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Using Distributed Reporting – Now
Much has been made of the possibilities of “citizen reporting” or “user-generated content.”
A variant of these ideas is the concept of distributed reporting or crowd-sourcing – whereby the public formally or informally helps to contribute reporting or content to a news organization, which filters it as part of the newsgathering process.
Sounds interesting – but expensive and time-consuming, right?
Here’s 5 Ways for alts to use distributed reporting now – incorporate it into your music coverage.
- Verify your reporting – doublecheck quotes and descriptive details captured on film or audio.
- Enhance your end product by including citizen-gathered media.
- Broaden your perspective by reading other’s accounts before composing your own.
- Connect with potential sources and witnesses.
- Communicate with readers. Let them know you checked out their work, and post a link to your final story.
Here’s a quick example of how I used distributive reporting to enhance a recent blog post.
I went to Coachella 2007 last weekend – and was pleased as punch to spot Paris Hilton in the crowd of the CSS show, during the song “Meeting Paris Hilton” – and even happier to get a picture with her afterwards in the corn line. [See blog post on LauraFries.com.] I had some reported materials for my story – my notes and photos. But – what else was out there? What did I, as one reporter, miss?
A quick search of Flickr (photos), YouTube (video) and Technorati (blog search engine) for “paris coachella” turned up a plethora of materials – some of which I ended up including in my final blog post – pictures of CSS with Paris, video of CSS performing the song, and even a picture of Paris, corn in hand!
With help from “citizen reporters,” I was able to create a fuller blog post.
Of course, distributed reporting shouldn’t be limited to arts and entertainment coverage. Did your city recently have an immigration march? Are you working on a story about it? How about giving distributed reporting aggregators like Flickr, YouTube, and Technorati a quick search?
Concept: Three Degrees of User-Generated Content (UGC)
“User-generated content” – it’s an ugly way of describing the great materials that communities contribute to the websites of their newspapers – whether comments, images, or entire stories.
Jonathan Dube, the editorial director of the Canadian Broadcast Corporation website at CBC.ca, founder and publisher of cyberjournalist.net, and incoming president of Online News Association [ONA], outlined three useful ways for categorizing User Generated Content at a panel session today at the American Society of Newspaper Editors [ASNE]’s 2007 Convention in Washington, DC.
Supplementary
- Content that is independent from news coverage, often not edited, and often low in news value
- Examples: Reader-uploaded images at the Tampa Tribune Snap.TBO.com, video-uploads at Boston.com
Integrated
- Content enhances journalism, is integrated into journalist coverage, and is often high on news value, such as eyewitness accounts
- Examples: The BBC received many images during the London Bombings from citizens, and the Fort-Myers News Press
“crowd-sources” articles by eliciting reader reports [example].
Stand Alone
- New journalism products created with user content, that are standalone and distinct from legacy products.
- Examples: YourHub.com, My.Tennessean.com, IndyMoms.com, Vita.mn
Many alts are already incorporating supplementary user-generated content by adding comments, and soliciting reader photos via their Flickr accounts. What ideas do you have for integrating user content on alt sites? And could stand alone user generated sites have any place in the alt universe?
Creating a Space for Community Conversation
May 10, 2007 at 2:05 pm · Filed under Advice, comments, community, conversation, legal, user generated content
Or, How to Have User-Generated Content on Your Site that Facilitates Conversation and Won’t Get You Fired
It’s a question that lots of papers are struggling with – “I want to include comments and other user-generated content on my site, but I don’t want a bunch of trolls arguing, and I don’t want to get sued.”
Super Quick Non-binding Legal Overview
Whew.
So … legal mojo aside, how do you create a space for conversations?
Step 1: Four Cs of Creating Community Conversation
Take out a piece of paper and jot down your answers to these questions.
Community
Who are the community members you expect to contribute content? Think about your web product – is it your entire site, or a stand-alone venture like a blog? Does your entire town have something to say, or just the music fans? And who are the listeners – the ‘lurkers’ who might never contribute, but might be faithful readers?
Conflict
What kind of conflict can you imagine this audience having? How will the content on your site contribute to conflict? For example, a forum about welfare reform will attract a different type of conversation than one about the best spot in town to get sushi.
Constructive Corraling
How can you steer your community away from conflict and towards conversation? Will your community behave itself if they are all identified by their real names? Is comment moderation the answer (not publishing comments until they have been approved by a human editor)? Or will a free-wheeling “we’ll take it down if it gets really bad” approach work for your community?
Calculate Risks and Benefits
Your ‘constructive corraling’ solution will have pros and cons. Weigh them in context of your staffing realities.
Step 2: Experiment
We’re putting together a community blog for the upcoming 2007 AAN Convention at Portland2007.AAN.org. Inspired by the community blog for the 2007 South by Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin, this blog will allow any conference attendee to post an ‘article’ – which AAN will be legally liable for. Here’s how I handled the content challenge.
Example: Community Blog at Portland2007.AAN.org
Community: My community consists of employees of AAN papers, associate members like cartoonists and software vendors, and folks who are interested in alternative media. My listeners consist of, well, everyone – but especially folks with a beef against specific papers or individuals.
Conflict: An industry characterized by mergers, buyouts and staffing changes is full of potential sources of conflict.
Constructive Corraling: Folks might be willing to say nasty stuff anonymously, but I am making the assumption that if they are only allowed to publish using their real names, that will curtail much of the trash talking. (Hopefully?) My constructive corraling mechanism was to moderate identity creation – that is, I am only allowing folks with verifiable identities to post on the blog. To create a user account, a potential author must submit a valid, verifiable email address – no ihatemyoldboss@gmail.com.
Calculate Risks and Benefits: Of course, verifying an email address requires a human editor – and even the fastest editor isn’t as fast as the instant gratification of a computer. I balanced the annoying wait time against the possible trouble I would get into if folks were allowed to post willy-nilly on the site, and decided it was worth it.
So, my experimental solution to creating a space for community conversation is to require folks to use their real identities – hoping that’ll force ‘em to play nice.
Step 3: Listen and Adjust
No matter how well thought out your solution is, it’s important to realize that you are herding cats. Listen to your users – what they think about your technical setup, what they think about the conversations that happen on the site, and more importantly, to the conversations themselves.
In that spirt, what do you think of my technical solution? Have I played the 4 Cs of Creating Community Conversation correctly? What tactics have you tried?
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