicago movie

I’m looking forward to doing a lot of coverage on e-books (especially with the upcoming Bookcamp), cover design and pretty much anything else I’ve wanted to cover in the literary world.

Severance full movie

• Excess Baggage video buy The Tragedy of Macbeth

Orgies and the Meaning of Life divx

, Kenny Yum, is heading to Washington D.C. for the inaugural. He’s a frequent visitor to the city and will try to shed his insight on next week’s festivities.

The Mikado film

You can follow him on our blog.

He will undoubtedly be tweeting the inaugural. I look forward to seeing the tweets get progressively more incoherent as the evening wears on.

The Bellboy buy

Here’s how

Fame

Hold That Ghost psp

Tony Arzenta divx

(not who to vote for but how to get that little piece of paper into the box)

The Thirty Nine Steps ipod

The Babysitters film

Universal Soldier ipod

The Mutant Chronicles movie

• It Could Happen to You download

Also. if you want to help a buddy out you can check out my handiwork (and tell your friends) on the National Post website later tonight.

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves dvdrip