The Online Journalism Award

The Online News Association (ONA) was founded in 1999 by a group of professional online journalists, who decided to organize a platform for those who believe that Internet is the most powerful communications medium to arise since the dawn of television. The Association has more then 1,200 professional members, that is: "members whose principal livelihood involves gathering or producing news for digital presentation". ONA administers the prestigious Online Journalism Awards since May 2000, as a joint effort of with the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, a comprehensive set of journalism prizes honoring excellence Web journalism. This year, two Spanish new media won the awards for non-English language sites. 

El Pais won the Non-English General Excellence to a Large Site:

"The winner sets the benchmark by which others are measured. On a bedrock of first-class journalism it has built a brilliant suite of infographics that are rich in information, yet easy to consume. The site is a shining example of how traditional media can blossom in the digital arena."

http://www.elpais.com/global/

Sitou won the Non-English General Excellence Award to a Small Site:

"The winner is a brilliant example of the new, smaller independent online news, information and community sites. It balances rigorous journalism with the most innovative application of Web 2.0 practices, all packaged in a gorgeous design with unique attention to small touches of navigational genius."
http://www.soitu.es/

General Excellence, Large Site: CNN

"A site that made substantial changes in the past year, making it one of the more dynamic destinations out there. One that takes user content seriously and integrates it into the whole, opening a new era of networked content. One judge predicted "everyone will copy it."

http://www.cnn.com/

General Excellence, Medium Site: LasVegasSun.com

"A winner with an impressive visual approach to journalism that helped them stand out as being a little bit different and very strong. One of the best newspaper Web sites I have seen, with high quality multimedia content that is integral to the site, not an afterthought or secondary element."

http://www.lasvegassun.com/

General Excellence, Small Site: ArmyTimes.com

"The winner clearly knows its audience, speaks to it honestly and helps it speak to itself. It is relentlessly helpful, packed with news and information that focuses on the needs of its users. What it gets back is an engaged community."

http://www.armytimes.com/

Knight Award for Public Service: WashingtonPost.com, Fixing D.D. Schools

"The winning entry is an excellent package that focuses on a specific issue of tremendous importance to the community. A very strong investigation, very well-written stories, and obviously a matter of great public import. If I was a parent in Washington DC I would be studying this."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/metro/interactives/dcschools/

Blogging Lessons For and From Journalism

Johnatan Bailey gives some advices on how to write journalistics blogs. In his article, he looks through the style and format on how to cover a story:

1. Dig into a Story
   
2. Write Visually
   
3. Radical Clarity
   
4. Cite Sources
   
5. Master Headline Writing
   

As he assets, there are some useful lessons from journalism that can help improve blog writing: "Though journalists are starting to make their peace with blogging and more reporters are starting up their own blogs, most are still loathe to connect themselves, in any way, to the mass of largely untrained and unpaid bloggers. But the success of blogging as a media indicates that bloggers are getting many things rights and that the “old media” may have something that it can learn, especially as it transitions more and more of its work to the Web".

1. Informal Tone
   
2. Corrections Policy
   
3. Conversations
   
4. Working with Competitors
   
5. Focusing on Free

You can also check some legal advice for bloggers.

Blog Catalog

This is a useful site where you could register your team blog to start enter in a social community for bloggers, learn about blogging or promote your blog. Check out the tutorial.

LAB: SOCIAL BOOKMARKING

From the personal selected sites to the sharing information, there is a recent method that is increasing its use among Internet users. Social bookmarking is becoming the most common way to store, organize and search for information, but also for keeping our links and research interest online. Users of social bookmarking system can save links to web sites they select as favorites. They can also share this links because they can be used publicly. One of the most popular system of bookmarks is delicious. But you can also find other tools that will help you in your personal and collective collaborations. Here you can check some of the top social bookmarking websites:

• Blinkbits, BlogMemes, Co.mments, Fark, Furl, 
• Google Bookmarks, LinkaGoGo, Ma.gnolia, Mister Wong, 
• Newsvine, PlugIM, Propeller, Stumbleupon, Slashdot, 
• Simpy, Sphere, Squidoo, Scuttle

Here you can find an easy tutorial that shows how to start up an account in delicious:

LAB: Making your own social network

A social network is a social structure made of nodes conducted by individuals or groups. They start up different ways of interdependency, such as values, interests, financial exchange, etc. The resulted structure becomes in several levels of complexity. The most common labels for this social relationship is nodes and ties.

Nodes are individual actors within the networks and ties are the relationship between the actors. You can find a huge range of ties between the nodes. One person can establish several and interconnected ties: familiar, friendship, academic, professional, business, etc. 

The importance of this new ways of relation and collaboration has been labeled in the term social capital which is a concept emerged in business, economic and political science that refers to connections within and between social networks. Just for the purpose of this course, we will focus social capital as the main characteristic related to networks. 

Myspace and Facebook are the the most popular social networks, but you can also check some other sites, such as Wiggio or Ning. Here you have some video tutorials about how to start up with them:

Wiggio

Ning 

The most popular social networks are, as you know, Facebook and MySpace. But you can also start up your professional profile in Linkedin. Do you know any other social network around the world? Take a look to virb.

READING: Mapping Citizen Media Models

Jan Schaffer former Business Editor and Pulitzer Prize winner for the Philadephia Inquireer, is the executive director of J-Lab: the Institute for Interactive Journalism an one of the most influential authors following the current transition process from old fashion journalism to the new media. J-Lab was launched in 2002 in the University of Maryland's College of Journalism to help newsrooms use innovative computer technologies to inform people about important public issues. In this study Schaffer, who also promote J-Lab's New Voices project, assets citizen journalism is emerging as a form of bridge media, linking traditional forms of journalism with classic civil participation. This study edited by Knight Citizen News network, analyses hyperlocal community new sties, a new phenomenon that is changing and growing rapidly. In Citizen Media: Fad or the Future of News? (2007), Schaffer sustains that "...The pioneers did not intend simply to experiment with new forms of journalism or give-and-take between citizens and journalists. Most site operators believe they are engaged in a new kind of community building, a kind of antidote to the “bowling alone” phenomenon".

The author gives examples of Citizen Media Models for analyze. Go to the websites and check components of interactivity, content, useful news, type of community generated, and, the most important: similarities and differences in their projects:

Community Cooperatives

The Forum

Northfield.org

Rye Reflections

ArbotUpdate.com

Trained Citizen Journalist Sites

Madison Commons

Chi-town Daily News

Professional Journalist Non-profit Sites

New Haven Independent

Voice of San Diego

Professional Journalists For-profit Sites

West Port Now

New West

Blog Aggregator Sites

Greensboro 101

PhyllyFuture

Syndicated Milti-site Models

Your Hub

Backfence

WickedLocal

Gate House Media

Legacy Media Sites

Bluffton Today

Northwest Voice

Southwest Voice

Solo Enterprise Non-profit Sites

Toledo Talk

Solo Enterprise for For-profit Sites

H2town

Baristanet

ibrattleboro

READING: From Web 1.0 to Web 2.0

Garham Cormodore works on social network analysis. Balancher Krishnamurthy center his reseach around the Internet measurements. In this essay titled "Key Differences between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0" the authors focus an enlightening comparative analysis of principal contents, interactivity and approaches of both plattforms. As they indicate: "Web 2.0 is a buzzword introduced in 2003–04 which is commonly used to encompass various novel phenomena on the World Wide Web. Although largely a marketing term, some of the key attributes associated with Web 2.0 include the growth of social networks, bi–directional communication, various ‘glue’ technologies, and significant diversity in content types. We are not aware of a technical comparison between Web 1.0 and 2.0. While most of Web 2.0 runs on the same substrate as 1.0, there are some key differences. We capture those differences and their implications for technical work in this paper. Our goal is to identify the primary differences leading to the properties of interest in 2.0 to be characterized. We identify novel challenges due to the different structures of Web 2.0 sites, richer methods of user interaction, new technologies, and fundamentally different philosophy. Although a significant amount of past work can be reapplied, some critical thinking is needed for the networking community to analyze the challenges of this new and rapidly evolving environment".

This year's fourth year of Web 2.0 Summit will be held this November in San Francisco, after the recent past Web 2.0 Exposition in New York. As their organizers asset, they have been focused on industry's challenges and opportunities. Now they suggest: "Our conversation is no longer just about the Web. Now is the time to ask how the Web might tapped to address the world's most pressing limits..."

What is Web 2.0? Where can we find our own sources, feeders, holders, etc.?
Why is important for us to discuss about Civil Society Media, Community Media and Alternative Media?