What is it?
An app that organizes tons of information and feeds, and creates a beautiful, storyboard-like exploration of media.
How it works:
After downloading the app (which lives exclusively on mobile devices — no desktop version available), users see a home page and a variety of starter feeds. You can add pages by choosing a “pack” — a premade bundle of feeds — based on topics like business, fashion and politics. You can then search the catalog for more feeds or add one on the pre-selected feeds from top publishers.
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This is part of a series of blog posts from the first ONA class of MJ Bear Fellows describing their experiences and sharing their knowledge with the community. Fellow Laura Amico, along with her husband, Chris, is the founder and editor of Homicide Watch D.C. in Washington, D.C., a website that covers every homicide in the nation’s capital, and includes news, obituaries, profiles, court documents and memorials.
Last week, Chris and I presented Homicide Watch at ONA’s DC meetup. You can watch the video here. In it, we discuss a lot of the technical and editorial specifics of what we do every day.
Our kicker from the presentation is the subject of this blog post (minute 35 on the video). These 11 “lessons learned” are meant to be somewhat inspirational, both for those going it alone, like I am, and for those in traditional settings.
I expand on each below, but in brief:
- Do what you can — now.
- Use what you can — now.
- Build what you can — now.
- Take risks.
- Evaluate.
- Be public.
- Think creatively.
- Trust that things will fall into place.
- But do what you can to make them fall into the right places.
- Never stop looking forward.
- Find your purpose, define it, and live by it.
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Jim Brady elected ONA president
Jim Brady, Editor-in-Chief, Digital First Media, was elected President at the ONA’s January Board of Directors meeting in Washington, D.C. Jim, who is in his fourth term as a Board member, has held the offices of Treasurer and Vice President over the past three years, and has chaired or served on many key committees, including Legal Affairs and Strategy.
Joining Jim as officers of the organization are: Meredith Artley, Vice President & Managing Editor, CNN Digital, elected Vice President; Jody Brannon, in the second year of her two-year term as Treasurer; and Will Sullivan, Director of Mobile News, Lee Enterprises, elected Secretary.
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More and more journalists are using images and other types of materials found on the web to create stories and multimedia packages. Without a dedicated media department, independent journalists in particular can easily run afoul of existing copyright laws. Fair Use provides a small haven by allowing exceptions to strict copyright laws for reasons of critique or news reporting. But how many reporters or media makers truly understand their rights? Patricia Aufderheide, director of the Center for Social Media at American University, recently co-authored Reclaiming Fair Use: How to Put Balance Back in Copyright and agreed to speak with ONA about free speech rights, documentary filmmaking and SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act).
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This post is one of a series of blog posts from the first ONA class of MJ Bear Fellows describing their experiences, projects and sharing their knowledge with the ONA community. Fellow Lucas Timmons is a data journalist and web producer for The Edmonton Journal in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
The Progressive Conservatives (PCs) have ruled Alberta for the past four decades. First elected in 1971, the Tories have formed the government ever since. With no legitimate threat to their power, Alberta’s provincial politics and elections can be very boring.
When Premier Ed Stelmach announced he was stepping down, the race was on for a new leader of the PCs and the new Premier. Six contenders put their names forward.
As part of the coverage for the leadership race, the Edmonton Journal decided to find out where the six candidates stood on four issues. We were looking for a way that would:
- Let the candidates outline their positions
- Allow our readers to get just the information they wanted
- Add to our online coverage, and bring people to our website
- Be interactive
- Look cool
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