Students newspapers should take mobile-first approach

You’re at a major intersection near the entrance to your campus and you see that a car has collided with a motorcycle. An ambulance is on the scene. What do you do?

If you don’t have a conventional camera, whip out your cell phone and snap a picture. Send it back to the newsroom with a text message reporting the basic details of the accident. Within seconds you can have a brief news report up on your news website. If the accident is causing a traffic jam you may want to send out a news alert via Twitter or short message service (SMS).

That’s mobile journalism.

Mobile technology puts the basic tools of multimedia journalism into every journalist’s – really every person’s -- pocket.

The trick is knowing when and how to use these tools.

While some journalists carry a backpack of equipment – a digital camera, a video camera, an audio recorder, mics, cables and tripods -- with them at all times, others rely on their cell phones to help them capture the news.

But to be a true mobile journalist, you don’t just need the right equipment, you need the right mindset. You have to think: There’s news here. I’m a reporter. I need to cover this. Now!

Report what you know

Mobile journalism means not waiting to get the complete story, the verification from police, the quote from the official source. You need to go with what you have. That doesn’t mean spreading groundless rumors. But if you see fire crews in front of a building with smoke coming out of it or you witness police arresting a man outside the Humanities Building, you can report that and get additional facts and details later.

Steve Buttry, director of community engagement for TBD, a local news operation covering the Washington, D.C., area, says news organizations need to take a “mobile-first” approach at every level. “Reporters, editors and visual journalists need to think first about how to package and deliver news for mobile devices,” he wrote in a post for his blog, The Buttry Diary. “Information technology staffs need to work first on development of mobile applications for popular devices.… Designers need to present content that is clear and easy to read on the small screen (even if this means spending less staff resources on design of print or web products).”

As Buttry notes, mobile technology isn’t just changing the way journalists collect information, it’s changing the way they distribute it. You no longer can assume that readers are looking at your site on a wide computer screen; they may be checking you out on their cell phones or iPods. That means you need to optimize your site for mobile devices, simplifying your pages so they are easy to read on a 1- or 2-inch screen.

Devise a mobile strategy

If your news organization doesn’t already have a mobile strategy, it may be time to craft one. Think about who your readers are and what will be useful to them. Keep in mind that mobile readers tend to be more local than online readers. In that way, they’re more like your print readers.

But they also tend to be younger and more technologically savvy – more students, less faculty and staff. And they're constantly plugged in. You want to be one of the sources they scan regularly, whether it's on Twitter, Facebook, SMS or your website.

Think about what your audience wants. “Mobile users like local information, video, breaking news and weather,” Regina McCombs, who teaches multimedia at the Poynter Institute, writes in a column for PoynterOnline. “Mobile users are socializing, multitasking, and passing time. And they're conscious of data rates and battery life, so they want it fast.” Check out McCombs' "10 Questions to Help You Craft a Mobile Strategy (Before it's too late)."

What do readers care about?

College news organizations should consider what their readers care about: on-campus activities, sports, building or campus closures, traffic conditions, disruptions in public transportation, crime, bargains.

If you're at the on-campus farmers market and a merchant is offering everything half off for the final hour, snap a picture and tweet it. If you're on the train to school and the driver announces a 20-minute delay, let your readers know.

The more you use mobile technology to report what's happening, the more your readers will look to your news organization as the definitive, can't-live-without-it source on the information they care about.

How is your news organization using mobile journalism? Respond to this post and I may use you in an example in a future column.

A great how-to on video blogging

Al Tompkins of the Poynter Institute offers a great how-to on video blogging in this YouTube video.

In addition to recommending particular tools like the much talked-about Flip video camera, Snapz Pro X (Snapz Pro Z for PC) for capturing video on your computer screen, and Videocue 2, a cheap but effective teleprompter program, he offers some suggestions on producing Web-quality video quickly. These useful tips can be applied to Web video news reporting as well as video blogging.

And if you don't already regularly "attend," check out "Al's Morning Meeting," Tompkins' daily list of story ideas that college papers as well as professional news organizations can pick up and run with.

Think multimedia at your next editors meeting

ST. PETERSBURG, FL.--Here's something to try at your next editors meeting or staff meeting: Think multimedia.

Start with this exercise inspired by Regina McCombs (photo at left) , a senior multimedia producer at StarTribune.com in Minneapolis-St. Paul (and a faculty member at the Multimedia Journalism for College Educators seminar I'm attending this week at The Poynter Institute).

Consider each of the different media your news organization uses--text, photos, graphics, slide shows, podcasts, audio slide shows, video. Then discuss what each medium does best. Your group will probably come up with several different attributes for each medium but they might include:

Text: Provides depth, background and context

Photo: Captures a moment in time, shows something happening

Graphic: Explains complex information, especially numbers; help readers visualize the unseeable

Slide show: Tells a primarily visual story that goes beyond a single moment

Podcast: Captures sound, tone, voice

Audio slide show: Tells a story with strong visual and audio elements, captures mood

Video: Portrays action and motion, lets subjects tell their own stories

Once you have a list for each medium, go through your story budget for an upcoming issue. Discuss each story and what would be the best way to tell it. Ask:

* Is the story dense with information and have a lot of background/context to explain?
* Does the story have a strong visual component?
* Does it have a strong sound component?
* Does it have audio and visual elements?
* Is there action or movement?
* Does the story have a lot of number facts?
* Would a map--two-dimensional or interactive--help the reader understand the story?
* Do you have subjects with stories to tell?

Finally, consider what is the best medium to tell each story and assign the story to the appropriate journalist. Voila! Now you're thinking like a multimedia journalist!


Does your newspaper staff already ask these questions on a routine basis? Are you proud of your use of multimedia? Post a comment below.

Photo courtesy of Sandra Ellis

Al's Rules for Online Storytelling

ST. PETERSBURG, FL.--"Make it interactive."

That was the first of "Al's 10 Rules of Interactive Storytelling" Al Tompkins of The Poynter Institute offered today to 25 journalism educators.

Tompkins, group leader for Poynter's Broadcast/Online team, is playing tour guide/ring leader/master of ceremonies this week for an intensive four-day seminar on Multimedia Journalism for College Educators sponsored by The Poynter Institute.

“The Web does interactivity in ways no other media can do it,” Tompkins said.

Tompkins showed a host of examples of the power of interactivity in online storytelling, including:

* The Herald Tribune's" "Broken Trust," an investigative report on abusive teachers

* The Washington Post's "Faces of the Fallen," a report on the soldiers who have died in Afghanistan and Iraq

* The Times Herald-Record's "I Didn't Do That Murder," an investigation of the 20-year-old conviction of Lebrew Jones

* Obleek.com's chilling map showing the toll of the war in Iraq on coalition forces.

"Ask yourself: What data do I have and how can I make it interactive," Tompkins said.

Here are Al’s 10 Rules for Interactive Storytelling:

1. Make it Interactive. It is NOT about YOU. Let the user manipulate the page, select what part of the story he/she wants to explore. Offer the story in graphics, text, videos, audio and photo soundslides. From the very earliest planning stages of your stories ask, “how can we make this interactive?” Don’t wait until the reporting is done and stick the leftovers online.News consumers want what they want how they want it and when they want it. It is true for the fast food business, it is true for the coffee business and it stands to reason that it would be true in the information delivery business too. If the user wants a completely packaged story we should offer that. If they want a short text brief, we should offer that. If they want just the video with no narration, let’s give it to them. Let them decide and let them interact with the information. They choose what they want to know.

2. Make a Front Page Promise. On the web, headlines must rock. Three word headlines, playful use of words and noun-verb-object heads work best. Your website’s front page must make promises about how the reader will benefit if they click a jump link. The most important promises speak to one of five main motivators:
—money, family, health, safety and community.

3. Make it Raw. The more important or visual the event, the more willing I believe the public is to tolerate lower quality video and less than perfect sound. Content is king. That is not an excuse however to intentionally lower your photographic standards or your professionalism. Raw video allows viewers to experience the story on their own terms, not just “know” what happened.

4. Leverage Your Digital Assets.When you cover trials, get copies of jury instructions, photos introduced to juries and put those online. Web Weather might target special interest forecasts that might not have a wide enough audience in the paper, but groups like surfers, farmers and golfers want detailed information about wind, waves, humidity and lightning. What other information do you collect in the course of your day? How can you leverage it to a higher use?

5. Involve the public and/but make it meaningful. Forget the lame online polls. How easy is it for your online users to contribute video, photos or report details of a spot news story, parades, holidays and weather? I do not recommend opening every news story up to comments. Some stories lend themselves to comments and some don’t. Be prepared to monitor discussions about news stories.

6. Tap into Local Passion Groups. What are people in your area passionate about? In San Francisco it is dogs and the environment. In Arkansas it is hunting. In Charlotte it is NASCAR and church. Whatever people are wild about in your area, give them a virtual watering holes where people gather to talk about and share whatever they are passionate about.

7. Map it! Interactive mash-up maps are a great way to allow the public to interact with information. Sites like ChicagoCrime.org map daily crime data over an interactive Google map. WTHR in Indianapolis mapped broken tornado sirens so viewers could see if they would be safe when a storm approached. Reporters at the The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette now collect GPS coordinates for where they gather stories and the stories get mapped daily so readers can see when a story is reported in their neighborhood. You can create free interactive flash maps easily using QuickMaps.com.

8. Feed Your Needs too. Use your online site to explain who and why businesses should advertise. Most news sites make it nearly impossible to learn anything about online advertising opportunities. USAToday.com’s online employee roster now offers links to stories that every staffer has contributed to.

9. You must SHINE online during elections, big breaking news and special events coverage. That is when sampling will be the highest. Do not disappoint people who are sampling you for the first time. Constantly update. Make sure you are changing your lead photo and headlines. Timestamp your coverage to highlight how often you are updating. It might be well worth hiring freelance help to make special events shine online.

10. Save elaborate online presentations for projects that have long legs. Don’t be afraid to build coverage over time. When a high profile crime occurs, for example, build a special section of your site that will become the home of continuing coverage that could last years as the case moves through the system. For major investigative projects, include reactions, follow-ups, legislative action and resolutions that flow from the stories. Put your biggest multimedia efforts in those parts of the site that will have a long life. A great hurricane resource page could be useful for years. There are topics and stories that occur over and over in your community. Save your big efforts for those kinds of efforts.

You can read a longer version of Tompkins’ rules in the July/August 2007 issue of Communicator, the magazine of the Radio and Television News Directors Association. And for more words of wisdom from Tompkins check out Al’s Morning Meeting on Poynter.org.

Poynter Multimedia Seminar: Day 1

ST. PETERSBURG, FL.--How do I sum up a day of intense learning and discussion at the Poynter Institute's Multimedia Journalism for College Educators seminar?

I keep coming back to Mindy McAdams' penultimate slide before sending the 25 brain-weary journalism profs back to the hotel after more than six hours at the institute.

Pssst! My own secret

I have usually learned technology that I teach in class less than one week before the first time I taught it!

You don’t need to be an expert; you just need to know a little more than the parts you will teach!

That's right. Mindy McAdams, multimedia guru, author of the pioneering textbook Flash Journalism, a woman whose name turns up 77,400 entries on a Google search, doesn't know it all.

And to teach this stuff we don't have to either.

All we have to do is learn a little, read/view/listen to a lot and know how to navigate an online tutorial.

McAdams, a professor of journalism at the University of Florida, recited the reasons journalism educators give for not transforming their curricula:

“We don’t know how”
“We don’t have equipment”
“We don’t know what they’re doing in these newsrooms”

"If we want to train students to think different, then we’ve got to do it ourselves," she said.

Take database reporting, for example. All those numbers, all those spreadsheets. What's a math-phobic journalism professor to do?

McAdams offered five concrete, simple things any journalism educator could do today without learning a single new skill:

* Assign articles by or about Adrian Holovaty
* Study EveryBlock
* Discuss any New York Times data project
* Assign a project to be built with Atlas
* Use exercises from National Institute for Computer Assisted Reporting to teach Excel.

McAdams and the other faculty for this week's seminar--Al Tompkins and Ellyn Angelotti of the Poynter Institute and Regina McCombs, a senior producer for multimedia for The Star Tribune--had other inspiring things to say, but I'm too bushed to report them right now. And in ten hours I have to be back at the institute for another mind-numbing but inspiring day.

You can check out McAdams' presentation, as well as other course materials, on her Web site. I'll share other links as I get them.