Home stretch

You’ve accomplished a tremendous amount of journalism in two months. To wrap up, polish up the site with the latest content and the improvements suggested in class. Then turn in the final writing assignment by Tuesday.

Here’s the drill:

1. Final stories

• Update bios
• Post blogs
• Post Deeper Look stories

2. Incorporate class critique

• More imbedded photos
• More link references
• Catergorize business stories

3. The Final: The DowntownAlive business plan.

Use our readings on the business models of interactive journalism to prepare a business plan of up to two pages that sustains, or perhaps expands this project.

Structure your business plan to address these specific areas:

• Audience: Identify existing and potential audience
• Content: Details a content plan that builds upon what we’ve created.
• Staff: The full-, part-time and unpaid community sources required.
• Revenue: A sustainable revenue plan referencing the models we’ve discussed.

May 19 agenda

Assignments due May 19

Dive into comments: Don’t be tepid. Jump into Galesburg Register-Mail comments streams. Affirm, challenge, engage and respond to other commenters. Then write up to 300 words about what you learned.

The commenting community is a critical part of an interactive journalist’s audience. Embrace it with both arms.

Stories due May 19

These stories draw on new reporting; existing reporting on the site and some innovation on your part to make each engaging to an interactive audience.

Chris: Parking. Specific reporting on how downtown visitors use parking andwhat might make it better.

Klayr: Youth hangout: Where, when how. Lists of things to do.

Andrew: Downtown crime. Fears vs. reality. Poll. Safest and least safe.

Andrea: Downtown needs a….   Compiling specific suggestions from those we’ve interviewed and from new sources. Perhaps a poll on our site?

Evan: Downtown theater. History. Are their successful downtown theaters in other towns?

Whitney: Destination shopping. Map of where people are from. Marketing efforts for destination… billboards. Who targeting?

Matt: Downtown history. We’ll discuss angles for this interactive presentation. This is due May 26.

Site critique

Add e-mail for all participants.

New inviting header

Inviting interactions

Wish Lists

Images

Promotion: Contact all your Facebook friends.

Polls

Categorization

The iJournalism business model

Sustainable interactive journalism requires a business plan. This week, I’ll introduce you to the parameters of a plan through these links.

Definition of terms

Things interactive journalists DON’T do

Dynamics of local vs. national advertising

Social networking drives traffic, not necessarily advertising

Analysis of CPM vs. CPC models

Another option

Traffic analysis through Alexa

May 12 class plan

Comment discussion

Your experiences this week.

Here’s a 2006 editorial summarizing the explosion of comments at the Quad-City Times.

Value: What are the benefits of online commenting? To readers? To journalists? To the newspaper business.

What are the drawbacks for each group?

Visitors

Melissa Coulter

Quadsville Editor for the Quad-City Times. Melissa helped create the newspaper’s social network site. She actively organizes chats, meet-ups and Web groups. She moderates comments and is a member of the Times Editorial Board. She also designs pages for print products.

Melissa participated in an exchange program with an Austrian newspaper last summer. She was raised near Monmouth and graduated from Augustana College.

Among her first projects was the invention of the Iowa caucus quiz, a series of video shorts with presidential candidates Obama, Clinton, Romney and others.  You’ve got to check out the Clinton quiz.

Jacqui Henriksen

 This Knox senior worked hard in our inagural interactive journalism class, then went on to win an internship in the Chicago Tribune’s online department.

Project work this week

What did you learn from customers?

Wish lists: Where are they?

Beyond profiles

Depth stories

Interaction

Events

Fun

Next week: The business case for interaction.

Read the links on our paid content debate page.

Compare Register Mail advertising inventory in print and online.. Identify unique advertisers for each. Who is buying both?

 

 

May 5 discussion notes and assignments

The site is shaping up wonderfully. We’ve got nine biz profiles posted with images.

Evan is working on the banner photo.

Andrea is completing the About page. Where should we shoot our group shot?

Editing team will be posting additional stories and images.

Interactive team is contacting the Register-Mail and connecting to Facebook and other sites.

For next week:
Customer focus
Interview enough individuals to provide three customer profiles about downtown.
File 100 to 300 word stories on each.

Downtown: Klayr
Lake Storey: Andrea
Knox: Andrew
Sandburg: Chris
Hy Vee: Matt
Mall: Evan

Questions:
These are starting points. Take off from there.

First, make sure they’re from Galesburg area.
Last time you were downtown?
What other reasons for going downtown?
Favorite place now and historically?
Wish list?
Personal info: Occupation
Would you live downtown?
Story ideas?

And a new one: Query them about their online information habits. And suggest they visit downtownalive.

For our May 12 comment discussion:

Plunge into an active comment stream. Be prepared to discuss  your experiences.
Post comments that affirm, challenge, question, add new info to the discussion such as a link or relavent personal experience.

Our guest speaker will be Quad-City Times Quadsville Editor Melissa Coulter. Melisssa edits and organizes Quadsville.com, the QCTimes.com social networking site.
Learn something about Melissa online.

Story filing protocol
E-mail stories to Mark at mmridolfi@aol.com.
Mark will e-mail back with revisions.
Post as draft to DowntownAlive.
Editing team will post live to site.

May 5 class plan

What have we learned? We’ll review your stories, images and experiences from the businesses you visited.

Audience identification

All journalism product development begins with a discussion of audience. Who will this appeal to? How? Audiences find value in a product when they can identify its distinctive attributes.

Audience: Business owners; prospective business people; town residents and customers; city officials; developers; other students.

Not audience: Big box shoppers; teens, youth;

Role assignment

Reporting obligations

Editing

Image production

Sections, for example…
Downtown history
Now & then
The insider
Something about…
Betcha didn’t know…

An event, for example…
After hours
Opening time
Eat your way across town

Audience development
Facebook
Register-Mail
TKS
Other Galesburg blogs

Downtown Alive

The 2009 Interactive Journalism class project will be Downtown Alive. Our audience is the downtown business community, its owners, managers, employees and customers. Our goal is to tell readers things they don’t know about downtown businesses, and particularly ideas about the future of downtown.

Your reporting experiences will drive this site. This is a heavy lifting week with site design and copy processing decisions to be made by the teams. But keep reporting top of mind as you proceed.

Here are our next steps:

Everyone: Business reporting. By next class, everyone will have completed three business profiles. That will give us 21 stories for our teams to post.

Design team: Matt, Evan, Klayr and Chris will register the site name with WordPress, give everyone administrative access; select a template and develop a custom header with image. Communicate this info ASAP so other teams can begin posting drafts. PLEASE post the projects ethics statement from our Ijournalism site.

Editing team: Matt, Andrea and Whitney. Editing team will compile and post existing copy and develop process for future copy. We will use AP style for this project.

Image team: Andrew, Evan and Andrea will create the process for selecting and displaying images.

Interactive team: Chris and Whitney will decide if the site will require preapproval for comments, or manage them after they’ve been posted. You’ll need posting guidelines. Also this team will develop strategies for drawing readers from other sites, for example Facebook and the Register Mail.

Our story so far…

Terrific work plan. Below is a summary of Tuesday’s plan.  Post your stories as comments to this post. That way, everyone can see them.

These stories will be graded based on standard journalism attributes: Clarity, sourcing, accuracy and reader engagement, specifically, telling readers something they don’t know.

 These 300-word stories will focus on just a few aspects of your interviews and research. Don’t attempt to empty your notebook in these first stories.

Assignments:

Klayr: Mark Holmes Art studio; Fins, feathers and fur pets.

Andrea: Register Mail; Coney Island Hot Dogs.

Chris: Foley Photo; Peoria Journal Star Office.

Evan: Galesburg Sewing Center; New China restaurant

Whitney: Hawk’s Tattoos; Inkeeper Coffee

Matt: Video Media Productions; Eichorn Jewelers

Andrew: One Stop Smoke Shop; Gas & Go Radio

Stories: Approximately 300 words on a specific angle.

Photos: Shots of individuals.

Evan: Multiple horizontal header photos.

Pick a name: Submit four options, including one that doesn’t use the word “Galesburg.”

Here are some of the questions to ask in each interview.

Describe your best day in business

In five years: What will you be doing, hope to be doing; won’t be doing

Wish list for downtown

Changes in downtown, good and bad

Your model downtown

Where did you learn your trade

What does downtown need?

Ask for images, new and old.

Encourage each source to provide a short essay about  a wish list for downtown.

April 21 discussion notes

Journalism

Journalism 2.0 discussion, Chapters 7, 8 and 9

Chapter 7

Audio recording: Illinois is a two-party state.

Iowa is a one-party state, but a recent court ruling allows a parent to secretly record a child’s conversations without notifying either party in the conversation.

Radio Shack phone recording connector.

New York Times podcasts: Tight; present tense; minimal production.

Chapter 8: Digital photos

Why are megapixels important?

Know your DPIs: 72 for Web; 200 for print; 300+ for magazine.

Four tips: Anchor the camera. Get close. Take lots of images. Be conscious of light.

Rule of thirds and an example.

Interactivity

WordPress page review.

Project

Read our draft ethics statement.

Role assignments. Andrew update on video equipment and editing availability. Matt suggestion on downtown reporting boudaries.

Reporting assignments: Business lists.

April 28

Class time 7 p.m.

Reporting: completed interviews and images from two businesses.

Interactivity: Two suggestions for site interactivity.

Read sock puppets. Jump in to a public news comment stream and write about your experiences.

Project: Draft designs

Upcoming:

May 5: Online comment day with Melissa Coulter, Quadsville editor and experienced comment moderator.

Rule of thirds

Which image follows the rule? Which ignores it?

April 21 class

Lots to cover…

Journalism: Discuss chapters 7, 8 and 9 from Journalism 2.0

Interactivity: Share your WordPress blogs. Add the url as comments to this post.

Project: Downtown Galesburg’s future.

Please provide…

Two project roles. Define two roles other than being a reporter. Editing, text or video; photography; database or polls. Site design. Consider a journalism experience you’ve not had.

Five business leads: Names and details of five downtown businesses

Andrew: Check library for video equipment availability and type.

Matt: Recommend geographic boundaries of downtown for purposes of this project.