Fundamentals of Interactive Journalism

It’s amazing how small the world has become since the onset of the Internet, and especially Facebook. At any given time I have friends living or visiting in tens of different countries around the world, on every continent. If there’s an earthquake in Indonesia, I can immediately check if my friend in Jakarta has updated her Facebook status saying that she is okay. Or if there’s a huge snowstorm going on in Australia, I can check my Aussie friends’ statuses to see if they are making snow angels. And sometimes I like to take a little imaginary around-the-world trip just by looking at my friends’ Facebook statuses:

-Amy should have been leaving for Egypt today!

-Laurie is two hours away from vacation and a nice 18 hour drive to FL!

-Amit is getting ready to party in Beirut!

-Ange is packing for Strasbourg .

-Amanda will be going away for the weekend… Going to Hangzhou!

-Henna is home in Finland!

–Gemi is 宅居在家

-Katja is stoked about jetting of to London in only three days time, weehay!!

-Tepa is doing some AWESOME diving in Solomon Islands! And yeah.. LOVIN it! =)

-Laura is “Finland Finland here I come” sooooon…….

-Kathryn is waiting for a phone call from sunny Perth…

-Zara and 10 days to Cuba!

-Ed is wondering why he’s come to Madurai.

-Ross is enjoying Sweden.

-George: Last Weekend in Paris !!

-Jordan is ready to go to Florida for the weekend.

-Mark is enjoying a Bintang in Luanbajo, Flores.

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So where does your status take you?

I profess to be an old-fashioned girl. I don’t have a television, and I still write letters (real ones, with stamps). But I’ve embraced the internet to a ridiculously dependent degree. I look online to see if it’s raining rather than looking out the window, and google word definitions rather than reaching for the dictionary sitting right on my desk.

One of my favorite iGoogle boxes is the “How to of the Day,” a lovely little feature that tells me how to do three new things every day! Like how to make scones, or to fashion a homemade scale to weigh your mail for postage. Some of them are really silly, but I do click on them frequently. Even if I already know how to. And sometimes I even look stuff up.

But then one day a WikiHow entry popped up that made me feel simultaneously slimy and sad. I give you:

“How to Touch a Girl.”

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photo credit: Global Market Insite

     More than ever now, we have to concentrate on consumer journalism, says a recent article by CJR -because readers are consumers and reporters should hear them out as such, especially when they have the World Wide Web as their podium.

     A lot of stories seem more concerned with the businesses and sources they cover, perhaps even their advertisers, says Johnston, writer of “Attitude Adjustment.”

     “One of the most powerful and enduring raps on mainstream media is that it identifies too much with the people and institutions it covers and too little with the readers who pay good money for subscriptions. Readers (and listeners and viewers) expect and deserve information that serves their interests, information that ever larger legions of publicity agents are paid to direct reporters away from, and toward what the business or government agency prefers.”

     Johnston focuses on an idea that’s nothing new, but becoming more prominent as the field of journalism enters the digital age.  The internet, not as overtly concerned with advertising issues as the paper edition, include blogs, where citizen journalists, or consumers, pitch in and voice out their opinions and reactions.

     Because of the nature of the internet, news is spread more quickly to a wider audience- journalists of all types of tracks need to use this technology to their advantage.

     Johnston cites many examples, including Jeff Jarvis’s post back in 2005 about his experience with Dell service, and how that brought about sufficient reaction by other Dell consumers to the point where Dell did something about it!

     Though Jarvis was referring to the comp company here, it clearly resonates the lesson journalists need to learn:

     “One of the great lessons of the cluetrain era is that your customers are your best customer support agents and marketers if only you allow them … and respect them enough to listen to them.”