Fast News and Dead Ends

For the most part, the speed at which news can be broken online is championed. It is altogether more fluid, open to interaction, change and updating than more traditional news media such as print, meaning that stories can be reported on as they happen and information spread from around the world almost instantaneously. However, in an online journalism blog post, Cliodhna Russell makes the important point that this brings with it additional pressure and problems. The rush for breaking news, where being first to the scoop is the primary aim, can lead to facts going unchecked, errors slipping through, and, as Cliodhna points out, occasionally the entire fabrication of stories.

Continuing the Multimedia Thread

Regarding news organisations adopting new multimedia routes to communicate a story  (as I spoke about in a previous post), I came across an online journalism blog post by Dara Healy that discusses and links to a great example of the multimedia possibilities in news media on the Guardian website. As Dara says,

‘It is an ‘interactive graphic that traces Ian Tomlinson’s last movements and presents accounts by eyewitnesses’. It highlights the true benefits that online interactive material can bring.”

Google Killer

Wolfram Alpha, a new web system that will answer all sorts of questions as it understands by drawing on a global store of information and performing complex computations, is being officially launched within the next month. The software was created by Britsh physicist Stephen Wolfram and is already being touted as a potential ‘Google killer’ though it functions far beyond that of a simple search engine.

The Legality of Linking

A online journalism blog by Colin Whelan alerted me to a story concerning the ethics, and indeed legality, of hyperlinks. Gatehouse Media Inc. filed a copyright lawsuit against the  The New York Times Co. They claimed that The Boston Globe (owned by The New York Times Co.) was violating copyright and trademark laws by republishing headlines and lead sentences from Gatehouse sites on Boston.com, linking to the original articles and bypassing advertisements on the Gatehouse homepage. Aside from the potential loss of revenue, it was also claimed that the hyperlinks created great degree of confusion as to which was the original source of the news.

The Rebirth of Investigative Journalism

In a blog entitled ‘The Web, the future of Investigative journalism?’, my fellow online journalism student David Kearns comments on the steady decline investigative journalism has found itself in in recent decades and looks to a future where the internet may arrest this slide.

Pictures Don’t Always Last Longer

Over three years ago, Mark Glaser wrote,

‘Imagine if you were a photo editor at a major publication, and you could view and search through every digital photo on every computer in the world to put together a feature. Or if something spectacular happened, and you could search photo tags to see what everyone at the scene was seeing.

This dream of a global photo album, compiled in real time by amateur and professional shooters, hasn’t quite materialized, but photo-sharing services such as Flickr and Buzznet are giving us glimpses into that future.’

Guardians of Free Comment

The Guardian’s Comment Is Free site was launched in early 2006 with a view to being an open forum for discussion and debate between journalist and reader. It contains all the main comment and opinion pieces from the Guardian as well as contributions from over 600 writers.

Irish Blogger Throws Brown On The Bonfire

An Irish blogger has been responsible for exposing a planned British Labour Party smear campaign against senior Conservative Party members. Wexford-based Guido Fawkes obtained a series of e-mails planning a new propagandistic website intending to destabilise the Tories.

The emails were sent by senior Gordon Brown aide Damien McBride to former Peter Mandelson adviser Derek Draper. McBride was forced to resign when Fawkes, whose real name is Paul Staines, published the emails on his website, www.order-order.com.

Multimedia: News in Sound + Vision

The Times They Are A-Changin'

One of the most prominent movers in the use of multimedia, sound, video and graphics is the online branch of the New York Times. What it allows the audience to do is fully engage with the news, moving the process of news consumption from a passive one to a more active and interactive one.

Their multimedia page gathers together stories and features which incorporate these new technologies into the stories.

The Internet Is…. Oh, Well, Whatever…… Nevermind

An article bemoaning the lost arts of patience, concentration  and application in an age where all human information is just a click away.

Are our fingers becoming quicker than our minds? Are our brains now reduced to shallow pools, basic functioning Operating Systems?