May 2006 Archives

I'm pretty sure I heard crickets in the newsroom this morning.

It can't be more than 70 degrees in here. Maybe colder. We'll need to check with Carlena to see if she has a thermometer. We can't see our breath yet, but it is necessary to wear a jacket.

Katie has been diligently working alone in the Multimedia Newsroom this week. I've been holed up in my office and running back and forth to Stauffer-Flint (our other building) trying to prepare for summer school.

We are planning some exciting changes to tv.ku.edu next fall. Stay tuned for the inside scoop on our continuing evolution.

Next week, Rick, Katie and I will be out of the office. There will be no one in the newsroom. I wonder if the police scanner will notice?

Congratulations to all of the 2006 journalism school graduates. Not to sound all sentimental and mushy, but I will miss you. I have had the opportunity to work with many of you over the last two-three years and I must say, it's been fun. You have demonstrated creativity and drive, I know you will go far in life. Please, stay in touch. Don't forget all the fun you had in the Multimedia Newsroom. Check back on this blog often and let us know what exciting things you are doing.

Gabe Van Pelt and Katie Jackson, members of the 694 online production class stand by the printer at 4:59 p.m. on Stop Day.

It's Stop Day. The newsroom was mostly dead. Mostly. Except for the online producers who were in the training lab scrambling to put the finishing touches on their final projects.

Final projects are never easy; as the stress mounts, tempers fly and people's feelings can get hurt. In the end, this group of students proved they have what it takes, IMHO, to survive in a multimedia world.

I'm proud of the work they did. Proud of the way they learned to work together. I believe this class builds character. It inspires and motivates students. I like to think that when they finish this class, and graduate, they leave the J-School knowing just a little bit more than they did when they started.

Next week, the online producers will present their projects on promotions, blogging, user-submitted content and newsroom assets to the dean as well as fellow students, faculty and staff. Thanks to Katie L.'s great suggestions for project topics, I think we will see some exciting new changes in the newsroom and online. Check back for excerpts from the class presentation after May 17.

I want to salute CBS for putting the March Madness games online for free. Sure, the video may have been a little grainy, and the log in wait was more than annoying. But I enjoyed having the option of watching somebody other than Duke play basketball in the NCAA Tournament.

The online content did not prevent me from watching the designated games for my market. In fact, I had my television and my computer on CBS.

The recent NFL draft coverage on ESPN was almost non stop. I can only look at Mel Kiper's hair for so long, so I hopped on www.espn.com and checked out the instant draft analysis on my Kansas City Chiefs. I also dabbled on other draft sites, including the borderline propaganda machine at www.kcchiefs.com, but in the end I still had my TV tuned to ESPN.

Going online enhanced my March Madness and draft day experience, and was a lot like the prom: I may have looked at other girls, but in the end I still stayed with the one who brought me.

The point here, folks, is that the new age media of blogs and The Drudge Report will not hurt The New York Times and CNN.

Blogs need content to ignite conversations. Top blogs Daily Kos or Michelle Malkin would be lost without reaction to stories from the old guard.

And the most popular sites on the 'net need outside content from the media giants. MSN, rated the number three website by Alexa, uses content from MSNBC for its news headlines. Google, the number two site according to Alexa, rips stories from the headlines of traditional news outlets such as The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, and even MSNBC.

And Alexa's number one site, Yahoo, has story after story from the Associated Press.

The truth is the big media giants are not going anywhere. People may wander off to the online world, but in the end they are still going to end up back where they started: in front a TV or newspaper, even if that broadcast or print story is online.

And I bet a lot of guys wouldn't mind ESPN for a prom date.

T-Rex is back!

The only thing I can remember about Intro to Journalism right off the bat is that Marshall McLuhan said, "The medium is the message." What happens to the message if the medium is as extinct as a tyrannosaurus rex?

Not much.

Instead of being wiped out in the Ice Age, the message can and will live on, just not on the mainstream media. Just look at these numbers from Nielson Media Research and see how much the Internet has hindered television ratings. And that was in 1999. The Internet was very popular then, but the mainstream media really didn't find a place online until a few years ago. Think about how much it has improved since then. Think about how much time it has taken people away from the television. Think about how much more of an impact it can have in the future.

The time when media will move to another age is approaching. Even Rupert Murdock, the modern-day William Randolph Hearst, said the Internet means the end for media barons. He said a new generation of media consumers has taken the gate-keeping power from the proprietors of previous years. That new generation will change the media world forever because it has something traditional media do not: time and space. That mean's any citizen can be a journalist.

OhmyNews is the leader of the pack. It started with 727 citizen reporters and four staff reporters. In 2004, it had more than 30,000 and 35, respectively. OhmyNews is evolving as the dominant T-Rex of today, as it's taking entire nations by storm, starting with Korea.

Many frameworks for studying 20th century media exist, but the Cultural Studies/Cultural History Theory may be the most appropriate because 20th century media is in fact history. The main element of this theory is that media does not own culture.

The people do. And soon they will be the proprietors of deciding what they want to see. They will be the T-Rexes of a new age.

Two months ago, knowing that I was going to graduate this May, I decided to buy myself a new computer. I figured I would need something new that would work for a few years, since I'd be out on my own without school computers to use. I ended up buying a combo package with a laptop and a desktop for $1,300. The point of this anecdote: most people in this country don't have thirteen hundred bones to drop on a couple computers.

The last time I checked, broadcast television was free. And here's some late-breaking news for you...

People like stuff that's free!!!

I spent $1,300 on two computers. I didn't spend $1,300 on a printing press.

According to Media Magazine, the television medium isn't dying at all. It's just being spread thin over various types of television watching. But there is a definite shift from the traditional sit down at 10 p.m. and watch the news each and every night mindset.

So what does this all mean? It means that we, as journalism students, need to think in innovative ways to lure an audience. And at the same time, we need to present newsworthy content in a respectable manner that's not over the top. Or at least not too far over the top. Whether that be for print, radio, television, or the web it doesn't really seem to matter.

It seems like more and more newspapers are trying to follow the trend of generating online revenue that our very own Lawrence Journal-World has polished over the last few years. Yet these are the types of quotes the people in charge of media conglomerates are throwing at us:

"There is no bigger problem today than the fact that we're not getting paid for online news. If we can't get paid for it, we aren't going to be able to continue to afford to do it." - William Dean Singleton, vice chairman and CEO of MediaNews Group Inc.

I wasn't aware of the business principle stating you had to make money in order to continue to offer your product or service. Here's an idea for you Mr. Three-Named CEO...if you clean up your crappy online news web site, you will attract an audience and, in turn, generate revenue.

Everything points toward convergence of all types of media. For now, all convergence means is that all the old media forms are coming together to form an online medium. It doesn't mean the old media are dying. But it also doesn't mean they won't die eventually.

Photo: Mark Zillman
Blogging just got more interesting.

I enjoy blogs. I look at them as online columns. Everybody likes a good columnist. As a sports fan, I enjoy reading Rob Neyer slam the Kansas City Royals for inept baseball decisions. I like reading the blurbs and comments about the Jayhawks on phogblog.com. I even get a good laugh checking out some of the crazy comments on the kusports.com message boards.

But the simple truth is that most people are not reading blogs. One study shows that only 3 percent of Americans read blogs.

If that number holds true, how can there really be an A-list blogger?

In fact, Technorati's top blog page is a "Page not found" on MSNBC. Did I miss something here? Of course, the solid BoingBoing.net came in second (see past article). A pretty cool gadget site rounds out Tech's top 3.

I guess it is not real surprising that no news sites made the top three (Daily Kos did take number five). With American Idol invading roughly nine million more homes than 60 Minutes, the web should emulate the boob tube and have more people visiting entertainment sites than news pages.

And with so many people enamored with entertainment, there is a web site that meets their never ending thirst for celebrities. Gawker.com has its Stalker site. Want to know where Geraldo was driving his Bentley? Want to know where Mandy Moore just shopped? Did Johnny Damon really go to the Container Store? The answers to all of these award winning questions can be found on New York map. Consider this the Chicagocrime.org of celebrity sightings. Hooray!

Then again, maybe bloggers are bigger than we think. Tila Tequila was recently plastered on the cover of Stuff magazine. Tila didn't invent a longer lasting light bulb, a new type of post it, or save a kid from drowning. She didn't even come up with a new Tequila drink (she can't even drink tequila-she is allergic to alcohol). But she is one of the most popular draws at MySpace.com.

So there you have the blogosphere in a nutshell. A top rated page is an error message, a map that tells us where Mike Meyers ate a corn appetizer, and one of the most popular girls on the internet is named after a drink she can't ever have. If this is the A-list, what does it take to get on the B?

I'm shakin' it on the dance floor at Abe and Jakes on Friday night when a fight broke out. Punches were thrown, knives were drawn, clothes came off, blood spewed on the floor and twenty cop cars lined the street. As I feared for my life and my night of fun I realized what the fight entailed. Two guys were fighting over who gets the most hits on their blogs. It was a typical he said – he said argument, which of course ends in a black eye, bloody nose or stab wound.

Okay, so that is a slight dramatization (emphasis on slight).

Don't shoot me (no pun intended) for replacing athlete with blogger and the cause of the fight with site hits.

I can only wonder what it would be like to be an A-list blogger or bloggerati. If A-list blogging is anything like A-list celebrities then "Houston, we have a problem." I envision bloggerati on the V.I.P. list at all the hot parties, drinking too much Cristal, fighting over other A-list bloggers and doing anything possible to get attention.

To become and A-list blogger you must provide provocative content and network to everyone you meet. But once you're there, how do you stay on top? It must get to the point when you create fabricated hype surrounding your blog for fear of moving to the B-list.

So, for instance, if bloggerati will do anything to stay on top, like celebs, then there is a grand possibility that much of what they say is just for audience reaction.

But then the question must be posed. What are blogs for and what types of blogs are on the A-list?

Technorati lists the usual suspects: Wonkette, a personal favorite, Gawker, Engadget and Lifehacker. The number one favorited blogger is deserving of the prestigious title, Comedian Jenée: People are Idiots, is hilarious, who needs to go to a comedy show anymore, now you can just read the comedy online.

We live in a time when it's too easy to poke fun at the news, politicians and the most outrageous trends. What the O'Riley Factor, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report do for television, bloggerati do for the internet.

But A-list blogs are telling it like it is and that's what people want to read. The satirical references to the topical and outrageous leave readers scrolling for more. Most A-listers aren't blogging about hard news, but they are telling their version of the news at an angle that television often neglects – humanization. If people want news they go to the names they trust the most. But if people want in-your-face humor, satire, bluntness and real opinions they look to the bloggers. Also, many bloggers are techies so coincidentily they blog about new technology and fancy gadgets.

Although blogs are individualized to meet the interests of a particular niche, there is always a pecking order. It isn't an ideal world for the B-List or Z-List bloggers, like me, who don't have an A-list usership, but when you find your audience they will receive you just like you were an A-lister.

But like celebs, the A-listers are around about as long as the "bag of the season." Just as there is a natural hierarchy, so is the realization that you ‘re just as good as the next blogger and he's actually funny.

What makes a good blog?

Who are we to decide?

According to Forbes magazine, "The method of blogging allows for publication on a whim, when the mood strikes, making the "blogverse," as some like to call it, one of the first places to look for reactions to the happenings of the day, and in specific areas of interest." Forbes goes on to list the best media, sports, travel, and medical blogs, among others.

Technorati has their own list the Top 100 blogs by the most favorited and unique links. These lists contain blogs of different topics but no list of qualifications for the making the top 100 other than sheer numbers.

I have to wonder, what qualifies a blog to be the "best." It may be nice to have your blog on a list that talks up its greatness but I don't think that we can take these lists seriously. They are a good guide but nothing to be written in stone.

A good blog is in the eye of the reader

Not to take anything away from the professional bloggers of the world, but nowhere on any of the sites did I see a link to ehub.ku.edu. So does that mean it is not a good site? Not at all. Blogs are a personal conversation with the readers and if the topic interests you then that makes it a good blog. It may not be on a list but that doesn't matter.

What makes a good blog is one that contains a topic that I am interested and enjoy reading. A blog that is interesting to me may not be one that my friends enjoy and that makes it very difficult to place any blog on a Top Blog list.

A good blog is one that is good in the Eye of the Reader.