Online Journalism Blog

I was due to take part in the 9th Journalism Leaders Forum next Tuesday, but sadly have had to pull out. I’m especially gutted because Chris Anderson, editor of Wired magazine and author of “The Long Tail“, will be there via video link. Another time perhaps… (more…)

Another Twitter lead led me to this one:

“Going Solo is a chance to learn how to do things like set your rates, make yourself known, close deals, find clients or let them find you, explain what you do to the world, find a life-work balance, or deal with administrivia in the networked world we web people work in.

“Who’s involved? Until we get a proper ordered list, here is a bunch of names (organisers, advisors, helpers…): Stephanie Booth, Elisabeth Stoudmann, Charlene Knoetze, Stowe Boyd, Suw Charman, Imran Ali, Stephanie Troeth, Sibylle Stoeckli, Martin Roell, Carlos Pacilio, Anne Dominique Mayor, Chris Brogan, and others…”

More here, including an early bird discount if you book by the end of March.

The EJC filmed three videos during the day at JEEcamp - here they are:

Charlotte Dunckley is a final year journalism degree students who has already launched a fanzine and is in the process of turning it into a commercially viable magazine - Things.

She recently popped in for an ad hoc tutorial and I asked her about her web strategy.

“I don’t have a website,” she replied.

“But you have a blog?”

“Yes.”

“Facebook?”

“Yes. And a MySpace page. With 800 friends.”

“So you do have a web strategy.” (more…)

What happens when you bring together local journalists, bloggers, web publishers, online journalism experts and new media startups - and get them talking?

That was the question that JEEcamp sought to answer: an ‘unconference’ around journalism enterprise and entrepreneurship that looked to tackle some of the big questions facing news in 2008: how do you make money from news when information is free? Where is the funding for news startups? How do you generate community? What models work for news online? (more…)

A new site review at JournalismEnterprise.com:

Brijit, says Nico Luchsinger, “gives me a quick overview of interesting long-form content that I might otherwise miss. The editorial process and payment method ensure that the abstracts are actually well written and helpful in deciding whether I should read the whole thing. There are various ways to access to browse the content, and a lot of different RSS feeds you can subscribe to.” Read the rest of the review here.

Friday will see over 40 of the UK’s innovators in online journalism (plus some from other countries) gather for JEEcamp - the Journalism Enterprise and Entrepreneurship unconference. They include people who have launched journalism startups like Scoopt and Yoosk; local journalists who oversee hyperlocal and blogger projects; freelancers with an eye on the digital future; and national journalists who have built online communities around their brands (for a full list - or to sign up to attend yourself, see the JEEcamp wiki).

The unconference will, broadly, discuss five areas. These are:

1. Business models (including advertising)
2. Audience development (including communities)
3. Funding
4. Legals
5. Online news models

But that’s just the start. Within those areas, what questions do you think we should be discussing? What questions would you ask?

It’s two weeks till JEEcamp - the ‘unconference’ around journalism enterprise and entrepreneurship. There are now over 40 people signed up across the JEEcamp wiki and Facebook event page, representing the national and regional press, tabloid and broadsheet, magazines, bloggers, freelancers, academics and journo startups.

So if you still want to come but haven’t signed up, please add your name to the wiki asap (the password is jee), as I may stop new registrations soon.
Also, sponsorship is available if you’re travelling from afar.

If you read the final part of my model for the 21st century newsroom concerning new media business models, I strongly recommend ‘Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business‘, an article by Chris Anderson, author of The Long Tail. Have you not clicked yet? Here are some quotes to persuade you:

“To follow the money, you have to shift from a basic view of a market as a matching of two parties — buyers and sellers — to a broader sense of an ecosystem with many parties, only some of which exchange cash.

“… There are dozens of ways that media companies make money around free content, from selling information about consumers to brand licensing, “value-added” subscriptions, and direct ecommerce (see wired.com/extras for a complete list). Now an entire ecosystem of Web companies is growing up around the same set of models.”

Anderson maps out a ‘Taxonomy of free’ including (more…)

Here’s the latest update from the team at JournalismEnterprise.com. This post is part of February’s Blog Carnival of Journalism.

Neaju, says Nicolas Kayser-Bril is “a smart way of making money using other people’s sweat … The total lack of journalistic work is a clever way to reduce costs. But it certainly doesn’t create any value for readers, who would have to fact-check themselves. For writers, the incentive to publish on Neaju instead of blogging is thin, as they lose control over content and leave behind any advertising revenue.“

NewsTrust.net, says Alex Gamela, is “A sort of Michelin guide for news media.”

The Panelist, finally, says Kayser-Bril, is “A niche publication for upper-middle class do-gooders, where a bunch of financial bloggers advises parents worried about the world and the assets they leave their children with.“