Get online readers involved: Video

Newspaper editors like to talk about points of entry on a page — headlines, photos, graphics, breakouts and the stories themselves. Readers usually start with the main art or top story and move in a left-to-right fashion from the top to bottom. This is not surprising to learn, but it’s important nonetheless. Editors should know how readers move through a page, and spend adequate time making sure they fully engage them.

On the Web, “engaging” is of a different kind and it’s doubly important.

In our book, we feature what we call “points of involvement,” because readers don’t just passively digest information; they use it and manipulate it to suit their needs.  Whenever you can involve readers, do it. This doesn’t mean to allow commenting on stories and other content, though that is a form of involvement and it is involvement in its most basic and obvious form. Rather, give readers tools to use the information you’re sharing.

• On the sports pages, that might be a calculator that helps me track my daughter’s batting average. (How many hits does she need in her next 12 at-bats to raise her .280 batting average to .300?)
• In news, a simple device might show, in various combinations, what my charitable gift might buy for disaster victims. We’re all familiar with those charts that show how many drinks it takes to exceed the legal limit, depending on our body weight, or what’s considered overweight according to our height.
• In business, the possibilities are legion, so here you want to provide some nice surprises as well as the obvious. (To return to the family, maybe you could show your son how long it will take to save up for that iPod Touch if you want him to experience saving for himself.)
• In features, one of my favorite interactive devices simplified a complicated story through involvement and interaction. Readers could click on a wheel showing various religions and each faith’s attitudes about different issues. Click on “sex before marriage” and learn about differences in attitudes and teachings from one faith to the next. This simplified navigation through a dense story, put the reader in charge and even made it fun.

Online, it’s easy to apply this thinking to more content. And don’t forget: You don’t have to do it all. Link to existing tools and databases that already are out there.

Imagine your online readers, and envision them leaning forward in their chairs to interact with your content. If you’re leaning back in your editor’s chair as you read through your Web pages, then chances are your readers are, too. This is an easy way to keep reminding yourself that reading on the Web truly is an interactive experience … if you build your content to allow it.

Our video about points of involvement is now available on iTunes, where you can download it to your iPod or other portable device.

Or, you can view it — and others in the archive — via our YouTube playlist, right off the Web or in the player on our home page.

Editors must re-energize at the end

One of my editing courses this semester is collaborating with a reporting course to produce a new community newspaper, The Stand.

The Stand is a monthly newspaper that serves Syracuse’s South Side, an underrepresented community that is a close neighbor to Syracuse University.

Editors already put out the inaugural edition, which they started and completed within the first two weeks of the semester. They did impressive work in a short time. Now they are working on the next issue. They are most vulnerable at this point.

Why? Because they are at risk of losing their energy, momentum and enthusiasm for this project. They have met with and communicated with the reporters on many stories. Reporters and editors have fielded many questions from the reporting professor and from me. The reporting phase for the coming issue is ending, and production will begin Monday. That phase entails its own set of questions and direction.

At the same time, editors are thinking ahead to the next issue because reporters are ready to start on those stories. When will it end? It won’t.

Editors must re-energize at the very point when they naturally would like to step back and admire their accomplishments. Take a break. Do something else. But the cycle — for print or for the Web — does not allow that, and it is a reality of the journalism profession.

That’s why editors must stay vigilant. Every story must get that final, comprehensive read when an editor steps back — not to admire — but to ensure that it is ready to go. That it follows the basic story structure; that it has a nut graph; that its focus answers the question, “What’s the story?”; that its sourcing is sound; that facts are substantiated; that there are no hidden problems.

In “Think Like an Editor,” three strategies offer guidance for editors to do this:

• Strategy 17: Closer Look: How to Tell Where the Story Works and Where It Needs Work
• Strategy 21: Holding a Story: 10 Warning Signs That a Story Should Not Run
• Strategy 22: Saving a Story: 10 Things You Can Do to Make a Story work

Editors in the course are focusing right now on the print edition. But the accompanying Web site is calling, too.

Emilie Davis

Twitter: Respect its power

Yesterday’s news included an item about John Daly, the pro golfer who posted a Tweet that included a golf writer’s phone number. Daly invited his followers to call the writer and chew him out for a story he had written about Daly; the piece detailed some unflattering things that were in Daly’s PGA Tour file. (If you aren’t familiar with Daly, he has battled alcoholism for years and has often gotten in trouble with the tour for some pretty erratic and sometimes unprofessional behavior.) The writer received around 100 calls before Daly killed the Tweet.

This got me thinking about an incident in a class, and it calls to mind a good reminder for anyone: Think twice before you Tweet.

• It can be powerful.

• It can be damaging.

• It can be exciting.

• It can be horrifying.

• It is always public.

I had an interesting experience last year, when I discovered someone in class was Tweeting comments about it. I was teaching with two other profs, and it was an unusual approach — we were trying to “turn over” the class to them in many ways, letting them pick a project topic and lay a reporting/research plan of their own. We were inviting them to lead, and we would follow. We offered plenty of advice along the way, but early on we were content to let the class “wander” a bit and experience the ups and downs and the trying moments of finding a direction, setting a path and merging a dozen voices and ideas.

The person Tweeting actually was a guest, a friend of a student in the class; this guest wanted to sit in because he had heard the class was unusual and our multimedia approach sounded fun and different.

Students had their laptops open, most of them running Twitter. Halfway through the night, the prof next to me gave a rib poke and pointed to the top Tweet on his machine:

“This is an interesting class,” our guest had Tweeted. “But I am very concerned the professors don’t know what they’re doing.” And later: “I could help these guys. I hope they can include me. If they do, I’ll ask my friends.” He offered more pointed criticisms in other posts.

During the break in the three-hour class, I pointed out to him that everyone was reading his Tweets in the class, including the professors (and possibly our funders, who might be alarmed to hear how clueless these professors were). Our visitor seemed quite taken aback and genuinely surprised. It hadn’t crossed his mind that the Tweets could be seen not only by us, but in real time. Or that regardless of the merit of his comments, they were rude at best for a guest.

In the end, none of us lost any sleep over the incident. But this kind of thing, and the Daly story, are sharp reminders that Twitter is, indeed, a powerful tool, not a toy, and it may have results and consequences beyond our imagination. And of course, it is another chapter in life’s lesson about privacy (and how little there is) in the digital age.

Few things are “just between you and me” anymore. Even if you don’t make your digital communication open to everyone, someone else might. Whatever you say is only a “forward” button or Retweet symbol away from wide publication to your boss, your friends, your family and thousands of others you don’t even know.

Steve Davis

There’s a lesson in ABC News cuts

There are some things we’ll keep returning to in our blog because they are so important and because they just keep coming up in the news. The recent announcement about cutbacks at ABC News (read the ABC memo here) is just such a case — and particularly so these lines from today’s New York Times (my italic emphasis added):

More journalists will become jacks-of-all-trades, wielding cameras, microphones and lights, as well as lists of interview questions. More production work will be conducted out of New York. “The ones who fear the most from the cuts are the ones that have a single function,” one ABC staff member said.

Mr. Westin (David Westin, ABC News president) said high-priced and purely cosmetic talent would become an increasingly endangered species. “There have been people in television news — very successful people — who do not write,” he said. “We are going to definitely require more of our journalists.”

In our book, we talk about the multijob journalist. And several times in our blog, we have noted that it has become increasingly important for everyone — college students and pros already in the profession — to develop a broader set of skills. This concept came up again this weekend, at a conference I attended. The message: It’s a good idea to “go deep” in one skill and broader in a set of others. “I don’t know how to do that” is not something you want to say these days.

There actually is good news in Westin’s comments, which indicate that strong writing (and reporting, of course) is the bedrock skill. That means if you’re a “word person,” your talents will be valued above all others in many quarters.

Actually, we have always known that. The truth is just so much more apparent now.

Steve Davis

Tips for making ethical decisions

A story in today’s New York Times under the headline, “Inquiry Poses a Quandary for Cuomo,” covers many aspects of making an ethical decision.

The news in this story is that New York Gov. David Paterson has asked Attorney General Andrew Cuomo “to look into allegations that he or others in his administration had interfered in a domestic violence case involving one of his most senior aides, David W. Johnson.”

The ethical issue: A fierce primary is ahead for the governor; the attorney general might be a political opponent. One stands to lose. One stands to benefit.

The story refers to fuzzy lines, complications, conflicts of interest, perceptions of conflicts of interest and red flags.

Editors, too, are faced with these when making ethical decisions about any number of issues: whether to run a story; whom to include or not include in a story; issues involving minors; stories involving sources who are naive or who might not understand the consequences of talking to journalists; misplaced priorities; exceptions; favoritism.

The issue of ethics is situational, fluid, tangled, confusing and conflicting.

How, then, do editors know how to make ethical decisions? They must follow a process, consider all the stakeholders, and adhere to the principle of minimizing harm. It is never easy.

In our book, “Think Like an Editor,” we share guidelines about ethical decisions, including “10 Warning Signs” and “10 Questions about Stakeholders” in Strategy 39: Ethics.

In the “Think for the Web” portion of Strategy 39, we remind editors that deciding whether to push the “publish to Web” button adds even more stress to making ethical decisions. Still, there are strategies editors can use to handle ambiguities and problems in real time and still post stories responsibly.

Reading about how others make ethical decisions can help, too. You’ll find some of our favorite resources at the Indiana University Web site on ethics and at The Poynter Institute.

Which story is the lead? Look inward

Every semester in my editing class, students participate in an exercise in which they must rank 10 stories in order of importance to their audience.

Individually, the students rank the stories and write a brief explanation about their choice for the lead story. Then, the students gather in groups of two and three to share their decisions.

The goal? Each team must decide on one lead and report back to the class.

Sometimes all students in a group agree at the start; sometimes a student is swayed to change the lead story; sometimes, but not often, the group remains divided.

Class discussion yesterday focused on two hypothetical stories in contention for the lead: that President Obama changed his stance to overhaul health care; that four SU students were killed in a car crash in a suburb not far from Syracuse University.

By design, the budget lines for these stories provide scant information. So discussions focus not only on what the students know, but also on what they need to know to make informed decisions.

Ultimately, the teams chose the Obama story because they said it is an issue that would affect all people, that his reversal would be big news, that health care is of great concern and controversy, and that the effects of his decision would be felt for a long time.

All good reasons.

Last question put to the class: What about the hypothetical story on the list that no one mentioned? The one stating that Pope Benedict had made a decision to allow women as priests. Wouldn’t that decision affect all people, be big news, be of great concern and controversy and affect people for a long time?

More importantly, what does the lack of discussion of that story say? Rhetorical questions were put to the students to think about as editors: Am I Catholic? Do I know people who are Catholic? What percentage of my audience is Catholic? Am I aware of the Catholic priest shortage? Am I aware of recent church closings nationwide — in part because of a lack of priests? Do I understand that this story would be a watershed moment after 2,000 years? Do I realize that this story would affect and be of interest to women, men, Catholics, non-Catholics, audiences locally, nationally and internationally, scholars and ordinary people alike?

Deciding story play takes communication and questioning, and it also takes a serious look inward. It is not an easy decision to choose “the” most important story. But considering personal values, knowledge and judgment is part of the process. Knowing the news is, too.

No directives were given in class for the teams to change their minds about their chosen leads. Simply, they were asked to take into consideration not only news values, but also the diverse nature of the class itself as their “newsroom” and the diverse nature of their audience.

Thinking. And thinking again. That’s what it’s all about.

Emilie Davis