Welcome to Journalism 80
Online Journalism
Spring 2007
T, Th 8:00-9:30 a.m.
122 Dempster Hall
Jan. 29, 2007 – May 19, 2007
Professor Mo Krochmal

You will need to obtain a G-mail account with the address of firstname.lastname@gmail.com
Introduction:

Welcome to a world where nothing remains constant, change is rapid, the future is unclear, and your opportunities are only limited by your imagination and your grasp of the basic building blocks of journalism.

This is an exciting time to learn about online journalism and one filled with opportunities as traditional mainstream news media grapples – some would say 'fumbles' -- with how to use the new tools and capabilities of the Internet and still fulfill its critical role in a free society and sustain itself as a viable business.

Journalism needs people who are undaunted by technology, comfortable with traditional values and ethics of the field, and willing to work around any obstacles to get the story and get it right. You may not get rich, or even have job security, but you will be performing a public service.

By your presence here, you are playing a part in building this medium. That is an amazing opportunity, and a serious one that requires determination and a disciplined work ethic.

Welcome pioneers.

What We Will Do

We will meet two times a week for a total of three hours over 15 weeks – that is just about equal to the hours a working journalist would average in just one working week, and a light one at that.

So, in order to do a good job to prepare you for this world, we have a lot of ground to cover.
The goal of this class is not to make you an HTML wizard, or a Photoshop guru, or even to make you a “plug-and-play” intern in some newspaper's web shop.

The goal of this course is to provide you with the intellectual tools you will need to make a meaningful contribution to an evolving field where the only constant is change. You are entering a dynamic and relentless environment that rewards a solid foundation in the basics of journalism – that is: solid writing, ruthless editing, “a nose for news,” reporting diligence, ethics and more – with the opportunity to use technology to innovate and create.

The objective of the course is to polish your writing and reporting skills, to hone your understanding of the principles and laws of freedom of speech and press, and know how this medium is different.

You will have to understand the history of this emerging field and the personalities and issues shaping it as well as how this medium will be affected in a multicultural and multilingual global environment. Additionally, you will get practical experience in the ethical use and presentation of images and information and be able to explain the ethical principles that guide the decisions you make. You must demonstrate the ability to think critically, creatively and independently.

You will know how to write correctly and clearly for this medium.

You will also be able to critically evaluate your work, and that of others, including your colleagues, You will be able to do the math, and crunch the numbers. You will be able to critically examine new technologies and apply them where appropriate.

We will work at an extremely high level, classes will be interactive, and we will be proceeding on various tracks concurrently. You are expected to be well read in current events (read the daily editions of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Newsday, at the minimum) be aware of current events, and be prepared to always ask questions and contribute to the discussion.

For every hour spent in class, I will expect you to spend two hours outside.

Yes, we meet at 8 a.m. Tuesday and Thursday. I'll be here and I expect you to be here on time, and to stay for the full class. Being late is being absent, and you will be marked that way. We have a lot to do and you will have daily, weekly and long-term assignments that require your presence. Pop quizzes, news quizzes and style quizzes can not be made up and an absence is not an excuse for not handing in work on time.

If you miss two classes, you will find yourself in a difficult position. Seriously. Yes, things happen like emergencies and medical absences. So, if you miss, you must bring a note from a doctor. If you miss too many classes, it is my responsibility to let the university know out of concern for your wellness. Miss three classes, and you fall one letter grade.

You are entering the newsroom of the future and will be forging lifetime bonds of friendship and trust. You are expected to conduct yourself professionally, and respectfully, towards your colleagues.

You are expected to bring to the table a grasp of grammar, style and punctuation and to turn in clean copy and to communicate professionally in whatever medium you are using (and that includes e-mail).

Accuracy

All articles must be accurate: Quotes must be exact, names must be spelled correctly, addresses should be accurate. Major errors in a piece will result in an F.

Integrity

"A cadet will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do." I like the simplicity of the honor code of the U.S. Military Academy. Do not lie, cheat or steal, or tolerate those who do. As journalists, we hold a trust in this society. We are looked upon to seek truth and serve the public. Let us work to uphold that trust. We do not take shortcuts. “I don't know,” is the just the beginning of the conversation.

Writing and reporting. This is the foundation of any type of journalistic endeavor. You must be able to come up with story ideas. You then must do the reporting, the writing, the editing, the re-writing, and then, and only then, the posting.

You will learn how to write and report for online presentation and and how to collect and produce multimedia and critically evaluate it and then use it in publication online. You will also evaluate the writing and reporting of your peers.

Teamwork and Deadlines: No matter what the medium, today's professional journalism requires the ability to work well with others – editors, artists, producers, photographers, videographers, audio engineers – and most importantly, with readers, who are empowered with the ability to fact-check your work and to respond well beyond the letters-to-the-editor page of the newspaper. Ask Dan Rather.

You will be working in teams and your success in this class will depend on your ability to integrate with each other, support each other, and meet deadlines.

In the real-time world of the Internet, scoops can be measured in milliseconds, putting a premium on the ability to accurately and quickly write and report, and then to turn around and do it all again. Deadlines count. In the newsroom, if you don't make your deadline, you don't keep your job. It's just that simple. So, know that deadlines count in this class too.

A skilled online journalist should: have innate multitasking ability, extreme attention to detail, fluent skills in multimedia and personal communication, comfort in working under the duress of extreme deadline pressure, be fearless and eager to deploy new technology, be able to work collaboratively in a team environment and successfully manage projects.

Additionally, an online journalist should understand the business/revenue issues of this medium and realize the value of understanding and cultivating diverse communities and encouraging user-generated content.

You will get experience in all of this as well as in evaluating news and online presentation, generating news story ideas, and, of course, in lots of writing and reporting. You will go off the campus for your reporting.

New media

You will learn how to write and report for Web, including the emerging channels of blogs, vlogs, and mobile. You will learn and practice the skills of writing headlines, captions, blurbs, voice-overs, and audio reports to create a click-compelling matrix of reporting that rises to the highest standards of ethical journalism and keeps the user engaged and interacting with the articles that will be assigned throughout the class. You will take photographs, collect audio and video, and generate graphics and perhaps even some animation.

The Business of Online Journalism

In this field, while respecting the traditional and inviolable ethical “wall” between editorial and business, you will still need to know about the financial fuel that powers your ability to conduct your journalism. We will look at the search for successful business models for online journalism, within traditional and start-up companies, and well in as solo efforts.

Each week, students will have required readings from the textbook, web research, editing and writing. The class meetings will include instructor lectures, deadline writing exercises, multimedia production, guest lectures and tests. But, this is not a class about somebody at the front reading, and you typing. The professor serves as a guide and a facilitator.

Assignments will be turned in electronically, via e-mail or posted in a website.

Students will earn points for attendance, and for contribution in class.

Required Texts:

Rich, Carole. Writing and Reporting News: A Coaching Method. Fifth Edition. Belmont, Calif., Wadsworth Publishing. 2006.

Norm Goldstein. The Associated Press Stylebook. New York, Associated Press. 2006.

Handouts, both electronic and hard copy.

Note: With the exception of the first class meeting, all assigned readings should be completed prior to each class meeting.

Note 2: There will be a number of unannounced quizzes on the reading, asking you to work with ideas from that day's assignment, or to put ideas from that reading into a context developed earlier in the term.

The overall course score will be assigned based on the following criteria:

Class Participation and attendance -- 25 percent
Assignments -- 20 percent
Quizzes, grammar, punctuation, style – 10 percent
Final Project -- 45 percent

All of your work will be edited and you will have the chance to rewrite the assignments but you will not receive letter grades on your reporting/writing assignments. This is a non-graded, coaching approach that is designed to let you concentrate on your skills, not your grades. At midterm and at the end of the semester, we will meet and look at your work, which will be graded at those times. You will receive grades on style quizzes, pop quizzes and class work. At mid-semester, you will turn in a self-evaluation, detailing your progress, what you have learned and your goals for the remainder of the semester.

Grade criteria
A = Outstanding work with excellent content, ideas, writing, reporting and style. Shows leadership, innovation, participation, support.
B = Very good work. Minor changes required.
C = Average. Requires substantial changes such as additional reporting, major rewriting and correction of numerous style errors
D = Poor. Fundamental problems in the assignment.
F = Unacceptable – late, inaccurate, incomprehensible, factual errors or misspelled names. Plagiarism is an automatic F.

Standards

Every article you do for this class must be original for this class. No repurposing of other work. You are encouraged to submit work done for this class for publication elsewhere, but not to take a piece written for another publication and turn it in for credit here. Also, all work assigned will be posted online.

No use of art that you have not produced. If you don't own it, or haven't received specific permission to use it, it's not acceptable for use.

Every piece you turn in will follow these standard forms:

Byline: By Joseph Pulitzer (joe@pulitzer.com)
Date:
Class: JRN 80
Professor: Mo Krochmal

In an e-mail, subject lines will be simple: Assignment and Date. All pieces will be posted. In a notebook, you will keep a hard copy of the assignment, the edits, and any rewrites. Newer work will go after previous work. Get an e-mail and a phone number for all sources. This information must be included in your notebook and e-mailed to me with every assignment.

On your assignments, basic grammatical spelling and style errors will be indicated. You will be expected to discover what you did incorrectly using the style guide and/or other resources.
Headlines will follow New York Times style (mixing uppercase and lowercase) and will be judged as strictly as the writing that follows. All work will have a headline that is compelling, and grammatically correct.

Articles will have a lede, a nut and a kicker. All will include appropriate and specific links. Multimedia will be captioned, people will be identified, photogs/videographers/creators will be credited.

No unidentified sources unless approved by the professor.

The Schedule:
The semester will be divided into three parts. In the first part, consisting of the first six classes, we will get up to speed and build a knowledge base. The highlight of this first segment will be a vlog project. You will report, write and produce a 2-minute scripted vlog with video and stills for presentation on February 15.

The second segment of the class, ending on March 27, will include lectures and tutorials, as well as live-blog coverage of our classes, produced by you, and a collaborative multimedia-journalism news blog, again produced by you. We will discuss these projects.

The third segment, and final project, will be to produce an edition of Nassau News to be published at NassauNews.org. You will divide into teams and cover a beat or area. A student editor will be selected to manage the project and the organization. Final deadline for that is May 10. We will publish on May 15 of finals week.

-- Week No. 1
Class 1. Introduction, Background, and Some Work.

We will start off first by covering the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. We will also learn about each other, and examine the history of online journalism, moving into the present, and then looking toward the future of the craft. You will take a short test to gauge your facility with AP style and grammar.
Assignment: You will prepare a story pitch for your vlog news project, a 2-minute news report on a subject of your choice. The subject you pitch should be focused, simple and achievable in the time you have to do it and should include multimedia elements. Your pitch should reflect some research into the topic – explaining why is it newsworthy and why you can do this successfully. The pitch should be quick – really no longer than 30 seconds, really.

Class 2. Nuts and Bolts

In this class, we will go over HTML, CSS, Javascript, and students will create a personal online site to host their class work. We will create the sites and discuss how we will use them in the classroom. We will also cover the elements of writing short, including captions, blurbs, headlines, and leads. You will make your vlog story pitches, with the hope of getting approval to move forward with the reporting. You get approval, you get more time to do the reporting.

You will read the following and then, for the next class, write a 250-word assessment and reaction to the assigned articles that will include at least two questions for discussion:
Rich, Ch. 12, “Web Journalism”

“Ten Toes in the Multimedia Waters” Rick Edmonds, PoynterOnline

"Who killed the newspaper?" The Economist, Aug. 24, 2006

"Amateur Hour: Journalism without journalists" New Yorker, Nicholas Lemann
2006 Online Journalism Awards – Finalists

-- Week No. 2
Class 3.

Zeroing in on your vlog topic. This class begins with a discussion of the readings. Students will then report on their progress with the reporting for the vlogs. Assignments returned. In-class deadline exercise: Students will locate a press release on their topic of interest and re-write it for a news article.
Reading Assignment: Rich, Ch. 17, “Beat Reporting”

Writing assignment: select five websites associated with network broadcast news shows and write a paragraph on each, critically evaluating the multimedia elements used in the reporting, providing links for readers to follow in order to see the specific work. E-mail to instructor before class. Remember your standards – a lede, a nut, and a kicker.

Class 4. Introduction to Video

Reading Assignment:

What works in online video news

VJ Article

Week No. 3

Class 5. Final touches made on vlogs

Students will become familiar with digital photography, learning how to take successful mug shots, action shots, and scenic post cards, and then how to write captions for them, and then to create photo packages.

Reading Assignment:

Rich, Ch. 1, “Changing Concepts of the News”
Writing assignment: Select five non mainstream-media blogs or vlogs. Evaluate for reliability of content, multimedia usage (if any), and interactivity. Distribute to colleagues.

Class 6. Presentation of vlogs
Reading Assignment:
Resources for Web Workers, Mindy McAdams, University of Florida.

Week No. 4 Next segment begins.

Class 7. Begin second section of class by peer review of vlogs and creation of a real-time class blog, and a collaborative class blog. For the first, a different student each class will document the class in real-time, getting experience in covering a meeting in real time. For the second, students will research and contribute abstracts and links of timely news articles on multimedia journalism, with one student serving as editor, making decisions on play, editing and posting of abstracts to get experience in managing an online news operation that publishes on Thursday. These blogs will continue throughout the semester and each student will have one turn at the wheel.

Class 8. Ethics. We will discuss and role-play real ethical situations.

Reading Assignment:
The New York Times. Ethical Journalism: A Handbook of Values and Practices for the News and Editorial Departments, 2004

The Associated Press Statement of News Values and Principles

Writing Assignment: Create your personal journalism ethics guideline

Week No. 5 Research and Data

Class 9. Students will learn how to locate data and information beyond what is available from a Google search. This class will concentrate on databases, hard-copy data and non-traditional sources of data.
Reading Assignment: Rich, Ch. 19, “Statistical Stories,” pp 387-392.

Writing Assignment: Create an 250-word article using statistics relevant to your beat. E-mail to instructor

Class 10. We will discuss how to collect, organize and present data.
Students will learn how to relate statistical data to geography, and learn how map mashups might be appropriate and useful to their reporting.

Week No. 6 Halfway point

Class 11. I will meet individually with students to discuss progress

Class 12. Maps and visual information

Week No. 7 Wikis and Communities

Class 13. How journalism is using wikis

Class 14. The concept of community – how to create it online, and how to cover a community.
Week No. 8 Diversity

Class 15. Multiculturalism and economics

Class 16. A Multilingual Web and Machines

Week No. 9 Final Project Segment Begins

Class 17. Speakers will brief class on the Nassau County communities Nassau News covers.

Class 18. Students will organize into six teams of three and decide topics and roles.

Week No. 10 The reporting begins

Class 19. Students will make story pitches
Reading Assignments: “Flash journalism: Professional practice today” Online Journalism Review, Mindy McAdams

Class 20. Progress reports

Week No. 11

Class 21. Storyboards due for reporting

Class 22. Rough drafts due

Week No. 12

Class 23. Progress reports
Reading Assignment: The Business of Online Journalism, Western Knight Center for Specialized Journalism.

Writing Assignment: Select 10 keywords from your beat, Google them and determine who has bought them. Then consider an advertising plan using those keywords to create revenue for your website.

Class 24. Production of final drafts

Week No. 13

Class 25. Presentation of final drafts.

Class 26. Publishing of Nassau News section, with final edits.

So, that's the plan. Please know that this is a road map. In our journey, we may veer off the road in response to your needs.

We are going to do a lot, and you will be able to do it. Just hang in, come to class, and do the work. I am available to you, after class and online. Ask for help, and do it before your deadline.
Also, remember that in this medium, you have a community. Ask for advice.

This anecdote from the blog of Jeff Jarvis, posted Jan. 25:

Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, told what he called a random story — it’s a perfect tale for the medium and the age — about empowering collaboration. His sophomore year at Harvard, while starting his company, he failed to study at all for one of his courses; he didn’t even go to class. So days before the final, he pulled all the pictures he needed to analyze off the web and put them up on a page online with boxes underneath. He emailed the class and said he’d put up a study guide. Sure enough, in moments, the students filled in their essential knowledge on the art. Zuckerberg got an A. And the prof told him that the grades in the class improved 10 percent over previous years.

So, be innovative, collaborate, know the rules – the do's, the don'ts and the dilemmas.

This is a very exciting time. There are not many opportunities to help build something and that is what we are doing. Let's get going.