So, after some long consideration, I've created a more thorough list of ideas about Digital Journalism. The backbone of this started in the classroom, and then I presented my rough list to friends and professional colleagues.
After some careful editing, I'm now establishing the following list:
Ten ideas about Digital Journalism 1. Digital Journalism is about orchestrating and integrating traditional media to tell one very great story; 2. Technology is not journalism; 3. Everything published on the Internet must be produced explicitly for that audience; 4. Research, reporting, writing, self-editing, thinking: these tenants remain paramount in the Digital Age; 5. Accuracy, accuracy, accuracy; 6. Let images be powerful; apply the same standard to writing; 7. Limit text to 10 paragraphs (per page) and Internet video to 3 minutes; layer chapters to create depth; 8. In a forum dominated by amateurs, professional work MUST look professional; 9. Serve the readership, work with purpose, always consider the public interest; 10. Embrace interactivity and empower it, cede control and create a meaningful experience. Engage.
Special words of thanks to Professor Brian Carroll at Berry College, Arik Hesseldahl at Business Week, and Professor Ted Delaney at Roger Williams University.
After several weeks of shooting video in a variety of settings, I began building a list of equipment I'd like to have to supplement my growing A/V kit. This week, I actually got on the B&H Video website and bought several key components. That stuff arrived today.
I bought a new tripod, the Velbon Videomate 607, which is a solid heavy tripod. I purchased this because I wanted my camera, the Canon HG10, to be mounted on a sturdy platform. This tripod will do the job nicely.
I bought a LCD light panel, which actually runs on four AA batteries. The unit attaches to the hot shoe atop the camera and puts out a warm bright white light. This little tool is very cool. It's small and light and fits inside my camera bag.
I picked up three lens filters including a polarizer which I'll use to make the blues in skies bluer when I'm outside.
Finally, I added two lenses to my kit bag too. I bought a Canon TL-H43 1.7x tele-converter that screws right onto the front of the camera. This lens basically doubles the reach of the telephoto capability. I also bought a Raynox 0.5x tele-converter. This lens makes everything look twice as far away, which is great for shooting in tight spots.
In fact, I mounted the Raynox lens on my camera and turned it on just to see how "fisheye" the shot got. The camera makes my arms look long and stretchy like Gumby's. Take a look:
So, I returned to Roger Williams University this week and quickly got my head back in the classroom. As part of that, I returned to contemplating some of the theories I've been applying in my Digital Journalism class. As it happens, a friend has also invited me to lecture on the same topic at a conference next month.
For the better part of a year, I've been teaching Digital Journalism and I've found that there are several key rules that need to be established early on. Most pertain to applying the basics of traditional journalism in a new digital era.
Anyway, you'll find that list, without explanation below. I figure, for now, I'll simply let the list stand knowing that my readership will object to it, if they see something they don't like.
Eight rules for Digital Journalism
1. Be true to the Internet audience: Everything published on the Internet must be produced for this audience. NO poaching stories or video images from traditional media;
2. Digital Journalism is about orchestrating traditional media – charts, graphs, illustrations, maps, music, noise, radio, print, sound, stills, video – to tell one very great story;
3. Be brief: Break the story down into multimedia chapters and remember NO ONE wants to read more than 10 paragraphs (per page) on any subject or watch more than 3 minutes of Internet video (per window);
4. One well-told story is better than a thousand poorly written ones;
MIDDLETOWN, RI __ As part of my Erie Canal tour, I got as far west as Syracuse before I turned around and started heading home. The three-day trek gave me a lot of insight into what I hope will become the essence of the project I've loosely entitled "A Multimedia Survey of the Erie Canal." Yes, I know it's not that sexy, but when hunting for money from the academic community, I figure the more definitive the title, the more definitive the funding response.
My trip took me from Waterford, through Schenectady, Scotia, Amsterdam, Fort Hunter, Herkimer, Little Falls, Utica, Rome, Canastota and Syracuse. I made of point of reviewing the Erie Canal Museum, several locks, and the waterfronts in several communities. I also walked through the New York State Museum.
As for the possible content, I think I've resigned myself to covering the Eastern portion of the canal, simply because it's under-reported and rurally pure. I'm certain the waterfront views as we sail west up the Mohawk River will be magnificent. I would like to explore the history, the culture, the environment, the wildlife, the tourism, the economics and possibly the politics.
The next step is fundraising. My application for funding from my own college, Roger Williams University, is in limbo. But I'm considering other options including the New York State Council for the Humanities, and the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities.
As for other support, I'll take any and all advice. I'm searching for points of interest, and people to consider interviewing; I'd also like to find a folk group to perform some of the Erie Canal music.
About the purpose of this project: Traditional journalism is on the verge of a breakthrough. There has been this push towards convergence, but neither side of the equation -- the print news folks nor the TV news people -- know how to make these media compatible. Unsure of the direction, the worst elements of these traditional media are beginning to dominate the development of the pending Digital Journalism movement. Example: Television news is very fleeting; there is no in-depth reporting, there is no archiving, there is no perspective. Now, these poisonous elements are finding their way into Digital Journalism. This trend is wrong and ill-fated. My hope is to reverse this trend by setting an example. This project is about depth, perspective, and historical dominion.
SYRACUSE, NY __ I found the Erie Canal Museum in Syracuse today. It's located inside the old Weighlock Building, a canal traffic weigh station built back in 1849. The building itself is marvelous. It's a brick building with an exterior exit that once lead to a portico. What's curious about all this is the fact that the building used to be along the actual Erie Canal.
Today, the stretch of the Erie Canal that used to flow through Syracuse has been filled in and is now Erie Boulevard. It's very surreal to stand outside the museum and look out on the four-lane roadway, simply because this was once the busiest stretch of the Erie Canal system. At its peak, four boats an hour would pass through the weigh station to be weighed and measured. Further, this building was located at a major traffic intersection where the Erie and Oswego canals once joined.
This intersection probably transformed Syracuse from a little backwater town to a full fledged city. Because of the city's location -- halfway between Albany and Buffalo -- and because of the link to Oswego and Lake Ontario, Syracuse exploded with commerce. In fact, when they drafted the original map of the canal system, they didn't put Syracuse on it because the city hadn't taken root yet. After the system opened, and after the Civil War, Syracuse incorporated as New York's sixth largest city, and quickly became the nation's second largest brew center, producing more beer than any other locality except New York City.
LITTLE FALLS, NY __ Climbed in the car early Monday morning and started driving westward along New York State Route-5 from Albany to Buffalo because this highway follows the Erie Canal footprint for at least a hundred miles. Along the way, I saw Schenectady, Scotia, Fort Hunter, Herkimer, Little Falls, Utica and then turned north for Rome.
I stopped several times to shoot video and still photographs as I continue to do some preliminary documentation of the ancient canal route.
My first stop was in Schenectady's old town area -- known locally as The Stockade -- which is filled with 17th and 18th century homes. I wandered down to the waterfront to see where the Barge Canal flowed through. I also learned today that the current Erie Canal incarnation -- known as the Barge Canal -- traces the Mohawk River upstream to Utica, a fact that makes the near-natural path lush and beautiful.
In Fort Hunter, as I drove into the Lock #12 parking lot, I discovered Rich Sullivan, the lock supervisor hauling wood around ahead of the April season opening. I introduced myself and spoke to him for the better part of an hour about his career, his life along the canal and his thoughts about its growth and potential.
"I'm retiring soon," he confided, "so what do I have to lose."
Sullivan was first hired by the New York State Canal Corporation three decades ago and started rising through the ranks quickly. It's apparent he loves the job.
"The best part of this job," he said, "is being outside," and later added: "And you meet a lot of interesting people from all over the world."
As part of our talk, he suggested that I needed to see Little Falls, so I got back out on the highway and headed in that direction.
He was right. Little Falls is beautiful. It's an old mill town that was once the cheese-making capital of the United States.
Today, like most upstate New York communities, Little Falls is a little haggard, but city planners are doing wonderful things along the waterfront. Here the canal rises up above the Mohawk River and rims the warehousing district which is being converted into restaurants and shops.
I was so impressed with the little city that I got out of the car and shot a standup right near the water's edge.
From here, I headed out again towards Utica and Rochester.
I had a very full day.
Finally, words of thanks to Joan Delaro from the Western Erie Canal Alliance and Howard Ohlhous, a self-described Erie Canal enthusiast from Schenectady, for your advice and interest.
WATERFORD, NY __ Arrived in New York State today and stopped in Waterford, NY to look at the waterfront there. This is where the Hudson River, the Mohawk River and the Erie Canal all join together. This is also the site where the Erie Canal Lock #2 is located.
An old friend and I loaded the car up with his two daughters and we walked around the lock and down along the waterfront development. Clearly, Waterford and the state have been spending money here. The waterfront path has a new brick walkway. Embedded in the pathway is a stone trail way map detailing the communities along the canal system. The site also has period lighting and amenities for a boating culture. It's all very pleasant.
Of course, I arrived here to see the gateway to the Erie Canal. Lock #2 is very impressive. The best part was just being here. I mean, after weeks of research from my home in Rhode Island, seeing the Erie Canal made the project VERY real.
Also, one of my Erie Canal friends told me I needed to see the Day Peckinpaugh, a canal barge that's being renovated. And, just as he promised, the ship was here, tied up on the high water side of Lock #2.
Excited about it all, I pulled out my Flip Video Ultra and shot a quick standup along the waterfront.
If my team opts to sail the eastern portion of the canal system, our journey will begin here in Waterford, a tiny mill town north of Albany.
In my last posting about Spring Break, I wrote that I will begin scouting out sites along the Erie Canal for a summertime project. Since then, I've got a handful of emails from advocates for the historic waterway asking for more details about the project.
Here's what I'm doing.
As part of my professional relationship with Roger Williams University, I must demonstrate professional achievement. Basically, I need to show them (and the academic community) that I'm still working as a journalist and applying some of the theories I'm teaching in the classroom. My hope is to begin producing a long form in-depth multimedia project about a subject that's visually appealing and rich with history and culture. After some lengthy debate, my teaching partner, Ryan Parkhurst, and I have chosen to profile the Erie Canal.
In fact, the Erie Canal is perfect: It's historic, it's visually stunning, there's a lot of passionate interest in the waterway, and New York State is working desperately to transform it into a tourist destination.
Our plan is to rent a 42-foot-long barge for a week in August and sail a portion of it with a production team. I'm looking to wrangle a still photographer and a video photographer to come along for the trip. I've also asked a mechanically inclined buddy if he wants to pilot the boat. If the team falls together, that will be a crew of five of us.
Now, during the sail, my hope is that we'll become part of the Erie Canal culture, we'll fish and swim, we'll visit the restaurants and bars along the route, and we'll likely conduct the interviews and shoot the B-roll aboard the boat. The method here is to make the boat and the canal the stars of the video.
Once the work is shot, we'd like to assemble it into a non-linear, multimedia essay that allows readers to review the various aspects of the canal: ie., it's history, culture, beauty, traditions, economics, environmental concerns, wildlife and so forth.
The model we're using is "The Crossing," which was published by The Rocky Mountain News.
Of course, ahead of this August shoot, we have a lot of questions. Among them:
1. Should we sail the eastern or the western portion of the canal? 2. What sites along the Erie Canal should we consider shooting? 3. Who should we be interviewing? 4. Finally, is there an audience for this sort of thing?
I'd appreciate any input. In fact, a small caucus of Erie Canal enthusiasts has already begun emailing me. Thanks for your interest, advice and support.
We're also searching for funding sources. For now, it looks like Roger Williams University may put up some money.
I spent the better part of 17 years floundering around the professional world searching for a work climate similar to my life as a college student. The lie here is that I missed the revelry and intellectual challenges that come with academic life; the truth here is that I really just wanted my Spring Breaks back.
Spring Break!
What a wonderful concept. One week off in March or April, armed with singular purpose of celebrating everything and nothing. The catch here is that this Rite of Spring is only granted to college students and -- to my wonder and delight -- faculty. It should be given to all Americans. American workers work too hard, earning roughly 12 vacation days annually. Germans, by some accounts, get upwards of 30 vacation days annually. Spring Break is about relaxing and recharging the batteries and enjoying life, without the distractions of cumbersome holiday rituals.
As an undergraduate, I had four years of it. For my freshman year Break, I went to Padre Island, Texas; my sophomore year, I went swimming in Hawaii; for my junior year, I went wandering across New Zealand; and for my senior year, I stayed behind in Ithaca, NY to appreciate the peace and quite.
My senior year break was by far my favorite. A group of us stuck around Ithaca, which had been abandoned by students from both Ithaca College and Cornell. As a result, a small pilot group of us had run of all the college haunts. We went every where. We wandered through the jock bars, the Cornell frat bars, and even the snooty graduate student hangouts.
Finally, at its best, a group of us gathered for a Friday happy hour in a place that, during any other school day, would have been teeming. Instead, it was lightly filled, the beer flowed easily, and the sunshine as the sun faded westward, painted the room with this amber yellow glow. It was a perfect moment. So tomorrow, after teaching two final classes, I will begin my Spring Break, my fourth as a college professor. My plan is to drive westward into upstate New York to scout out the Erie Canal ahead of a summertime project. My hope is to shoot a multimedia documentary about the ancient waterway. For now, I'm scouting out sites along the 360-mile trail. For me, that's recharging my batteries.
Lately, I've been pretty cavalier about my video editing. Over the last several months, I've filed roughly 30 videos to YouTube.Com and Facebook. Most of these are straight up legitimate video packages using video and audio that my students and I have produced.
However, I have -- on occasion -- poached some audio from other sources and laid video over these tracks. Clearly, this is a violation of the copyright laws but -- being educator -- I felt I needed to push the boundaries to see who would push back. I thought for sure that it would be the Recording Industry Association of America or YouTube who would strike at me first. I was wrong. Facebook was the first to purge one of my video packages because I was using copyrighted materials.
The video was shots of the Abe Lincoln statue here in Providence, RI. I shot the video with my own cameras, so the images belong to me. During the post production, I wall papered the video over three songs: Barber's "Adagio for Strings," a folk song entitled "Farewell to Ashokan," and Dwight Yoakam's "Please, Please Baby." I switched the songs because I wanted to demonstrate to my students how music can set the tone and emotion for video. Clearly, the Dwight Yoakam song -- a quick rockabilly number -- was designed to exaggerate the "feel" of the audio track. This was the song that got me in trouble.
When I was done, I posted all three videos on Facebook. Today, I got the following message from Facebook's copyright division:
Hello,
We have removed your video entitled "Lincoln Statue take #2" uploaded at 1:35pm February 18th, 2008. We did this because we learned that your video might include copyrighted material owned by a third party, such as a video clip or background audio.
If you are the copyright owner, or have permission from the rights holder to upload and distribute this material on Facebook, you may file a counter notice of alleged infringement by following the link below.
Please note that if you re-upload this video without filing a counter notice, or if you upload another video that infringes on the rights of a third party, our system will again remove the content. This could cause your access to the Facebook Video application to be disabled, or your Facebook account to be disabled.
This is called a "cease and desist order."
Of course, I think this is just a little corporate thuggery encouraged by the looming and menacing threat of the RIAA which is always waiting like a thief in the wings looking to snatch our dreams from that little bubble cloud hovering over our sleeping heads.
Oh well. My apologies to Dwight Yoakam. I was merely using your song for educational purposes.
One of the best things about teaching is having a chance to work with the students. People get into teaching for a variety of reasons, among them, vanity, comfort, job security, research, but I think must teachers will agree with this point: It's the students who make the process of teaching wonderful.
What I find is that my students are always surprising me because you never know what they're going to say or do.
In my case, because I'm a journalism professor, I'm often granted a closer look inside the lives of my students. Sure, journalism is supposed to be distant and objective; but the process of teaching journalism requires me to get them to start wondering about themselves before sending them searching outward and beyond. Ideally, I teach them to find their passion and write about it.
This semester, I'm working my way though a Digital Journalism class. Because this is the first time I'm teaching it, I find myself building, creating and recasting the curriculum constantly. Still, the principles are the same as TV news reporting: I have to teach them to wield cameras and tell stories with images. As part of that, I have them out in the field training with the equipment.
Today, I had my students doing busy work. They take the camera outside, they set it up, and they stand in front of it and blab. Sometimes, what they say is poignant; often they don't realize they're on camera.
Point in case: One of my students, Charlie Schipani, began talking about his father and his move from Italy to the United States. As he spoke, one of the students asked him "if he was a guido?" He shook the question off and said something very sweet and funny:
One of the best things about the Internet is the fact that it offers you the ability to track down old friends, and old familiar things. When I was a senior at Ithaca College, one of the topic songs playing in the campus radio rotation was "Considering a Move to Memphis" by the Colorblind James Experience. I liked it because it had a very dry bit of humor attached to it suggesting that moving to Memphis would be a little dull.
The chorus was: "I'm considering a move to Memphis, a move to Memphis, a move to Memphis; I'm considering, I'm considering, a move to Memphis, a move to Memphis," which the singer, Colorblind James, would speak in a deadpan, dull voice. It was great fun.
Anyway, I found that the band was offering its greatest hits CD online and bought it. The CD turned up in the mail yesterday and I plugged in immediately. Ah yes, to be grooving again on the dulcet tones of Colorblind James and the Death Valley Boys.
Now, I'd forgotten how talented the musicians were in the band and was surprised to hear how strong the stand up bass riff was in the bridge. I was so impressed, in fact, that I dumped the song into Final Cut Pro and laid some video over it. Sorry boys.
Roger Williams University hosted GrrlTech 2008 today on campus. If you don't know, the idea is to wrangle female high school sophomores and juniors and bring them to Roger Williams for a brief review of technology fields that often favor men. For my part, I spoke to 40 students about the Internet, digital journalism, blogging and other digital media. My two teaching sessions lasted about 45 minutes each.
The idea, of course, is to give them a taste of what's going on professionally with Internet Journalism. To do this, I showed them some things they already know, Facebook, YouTube, the Providence Journal and I compare them to things they may now know like Boston.TV. From there, I show them the professional aspects. I showed them my YouTube video pages and this web blog just to demonstrate how easy independent journalism can be.
Next up, I shot some video. Like my current college students, these students were really eager to get out of the classroom and into some trade craft. I lined them up in the quad and had them shout "Girl Tech Rocks!" into the video camera. And because I like outtakes, I caught a little of that on tape too.
What I want them to know: I want them to understand that no one really knows what to do with the Internet and, by default, the future of the Internet belongs to them. I also want them to know that if you're passionate about writing, research and editing, journalism -- and specifically digital journalism -- may be the thing for them.
Of course, I also wanted them to have a fun. I mean, why not! The world really belongs to teenaged girls anyway, doesn't it?
One more thing: During an assembly of the GrrlTech 2008 students, RWU President Roy Nirschel looked into the crowd of roughly 300 Rhode Island students, and called two names randomly. These two students -- from Scituate and Cumberland -- got scholarships to Roger Williams University. That's $125,000 each!
I began moving my Digital Journalism students away from the Flip Video Ultra camera to the more sophisticated Canon HG-10 video camera this week. The idea is to put them out in a visually pleasing part of the campus where we set up the cameras, microphones and tripods and begin doing standup training and man on the street interviews. Typically, the students find all this field work to be fun, funny and informative.
I like this field work because you get to go outside and interact with the students in smaller groups. I find talking with three or four students in the field tends to be more productive. Out there, you can show them the equipment and then have them work with it.
Better still is the fact that my skills with the equipment are improving. At Ithaca College, I had to rely heavily on the tech support staff to do the training. Here, I know the tools well enough that I can make them work. That fact makes teaching a lot easier.
Rhode Islanders took to the polling centers today to cast ballots in the primaries. The weather is overcast and rainy with this light New England spit blowing over Aquidneck Island.
I did my part. I climbed in my car and headed to my posted voting center here in Middletown, RI, only to discover that they moved it to the high school. Back in the car, it took me roughly 15 minutes to find my way to the election center.
Now, Middletown High School is certainly a throw back to the 1980s. The current building was built in 1987 and it looks just like most other high schools in the Northeast. The roof is flat, the building is a mixture of brick-face, glass, and steel facings.
I followed the light crowd across the parking lot and into what looked like the gymnasium. A long table was broken down alphabetically, and I approached the S-Z station and spoke with two election center volunteers. They asked for my name and I presented them with a driver's license.
One woman read my name and address allowed and then turned to her companion and said: "He's undeclared."
"Which party are you interested in?" the other woman asked holding two envelopes.
"Which is which?" I asked.
"The yellow one is the Republicans; the blue one is the Democrats."
"I'm much more curious about the Democrats," I said, and she handed me a blue folder and a registration form.
"Hand this form to the clerk," she said.
I moved down the table, handed the white form to the clerk, and she directed me to a line of desks. Once at the desk, I opened the blue folder and pulled out a large blue ballot. The form was 8-inches by 14-inches. On it were the names of the three Democrat candidates: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards. To select one, I had to take a black magic marker and connect two halves of an arrow which pointed at my respected candidate.
Once that was done, I took the ballot to a voting machine and literally fed the end of the paper into the machine. The machine grabbed the end of the ballot and sucked it inside the counter system.
On the exterior of the machine, a red electronic counting mechanism ticked from 275 to 276, making me the 276th voter at this station today.
The clerk said the voter turnout was brisk and steady but not record breaking.
For now, I'm placing this button on the page to see how people react to it. I promise that all donations will go towards digital journalism research and/or adding content to this page.
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