In the coming days I’ll be ending my tenure at KXXV/KRHD in Waco, packing up my stuff and starting all over again at WISH-TV in Indianapolis.
We’ve made great strides at KXXV, from frequent updating of stories to unparralleled coverage of breaking news. We redesigned what was the ugliest website known to man and made it an award winning website.
The biggest struggle at KXXV, and that I anticipate facing at WISH-TV, is the “television reporter/producer” mindset. This hinders the “Web First” mentality. Producers seem think their show in 4 hours is more important than an immediate update to the web; which can be costly.
To have a trully multiplatform news operation, which all TV stations want, you need to be in the “journalist” mindset. Several stations are already hiring “News Content Managers” instead of producers with the expectation they will cross produce for the web and for TV. We’ve also seen the move from “Reporter” to “Multiplatform/Multimedia Reporter” signifying the desire to end the TV only mindset.
KXXV struggles and will continue to struggle because producers see their obligation to the web as an afterthought. As newspaper readership and TV new viewership continue to fall, the importance of getting information onto the web grows. Arianna Huffington explains the need for news organizations to reup their journalistic standards so that we participate with viewers/readers rather than dump information in their laps.
If we serve as an outlet for information, train new journalists to dig up stories rather that front the yearly stories and bolster our credibility by removing bias we can successfully compete with the mom and pop bloggers.
I’ve gotten several emails from folks “in the biz” about my coverage of the Fort Hood shooting. Several of my former collegues (who have gone on to much larger markets) filled my text message box with notes of appreciation. Yesterday, my boss forwarded me the day’s issue of Magid Morning Facts, I was thrilled to see my GM/News Director gave me credit for our online coverage of the Fort Hood Attacks. I’ve included a short tease below, but you can find the full story, complete with pictures, here.
“Beyond executing the station’s breaking news plan on-air, the KXXV team moved quickly to mobilize the Web site to accommodate overwhelming interest in the story, which broke during the workday.
“KXXV Vice President and General Manager Mike Lee told the Morning Facts he gives a lot of credit not only to the reporters and photographers sending stories in, but also to Webmaster Patrick Tolbert. “He put in some very long hours, perhaps more than anyone at the station, to make sure we provided the best information available online,” Lee said.”
It’s no secret that NBC OnOs made producers reapply for their jobs not as producers but as content managers.
So, why don’t producers get it? The web is no longer an afterthought, its a forethought. Your newscast is 30 minutes a day, but the website is 24/7.
A website should never, ever, ever have popup ads, but what happens when you need to open a new page?
This discussion often comes up at work, where, why and how often should they be used?
Take today for example, I’m toying around with a new flash based video player for our homepage, but there isn’t space enough to have a player and a list of videos with thumbnails. The logical answer is to the video player pop up, but there are inherent problems. For example, People with popup blockers will have to take preventative measures in order to see your video. In a world where the less clicks the better, this could be a losing factor.
What about off site links? Is it fair to pop up a window to a site you mention in a story? Ideally, the visitor would close the new page and come back to your site to read more stories, and it increases time on site.
I feel as if the introduction of tabs into web browsing eliminates some of the evilness of popups, but as with all web projects, not everyone has adopted this new technology. With tabs, a user can quickly switch between links and content, allowing more efficient multitasking. In fact, as I write this, I have three tabs open! In the office, I use tabs to open my CMS console for our sites, our competitor’s site and my site every time my browser starts.
Migrating files to new servers at work got me thinking about my own files. I am now in the process of migrating servers for the domains I control.
UPDATE: It took all weekend, but I have it sorted out. I ran into a crazy wordpress bug with uploads but managed to fix it.
I will keep your status here:
- STRATEGICDEMOGRAPHICS.COM – COMPLETE
- RICKVELACLOTHING.COM – COMPLETE
- PATRICKTOLBERT.COM – COMPLETE
- PATRICKTOLBERT.NET – Redesign in progress
- BELLECRAVATE.COM – parked
Traditionalists will tell you that you should print news papers for them. But, that too is a problem. You would be competing with state run media that has the best access to state sources and unlimited state funding.
When the British gave Ghana, their former colony, its independence in YEAR, a Ghana Broadcasting Corporation was set up. It is modeled after the BBC with newscasts at the top of each hour and entertainment programming in between. Only a hand full of Ghanaians could access the media through broadcast channels so a host of independent newspapers hit the presses.
If you’re looking to go into the printing business in Ghana, be sure to keep reading, all news print in the country must be purchased from a central governmental agency. This agency dishes out different paper’s alotments based on circulation. And, say if the government did not like the story you ran about them last month, your next month’s alotment of newsprint may never be delivered.
In order to fight the lack of newsprint, the independent papers have teamed up and decided that a different paper would be published each day. Under the agreement, the independent paper gain all of the single-copy sales by independent paper readers each day. Therefore, there is one large independent paper to compete with the state run paper The Daily Graphic, each day of the week.
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