Online journalism news round-up

Is Video the solution to online advertising woes?

Good news from the States – news organisations there are seeing an increase in traffic and revenue from video advertising.

According to a report in the New York Times, highlighted by Betsey Reignsborough on editorsweblog, many publications and broadcasters are leaning more heavily on video reportage on their websites, creating more opportunities for advertisements.

Advertisers are becoming more willing to buy space on videos rather than just on static pages because of the increase in traffic as well as the ability to use dynamic advertising, reports Reignsborough.

Readers have indicated that they are more willing to click play on a video then read a whole article, she continues and sites are posting more video footage to keep up with the demand for video advertising space.

She cautions that there is controversy over "autoplay" - videos that begin playing automatically as soon as the web page has loaded – which means that a viewer did not press play and is not necessarily watching the video.

This, she says, tallies up totals of video streaming without legitimacy.

Students launch hyperlocal news site

Meanwhile holdthefrontpage has covered news that MA Online Journalism students at Birmingham City University have set up a new hyperlocal website focusing on news from around central Birmingham.

The multimedia site, Hashbrum.co.uk, features maps and slideshows in its coverage of the news.

Editor Andrew Brightwell told the website: "I think we see it as a way to learn about how online news can engage and be informed by its audience.

"So we're interested in experimenting in ways of finding, creating and presenting news. We've tried to have some fun with the way that we've covered stories.

"I can't say exactly how it will develop, but I hope it evolves a life of its own, in a sense.

"By this I mean that it'd be really successful if we feel that much of the news we're creating is being led and developed by the site's audience."

Top 50 Journo Blogs

Finally, the US website Journalism Journeyman has released a list of the 50 best journalism blogs.

The list has been divided into various categories, including citizen journalism, school-supported and new media focused. See if your favourites made the cut here.

Awards To Honour Breaking News

The finalists for the Online Journalism Awards have been announced and a total of ten sites have been nominated for breaking news coverage.

Award nominees compete in categories with websites of a similar size and this year sees three titles up for the breaking news prize for a small site.

They are: The Daily Astorian for coverage of the Gearhart Plane Crash; The Desert Sun for the Desert Hot Springs Gang Sweep; Pressconnects.com/Press & Sun-Bulletin for the Massacre on Front Street.



In the medium site category, the shortlist of four includes LasVegasSun.com for coverage of a snowstorm and the Dallas Morning News for its breaking news reports on the collapse of an American football training stadium.



Finally, the nominees in the large site category for breaking news are: The BBC for the Mumbai terrorist attacks; the New York Times for the plane crash on the Hudson river; chron.com for Hurricane Ike.



Run by the Online News Association, the awards also honour investigative journalism, multimedia, blogging, video journalism and general excellence – the full shortlist is available to view in the press release.

“We were regularly awed, inspired and delighted by the quality and innovation evident online today,” said Anthony Moor, co-chair of the awards committee.

The winners will be announced in October at the 2009 ONA Conference.

Six Ways To Make Video Pay

How to generate revenue from online videos is one of the challenges facing news publishers in the digital age.

A recent blog post addresses this issue by listing some of the ways that news websites in Minnesota have been trying their hand at making money from their videos.

Here are the six suggestions from Vadim Lavrusik, writing on the Online Journalism Blog:

1 - Internal hosting:

“News sites with a significant interest in monetising video content should move away from hosting content on sites like YouTube, which provide little opportunity for profit from revenue sharing.”

2 - Pre-roll advertising:

Lavrusik points out that this has been the most effective strategy so far and is becoming increasingly popular too.

3 - Complementing ad forms:

“Incorporating a banner ad that complements the video ad provides more exposure on the page and is usually more attractive to advertisers.”

4 - A 15-second rule:

Lavrusik notes that displayed ads on the sites he studied all lasted less than 15 seconds as research shows that longer ads can lose people.

5 - Search:

“If local news sites incorporate specific video searches, they could sell sponsored links to appear at the top.”

6 - Producing advertisements:

Lavrusik spoke to the chief executive of Borrell Associates, who said that news publishers need to be more creative with their online advertising in order to tap into the video market.

See the full post on the OJB.

BBC To Share Video News with Print Websites

The BBC has struck a landmark deal with four national newspaper groups to share video news on their websites, the Guardian reports.

The deal -- described as the latest step in the BBC's plans to share content, expertise and technology in the name of public service -- will make a limited range of free BBC video news content available on the websites of the Daily Mail, Guardian, Independent and Daily Telegraph. The BBC video will supplement the websites' own material in the areas of UK politics, business, health and science, and technology.

The BBC plans to make the same video news content available to other UK-based news websites in the future. The arrangement covers only news, not other genres such as entertainment or sports.

The video will carry BBC branding, and partner media organisations are not allowed to place advertising around the clips.

The video news sharing proposal marks a significant shift in relations between the BBC and rival media companies, GuardianMedia writer Mark Sweney points out. Newspaper publishers have long argued that the BBC has used licence fee revenue to fund its expansion into digital media, an arena where it competes with content providers that do not have access to a comparable public subsidy.

The industry won a battle last November to halt the BBC from launching a £68m network of local video news websites when the BBC Trust rejected the corporation's proposals.

The BBC recently has embarked on a series of partnerships with commerical media companies to fend off government proposals to top-slice the licence fee to help support other public service broadcasters, Sweney reports.

Follow Globe Video Via Facebook

Fans of a news site’s sports video can now follow it from their Facebook pages.

The new application enables Boston.com to make its daily Globe 10.0 more of an interactive feature as users can submit comments and contribute ideas for the next sporting debates.

Facebook users can also win prizes for the most promoted comments and invite their friends to join in with the burning issues.



See Editor & Publisher for more on this story.

Sports Coverage Draws Record Traffic

Preview coverage of an all-star baseball game has given an American news site its best-ever traffic figures.

Staff at the St Louis Post-Dispatch went all out with their multimedia reporting of the classic event and reaped the rewards after recording some 2.7 million page views in a single day.

The preview coverage included blogs, video content, photos, a round-up of the latest all-star tweets and all-star game quizzes.



Editor Arnie Robbins attributed the success to the multimedia approach taken by his team.

He told Editor & Publisher: “We had a lot of cool stuff this time on the game.

“The most interesting was a video - Cardinal Culture - a six-minute video of fans who love the Cardinals.”

He added: “We have the best coverage of the All-Star game anywhere.

“Fans from the area want to know about things like traffic around the game and events, and out of towners basically are fans of the game who want to know about this game, too.”

Visit stltoday.com/allstar to see the preview reports and subsequent coverage of the game itself.

Independent Signs Video Deals

The Independent is working with two media groups to enhance its video content.

Firstly, the newspaper has secured a deal with Press Association to supply its website with 200 video packages per week.

It has also signed an agreement with Octopus Media Technology to improve the presentation and distribution of video content.

According to the Independent, PA video journalists will provide 100 voiced video reports each week as well as 100 short clips to be displayed alongside the newspaper’s own articles.

“Working with PA and Octopus ensures that we have a platform that can deliver video to our userbase that is both flexible and integrated,” said Bill Swanson, managing director for digital at the Independent.

“The range of content also enables us to position the player in more areas of the site, it is the next step in our evolution as we continue to try and enhance the user experience and relevancy of our site.”

Liverpool Paper Makes TV Debut

A live debate about unemployment has become the first programme made in the Liverpool Daily Post’s new digital TV studio.

The half-hour show was streamed live on the business section of the Daily Post’s website using Bambuser technology, reports HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk.

Viewers were invited to contribute by submitting comments in real-time to an accompanying live blog.



Business editor Bill Gleeson declared the online debate to represent “a big leap forward in terms of bringing the digital age to newspaper titles”.

He said: “In the run up to the programme, I looked at how 20 other UK and US newspapers did television, in terms of the standards of presentation, production and research.

“In all of these areas, ours was the best by a long way.”

Following the success of this first digital TV venture, LDP editor Mark Thomas announced that his team is already looking to produce similar offerings in the future.

“We are now working on developing a rolling programme of business debates in the same format and I think this has the potential to bring us in some significant new revenue in the months ahead.”

Mail Recruits Video Producer

The Daily Mail is to boost its online video content thanks to a new deal with ITN On.

According to a press release, the multimedia group will supply the Mail Online with dozens of video packages each week covering national and international news.

The company will also provide dailymail.co.uk with video news reports featuring the latest sports, business and showbiz headlines.

“ITN On has demonstrated to us that they have high-quality content which is frequently unique,” said James Bromley, managing director of Mail Online.

He added: “We are looking forward to working with them to add video to even more of our stories.”

ITN On recently hit the headlines itself after it was revealed that ITN.com had cancelled its contract to supply video and multimedia content to the site.

[HT – Journalism.co.uk]

How-To Videos On YouTube Channel

A YouTube channel dedicated to online journalism is building its stock of videos from industry experts and practitioners.

Launched in April, the YouTube Reporters' Center already holds more than 30 videos offering tips on key aspects of digital journalism.

Categories include Expert Videos, Interviews and Profiles, Investigative Reporting, and Ethics, Law & Fact-Checking.



Among the industry insiders offering the benefit of their experience are veteran investigative reporter Bob Woodward, CBS news anchor Katie Couric, and HuffPost founder Arianna Huffington.

In addition to these general advice pieces, there are also technical instructional videos such as this one from Reuters.com about filming effective video interviews.



And this video from Bloomberg TV gives some valuable tips on how to tell a story with numbers.



YouTube says of the citizen reporting resource: “The YouTube Reporters’ Center is a new resource to help you learn more about how to report the news.”

Daily Express Tests New Site

The Daily Express is seeking feedback on its redesigned website, now available in beta.

Visitors to express.co.uk are currently directed to this new beta version, but can still access the original site by selecting it from the home page.

After comparing and contrasting the two, users can go to the short survey and give their views on the changes.



Created by Netro42, the pilot website introduces category widgets on the homepage – such as Weather, TV Guide, Lifestyle – which can be collapsed by users to suit their interests.

The beta version also introduces a web search widget and a video player offering sporting highlights from the Ashes series, the Premier League, and international football.



Reviews of the beta site can be found on the Online Journalism Blog and on e-consultancy.com.

Asylum Piece Wins Multimedia Award

A multimedia report revealing the plight of refused asylum seekers in the UK has won a photography award.

Still Human Still Here by freelancer Abbie Trayler-Smith has received first prize in the multimedia category of the Press Photographer’s Year 2009 competition.

The video uses still photos, moving images, text captions, audio excerpts from interviews and a soundtrack to tell the story of some of Britain’s most impoverished people.

All the elements work together to produce a captivating piece of photojournalism, which was posted to video-sharing site Vimeo four months ago.

Still Human Still Here - Refused asylum seekers in the UK. from panos pictures on Vimeo.

The report was produced by independent photo agency Panos Pictures and will be on view in an exhibition of all the winning entries at the National Theatre this summer.

Among the other 15 category winners were photographers from the BBC, Manchester Evening News, Getty Images and the Daily Mail.

[HT - HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk]

Interactive Coverage For Jacko Tribute

Social media sites joined with mainstream news groups on Tuesday to offer interactive coverage of the Michael Jackson memorial concert.

Live video was accompanied by real-time comments from fans on the websites of many broadcasters – including CNN, ABC News and msnbc.

Twitter was the social media tool of choice for msnbc.com, which aggregated tweets (powered by Tinker) alongside streamed video footage from the Staples Center in Los Angeles.



New product development director Cory Bergman said that the online coverage represented “a first for both Twitter and msnbc.com on a large-scale news event”.

Meanwhile, both CNN and ABC News opted for Facebook Connect to draw fans to their live video stream.



According to Mashable, the interactive coverage on CNN.com attracted a total audience of almost ten million and thousands of updates from Facebook users.

In an interview for CNN, Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg talks about her company’s involvement in the broadcaster's coverage of the event.

Mirror Launching Footie Site

A website dedicated to the beautiful game is set to be launched this year by Trinity Mirror.


The standalone multimedia site will feature text, video and photographic content from matches, reports the Guardian.

It will have a breaking news feed, blogs, and plenty of special features, such as a weekly video report from the ever popular Robbie Savage and a daily soccer show.

Fans will also be able to access a treasure trove of Mirror Group photographs capturing the highs and lows of English football over the decades.

MirrorFootball.co.uk is scheduled to go live this summer, in time for the start of the new season.

[Photo by Atomic Shed on Flickr.]

ITV Ends Web News Contract

ITN’s web division will stop supplying news to ITV.com next month following the cancellation of the contract.

The Guardian cites sources suggesting the agreement was worth an estimated £500,000 to ITN On, which has provided text and video reports to the website.

Video bulletins covering global and national stories will be supplied in the future by the television news division of ITN.

Text articles published on ITV.com will come from ITV’s regional journalists.

A memo from ITN On managing director Nicholas Wheeler published on the Guardian website reveals that job losses are now inevitable.

He concludes: “The loss of this contract represents significant revenue hit for ITN On, and means that we have to review the online operation to see how we can best deliver text stories to our remaining online clients.”

Next Step Journalism

The death of Neda Soltani, the young Iranian woman who has become the tragic human face of the nation's post-election turmoil, demonstrates the process involved in what Bill Mitchell of the Poynter Institute calls "next step journalism."

A distraught bystander captured video of the killing on his phone and e-mailed it to a friend in the Netherlands. Within five minutes, the video was on YouTube and Facebook -- and became international news.

Mitchell says our news increasingly will be shaped by a similar process, one that begins with an event and is characterized by the collective sharing and enhancing of information. The process "provides lots of opportunities for journalists and non-journalists alike to assess what a story needs next, figure out what he or she is best equipped to contribute, and move the story along."

In Soltani's story, he identifies seven elements of this kind of storytelling, some more in need of professional journalism skills and values than others. Their common thread is the importance of collaboration.

* Documentation: Two cell phone videos captured the crucial moments after Soltani was shot Saturday evening, including the frantic efforts to save her. The low resolution of the videos and chaotic movement of the cell phone cameras did not get in the way of telling this critical part of the story, Mitchell points out.

* Context: The videos left many questions unanswered. But Soltani's fiance provided some context in an interview broadcast by Aljazeera, describing her views on recent events in Iran and explaining why she happened to be on that street corner.

* Transmission and Distribution: It was initially unclear how the videos made their way from the street corner to Facebook and YouTube. The Guardian filled in the details above. Other information came from The New York Times and the CBS Evening News, among others.

* Verification: Some of the initial postings about the shooting included a message from someone identifying himself as a physician who said he witnessed the shooting and tried to save her. A series of tweets and re-tweets from around the world confirmed this information and identified the doctor.

* Correction: Some of the details distributed on the day of the shooting, such as the identity of a man standing near Soltani, turned out to be wrong. Within two days, a Los Angeles Times correspondent had tracked down the man and identified him as her music teacher.

* Analysis: Mitchell says the best analysis he has seen of the significance of Soltani's death has come from journalists, particularly highlighting an essay on Time.com by Robin Wright.

* Sense-making: "It's still too early in the Neda story for anyone to be able to provide the perspective and wisdom required by this stage the process," Mitchell writes. "Who will do it best? Journalists? That physician who tried to save Neda? Historians?"

More important than the who is the what, he concludes. This tragic story "has taught us plenty about what this kind of storytelling will require -- and what it can produce."

Free raw video, courtesy of the PA

A free Press Association video wire service will be available to regional newspapers from Tuesday 5 May, the PA Group has announced.

The video wire, which will be available on a trial basis, will provide raw, editable footage of the day's main stories. It will cover up to 30 stories a day across news, sport and entertainment, including interview clips and cutaways.

The agency says its training arm also will provide courses on video editing to help newspaper clients get full value from the new service.

PA has been producing pre-packaged video content for media websites since 2005, primarily as edited clips. This material will continue to be available.

However, as HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk reported, the new wire service is the first time that video has been available to customers on an unedited basis alongside text and picture content.

Music to Your Users' Ears?

Music is a powerful and pervasive part of our culture, and it offers an opportunity to add an extra kick to a visual story.

No, wait. Music can be emotionally manipulative, and it hurts credibility to attach it to journalists' stories.

The Poynter Institute's Regina McCombs recently offered some guidelines for online journalists who agree (or disagree) with both arguments:

* In general, you should not add music to what was gathered from the scene.

The authentic audio, video or photography gathered in the field is the most important storytelling material a journalist has. Adding material that was not gathered through the reporting process must be done with great caution and skill. Natural sound can be just as powerful.

The BBC is among the organisations that have decided against using music in news stories. "You are changing what you're representing, and if you're changing it, it shouldn't be there," said Fiona Anderson of BBC Newsgathering. "I think this whole issue of enhancement is really dodgy."

* In the rare cases in which you add music, it should be used to enhance or further the narrative, not to compensate for incomplete reporting.

Brian Storm of media production company MediaStorm says music works best when the photojournalism carries the storyline and contains the narrative -- not because narrative is missing. Music "doesn't make a piece work," he said. "All the elements have to be working. It's like another gear you have."

"Music can get in the way, it can control the pacing, it can put it on rails. It becomes like an amusement park ride, presented so you become passive," argues documentary editor Jonathan Menell. "It tells the viewer you're going to handle them and control the emotion."

* All stories are not equal.

Just as writers don't approach feature stories the same way as investigative pieces, the standards for adding music may vary within story genres.

In general, the American Press Institute says, the more serious or sensitive the story, the more careful you should be in using background music.

* Music is not a universal language.

A breathtaking aria to one person is grating noise to another. Because people's reactions to music are subjectively influenced by their personal tastes, music and mood, you can never be certain how you affect a story by adding a piece of music.

* You must understand the craft of scoring music if you add it to stories.

Most of us are not skilled in the use of music with video. As with photography and writing, incorporating music well requires a lot of craft, both in selecting the music and editing it.

McCombs offers several examples of how music can affect reaction to a story. The bottom line, she says, is that music should not lessen our stories nor be used to manipulate viewers' emotions. If you're considering adding music to any piece, you need to be cautious and thoughtful. And you must respect the integrity of the story.

Papers Compete For New Media Awards

Regional newspapers are competing against nationals in the digital categories at this year’s Newspaper Awards.

Designed to celebrate newspaper and new media production, the annual contest gives away two web-based awards – Best Use of New Media and Electronic News Site of the Year.

The shortlists for both have been revealed and among the nominees are national newspapers, local newspapers, new media companies and the BBC.


Best Use of New Media

Alphaville, Financial Times - The Long Room

chroniclelive (Newcastle) - Ronnie Gill avatar

Evening Times (Glasgow) - Community websites

Express & Echo (Exeter) – Kellow’s Bootlaces football TV show

Henley Standard - Website

Thisissouthdevon - Rockstars

Daily Telegraph - Mobile applications



Electronic News Site of the Year

bbc.co.uk
belfasttelegraph.co.uk
ft.com
guardian.co.uk
kentonline.co.uk
telegraph.co.uk
timesonline.co.uk

Plus, the video content on the website of the Cambridge News has been shortlisted for the award for Most Significant Contribution to Future Newspaper Success.

The winners will be announced near the end of this month in a ceremony in London.

A full list of all the awards and nominees is available on HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk.

How To – Shoot Video For The Web

The all-important basics for shooting Web video are featured in the latest Reporter’s Guide to Multimedia Proficiency post from Mindy McAdams.

Blogger and academic McAdams has reached part 12 in the series and turned her attention to filming video pieces for news websites.

Here’s a summary of her guidelines:

What’s A Story?

McAdams asserts that video packages should not rely on facts like a report, but rather seek to tell a story.

This requires journalists to be genuinely curious about the subject and able to find and identify the interesting, the unusual and the unexpected.

What’s Worth Capturing?

This means going around without a camera and microphone at first in order to get an idea of what’s happening and what would make an interesting image etc.

When To Shoot?

McAdams suggests that interview subjects will talk about the things the reporter asks them about – so get material first and then pose your questions, rather then shooting footage to fit an interviewee’s responses.

What To Shoot?

Taking her cue from video journalism blogger Angela Grant, McAdams says the question of what to shoot comes down to three things: “I like to call them ‘action or activity’; emotion; and ‘you’ve got to see it to believe it.’”

How To Shoot?

McAdams suggests beginners should try to keep camera movement to a minimum – no panning or tilting – and shoot short clips of action.

How Much To Shoot?

The five-shot method is recommended – where five different shots are taken of each action to increase your options when editing.


Visit McAdams’s Teaching Online Journalism blog for the full post and for some useful links to other resources and blog posts on video journalism.

The Reporter’s Guide to Multimedia Proficiency also includes posts on blogs and RSS feeds, and creating audio-visual slideshows.