Traditional news media were handcuffed (figuratively at least) during the crackdown at Zuccotti Park, where the Occupy movement began. News from the scene got out anyway via new social media tools like Storify, according to the ReadWriteWeb blog. "The raw power of citizen media — and the future of news envisioned by a site called Storify - thwarted the media blackout." More from Poynter and a Knight Center blog.
Science writing news
Journalists who survive layoffs tend to have a sanguine view of their situations and charity toward their employers, according to a Kansas journalism professor's survey noted on the new JimRomenesko.com blog. What's more, the older and more experienced the journalist, the greater the job satisfaction, Scott Reinardy's study said. The study “demonstrates that a large number have managed the stress of additional workloads and job responsibilities,” Reinardy wrote.
The author of “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” stopped by the Nieman Foundation last month to talk with Esquire's Chris Jones about how he does what he does. "I’m on the road a lot," he says. "I believe you have to be there. I don’t use the technology now any more than I did when I was a young reporter." He recalls a New York Times veteran warning him about technology in the early 1950s: "Stay away from these telephones."
Journalists thrive on deadlines but speakers need to prepare, Dallas Morning News editor Tom Huang writes in a Poynter post. Huang's top 10 tips for journalists doing presentations include "Understand that part of teaching is showmanship," and "Get your audience to interact with you." But above all, prepare: "You’re good at what you do. But that doesn’t mean you’ve broken down what you do into steps and thought about the most effective way to teach those steps."
Canids galore: Where did dogs come from? Bad news for bulldogs. Pleiotropy, pre-adaptation, and the domestication of silver foxes. Silver Fox, blogging geology. It's Sand Dune Week!
There are at least six different ways to sell ads on your blog, Steve Buttry writes on The Buttry Diary. Beyond listing them with examples, his suggestions include joining affiliate programs like Amazon's, syndicating your content to other web sites or print outlets, or self-publishing your content in print or e-book form. "Your success is going to rest in attracting strong traffic to your blog" via search-engine optimization and social media promotion, Buttry says.
Did you know smoking can improve the performance of long-distance runners? If you saw this article by Kenneth A. Myers in the Canadian Medical Association Journal you might have wondered about its editing — especially if you skipped the abstract. Myers tried, Travis Saunders wrote on Obesity Panacea, "to illustrate how you can fashion a review article to support almost any crazy theory if you’re willing to cherry-pick the right data."
In New York City, having media badges didn't protect reporters from being treated just about as roughly as Occupy Wall Street protesters, Robert Niles points out in the Online Journalism Review. "What's the point of having that credential … if it's not going to keep you from getting hit, gassed or hauled off to jail with the rest of the crowd at a protest you're covering?" Niles asks. Maybe, he says, it's time to rethink the practice.
Lauren Gravitz spent years planning a story on Ralph Steinman's on dendritic cells, but he kept putting her off. Then, she learned he'd won the Nobel Prize — but died three days before the announcement. "I had been envisioning it as a feature, something that allowed a pretty deep exploration of the person and the people around him, his science, and the narrative of the developing disease," Gravitz told The Open Notebook. "Then all of the sudden, the story changed."