Journalists will find that blogs are excellent feedback tools for their own work and for the work of other journalists who write about the same things you do.
Example:
How blogs can circumvent Big Media
Backstory: The French daily Libération publishes a story about The Pixies getting back together last Friday.
Comments: Frank Black [Black is the lead singer/co-founder of The Pixies – Akin] disagrees with a couple of things in the story and finds the journalist's website and photoblog and, on Monday, uses the comments section to post his own.
Conclusion: The journalist explains that the very heavy-handed editing changed a number of things in her article and that she was just as frustrated as he was. Her husband even chimes in!
How's that for personalized communication?
Tech journalist Jon Udell has an extended essay at his blog on how he uses a blog to research, develop and enhance the articles he does, most of which, he concedes are for information technology trade magazines. But we both agree that some of his principles extend to other subject matters.
Udell will sometimes publish a first draft of his article on his blog before submitting it to his editors. Seems odd, doesn't it? But he says that by publishing on his blog ahead of time, he can break out of what he calls the “editorial ivory tower”, which he uses to describe that phenomenon when your editor or assignment desk gets a hold of one kind of story or one angle or one approach to a story and won't let go of it. That top-down direction on a story also grabs you, the writer, and you can't think outside the box. Pre-publishing the story brings in fresh ideas and fresh approaches and, even, completely new story ideas.
When folks in a journalists' ecosystem get wind that a reporter is working on a story, they get involved. So, Udell gets feedback from PR types, vendors, and others.
He finds, in some cases, he can help build some 'buzz' about a story.
After publication, his blog serves as one place where readers can discuss the story, provide more feedback and enhanced the story. Udell also uses his blog to publish extended interviews that formed part of the story and basically empty his notebook.
As an aside, San Jose Mercury News technology columnist is actually publishing his book as he writes it on his blog. His book is called Making the News and in it, Gillmor describes how journalism is changing, “from its 20th Century mass-media style to something profoundly more grassroots and democratic.”
As he publishes each draft of this book, he's asking readers for their thoughts, anecdotes, and feedback — a kind of grassroots approach to writing a book. Blogs and their effect on journalism are a big part of this book.
Even for those journalists not blogging themselves, you need to find your way around the blogosphere to find new sources and new story ideas.
Find stuff on blogs:
- Technorati is where I usually start. Type in a search phrase, a get a pile of blogs that contain that term.
- A blogger named Ari Paparo has compiled a list of blog search sites.
Public relations people and corporate types are also — slowly, to be sure — getting used to the idea that blogs can be an excellent tool to foster the communication goals of a particular organization.
Public relations professional Tom Murphy says this:
Blogging is an opportunity for Public Relations, not a threat.
Blogging provides a unique means of providing your audience with the human face of your organization. Your customers can read the actual thoughts and opinions of your staff. On the flip side, consumers increasingly want to see the human side of your organization, beyond the corporate speak.
Tim Bray — Vancouverite, high-tech executive, and one of those responsible for creating XML — recently went to work for Sun Microsystems. He's encouraging Sun employees to blog about what they do. If you're a reporter covering an organization that is encouraging its employees to blog, it makes sense to know what the framework for those blogs are. What can they not say? Who approves what they say?
If you cover Microsoft, as I do, you must cover the blogs written by Microsofties. (Warning: There are more than 550 blogs written by Microsoft employees at this site and here's another list of Microsoft blogs.)