media Archives - Page 4 of 6 - Author JD Lasica

Attracting young talent to your online news staff

Step #1: Start with your newsroom’s corporate culture This column appeared in the May 1999 issue of The American Journalism Review. Web journalists today face a choice: work at the online division of an old media company, like Tampa Bay Online or Time Digital, or dive headlong into a new media company that exists only in cyberspace. More and more, they’re choosing the latter. Consider Janelle Brown. When she graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1995, she knew she wanted to be a journalist, but the traditional route of ladder-climbing at a newsroom didn’t appeal to her. “The idea of working at some really dry or dull newspaper didn’t interest me,” she says. “Old media seemed so hierarchical,

Protecting the privacy of Internet users

Smart ads are a worthy tool — if safeguards are built in This column appeared in the April 1999 issue of The American Journalism Review. The worst-kept secret of online advertising is this: Nobody clicks on banner ads. And that’s bad news for a Web publication’s bottom line. At least one online newspaper is taking steps to turn that around through a technique called targeted advertising — essentially, tailoring ads right down to the individual user. It’s a gambit worth exploring, as other Internet companies have done. But online publishers considering such a move should not minimize the importance of posting clear policies to reassure users worried about their privacy rights.

Seven more sites for freelancers

And a new service matches online editors with content talent This column appeared Feb. 3, 1999, in the Online Journalism Review. Here’s the version on the OJR site. Second of two parts. See Part 1. These may well be the glory days for freelance writing on the Web, with dozens of sites paying rates that compare favorably to print publications. For both veteran journalists and aspiring writers, the Internet has opened up potentially lucrative new markets. A new online service devoted to just that notion will debut later this month. Content Exchange, created by Editor & Publisher columnist Steve Outing and freelance writer Amy Gahran, will bring together those who create content for online media and those who buy content.

Golden days for Web freelancing

Seven sites worth writing for This column appeared Jan. 26, 1999, in the Online Journalism Review. Here’s the version on the OJR site. First of two parts. See Part 2. The Web has opened up new landscapes for writers. Where major newspapers like the Miami Herald pay all of $200 for an off-lead, front-page travel story including photos — I got the check Friday and spent it Saturday — online publications sometimes pay considerably more. While Salon and Slate remain cyberspace’s best-known outposts of original content created by staffers and freelance writers, the Web today is flush with a host of online publications offering quality non-fiction. Indeed, this might be the best of times for freelance writers with some online

Drudge and Flynt: Two of a kind

Can the mainstream media resist being dragged through the mud? This column appeared Jan. 7, 1999, in the Online Journalism Review. Here’s the version on the OJR site. Drudge has taken his articles down, but you can still read them here. To track how the Clinton paternity story infiltrated the media, see A cybersleaze timeline: Anatomy of a smear. Matt Drudge and Larry Flynt — who would have thought them soulmates? Drudge, the enfant terrible of online journalism, has been ratcheting up the hysteria volume this week over his latest “world exclusive”: that Bill Clinton may have a 13-year-old son, the result of a tryst with an African American prostitute who’s seeking to prove paternity through DNA testing. Flynt, publisher

Examples of Drudge Report dispatches

The following dispatches from the Drudge Report are being reprinted under the fair use doctrine for educational purposes in cooperation with the Annenberg School at the University of Southern California. WHITE HOUSE DNA CHASE: TEEN DOING ‘WELL’ AFTER NEWS OF ‘NO MATCH’ **Exclusive** He had been told all of his life by his mother that Bill Clinton was his father, but late this week, 13-year old Danny Williams of Arkansas learned the truth: He is not.

Newsweek arrives on the Web

Editor and General Manager Michael Rogers discusses Newsweek’s online strategy This column appeared in the January 1999 issue of The American Journalism Review. Newsweek has joined the future. Newsweek.com arrived on the Web Oct. 4, 1998, and unlike the first wave of mainstream media news sites that reinvented themselves every five minutes, these folks don’t seem to have an identity crisis. The streamlined site has a spare, minimalist look, featuring all the content of the print magazine alongside a handful of daily features and breaking news provided by others. With a 10-person editorial staff, the Web site has both a modest agenda and realistic goals. In short, Newsweek.com doesn’t pretend to be all things to all Webheads.

Choose your bedmates wisely

When partnering with advertisers, content sites need to be careful to avoid conflicts of interest This column appeared in the Dec. 31, 1998, issue of The Industry Standard. Here’s the version on the Industry Standard site. These are the Web’s Woodstock days. From small startups to corporate behemoths, the name of the game is to bed as many partners as possible. It’s finally dawned on online publishers that they can’t just put up some wickedly cool content and expect the world to beat a path to their Web sites. Without distribution, you’re dead. Which is why companies are hopping into bed with one another faster than you can say Powered by AT&T WorldNet. Check out the roll call of recent

Microsoft Sidewalk reinvents itself

With a turn toward commerce, Microsoft’s online city guide places marketing above journalism This column appeared in the November 1998 issue of The American Journalism Review. Remember those apocalyptic headlines two years ago, the ones predicting that plague and pestilence would be visited upon all that journalism holds sacred because of Microsoft’s emergence as a media player? As it turned out, toads did not rain from the sky. Such fears always struck me as wildly overblown. And today, MSNBC and Slate notwithstanding, it should be clear from its online actions that Microsoft is positioning itself as an Internet transaction center — but has no appetite to reinvent itself as a media company.

Salon: The best pure-play Web publication?

Salon may be a harbinger of journalism’s future on the Internet This in-depth profile of Salon magazine appeared in the June 1998 issue of The American Journalism Review. When the editors of Salon heard the reports about the White House sex scandal on the morning of January 21, their daily newspaper instincts kicked into overdrive. Andrew Ross, who caught the news on the radio over breakfast, surfed the Web for the latest developments and banged out a 630-word commentary from home that went up on Salon’s site before noon. Editor David Talbot, news editor Gary Kamiya and the rest of the newsroom went into “standard journalistic feeding frenzy mode,” Kamiya recalls. By the time the exhausted staff trudged home that