New York Times on the Web

Video comes to the Web

January 7, 1998 by JD Lasica

CNN, the New York Times & APTV have begun experimenting with streaming video

This column appeared in the January-February 1998 issue of The American Journalism Review.

Quietly, without much fanfare, online news sites have begun making good use of a revolutionary new information tool. It’s called video.

Until now, anyone seeking to capture the flavor and texture of a news event was limited to surfing the old-fashioned way: with a TV set and remote control. News sites on the Web have offered the occasional QuickTime video, but that required long download times, typically several minutes for just a 30-second clip — hardly worth the trouble. [Read more…] about Video comes to the Web

Preserving old ethics in a new medium

December 7, 1997 by JD Lasica

To avert ethical problems in cyberspace, cling to traditional journalism values

This column appeared in the December 1997 issue of The American Journalism Review. I was interviewed on the topic of Internet news sources’ trustworthiness by Bloomberg Radio on April 4, 1998.

If ethics are rarely debated during the daily miracle of churning out a newspaper, the subject is rarer still in the whiz-bang, techno-toy-driven realm of new media.

While all the old ethical rules surely still apply in new media, the Internet also presents dilemmas that never existed in a print world: reporters lurking invisibly in chat rooms; ad links embedded into editorial copy; the posting of private tragedies in news archives until the end of time; tracking users’ habits and sharing that data with advertisers; putting the tools of publishing into the hands of little league coaches and others who aren’t trained journalists. [Read more…] about Preserving old ethics in a new medium

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