a new list of “Ten Things Journalists Can Do to Reinvent Journalism.”
- Start your own online news site. You’re not going to make dent in the universe working for a newspaper company, or any chain news organization. Get out now. Pursue your own passion and your own dream, stick to it, and you will accomplish something that matters.
- Connect to the community you serve, whether it’s geographic or focused around an interest. Be passionate about that community and do your best to meet all of its informational needs. Make sure your site is indisputably essential to the community you serve. Readers trust news organizations that look out for their interests. Be that kind of news organization.
- Cover the big and the small. Focus on people, not government actions and process (though, obviously, this can’t be ignored). A continuous stream of news will include stories about dead deer, city council hi jinx, cows in the roadway, misappropriation of funds, great-grandma’s 100th birthday, etc. Focus on people more than politics.
- Be a real person. Your byline matters. You will be a more trusted source if people have some sense of who you are. You don’t need to open up every aspect of your life to public disclosure, but sharing selective details helps people connect with you and makes them more interested in what you report.
- Publish what you know when you know it and let stories unfold incrementally. This also brings your readers into the process, adding information, providing new tips, correcting errors.
- Be absolutely ethical in how you handle information. Be as truthful and accurate as humanly possible. Part of the new information ethics, however, is also about correcting others errors where you find them. Don’t let misinformation spread, because it spreads too quickly these days.
- Be transparent. Be transparent about who you are and what you believe...
- http://howardowens.com/2012/01/08/ten-things-journalist-can-do-to-reinvent-journalism-the-new-list/
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