Social media insights for journalists

The Project for Excellence in Journalism recently studied the content of blogs, Twitter and YouTube to get a feel for the relationship between mainstream media sources and social media.  Even more specifically, the researchers were able to determine how the content is different (or the same) between the two.
Here are some of the findings:

Social media [...]

Ten tips for getting a TV news job

Thousands of recent or soon-to-be journalism grads are combing media company websites and shooting out resumes all across the country right now.  So what types of jobs are they likely to find?
In doing content analysis of more than 500 broadcast news job postings from the ten biggest TV news companies in the U.S. at the [...]

Local TV websites to watch

Editor & Publisher has released its annal list of Eppy award finalists.  The Eppy honors the best of the Web and it’s always interesting to see which local TV news sites make the list of nominees.
This year, as in the past, the list is short — only a very small percentage of nominees come from [...]

Is the TV package outdated?

Consider this: at many local television stations, reporters cover two or more stories a day and never turn a package. Former news director Geoff Roth, who now teaches at Hofstra University, says the trend toward covering the news with live shots and v/o’s or v/o-sots is not going away. At his last station in Fresno, [...]

Women, minorities make big impact on TV news

A lot has happened in television news over the past twenty years, not all of it for the good.  But at least one development can be applauded – the network newscasts are featuring more women and minorities as anchors and reporters than ever before.
According to the Miller-McCune website, a new study published in Electronic News [...]

More stations using solo journalists

More research from RTDNA/Ball State University indicates that television stations are relying on solo journalists to do more newsgathering than ever.   In fact, nearly a third of stations say they use sojos more than they do two-person crews. 
Three years ago, 22.3 percent of surveyed stations said they “mostly use” one-man-bands.  Today, that percentage is up [...]

Doing more in more places

It’s not news that local television newsrooms are doing more with less. But the latest RTDNA/Hofstra survey shows that even as the economy struggled last year and TV newsrooms laid off more staff, stations produced more news on the air and on other platforms and outlets than ever before.
The average amount of on air TV [...]

Cell phones make news coverage better

It’s certainly not the first time cell phones have played a significant role in a breaking news story. From the Virginia Tech shootings to protests in Iran to the plane crash in the Hudson, eyewitnesses have been sharing important information about newsworthy events for several years now.
But, according to NetNewsCheck, the sheer volume of content [...]

Dan Rather on role of journalists

At 78 years old, Dan Rather is still reporting the news. With his 60 years in the business, he has had a lot of time to reflect on the role of journalists in society.
Speaking before a packed house at the University of Mississippi, Rather said “journalists must bear withess;” they must be “honest brokers of [...]