Bootcamp Offers Multimedia Advice, Resources
Although the journalism industry is going through unprecedented and painful changes due to the migration of readership to the Internet, the profession will survive, and the skills that journalists use every day - finding and evaluating sources and information, analyzing trends, writing quickly and with high quality, developing subject area expertise - will continue to be in demand.
Reporters trying to determine how to adapt to the new environment first and foremost need to be confident. At least one speaker in nearly every session had the same advice for Bootcamp attendees: Don't be afraid.
"It's just another phase of journalism," said Joann Allen, a Reuters reporter who presented in the session Building Your Own Brand. "If you think of it that way, you'll be fine."
Allen decided to go back to school to develop skills she will need as journalism increasingly is delivered online. She earned a master's degree in new media from American University this year.
"I'm really excited," Allen said. "I'm doing things now that I wasn't doing 22 months ago." She now regularly carries around her digital camera to shoot images that she uploads to the Web. She also edits audio and video.
Meredith Hooker, managing editor for Internet at Gazette, said that persistence in seeking ways to develop Web skills will pay off, even in a large newsroom.
"If you ask, people will let you do all sorts of things," said Hooker, who was a co-presenter with Allen.
Hooker approaches her work as if she's a multimedia specialist because that's what she aspires to be. She wants to break out of the traditional reporter category. She advised attendees to create a digital media job in their organizations that doesn't exist now.
Both Hooker and Allen recommended www.lynda.com as a good site to visit to survey and practice various software packages. They also encouraged participants to put links to their stories out on Twitter to build their audiences. They stressed that no one should be intimidated by Tweeting.
Hooker also encouraged participants to develop their online skills by establishing a blog on Wordpress. She called it "a place to play."
In his session, Get Online: Building the Best Web Presence and Clip Portfolio, Mark Young, online editor at the State Department and a former web journalist, recommended Wordpress.com and Weebly.com as some of the best sites to establish a homepage and/or blog. Each is free and easy to use.
He advised participants to build their site on Wordpress through "pages" rather than "posts." The latter works best for updating your blog; the former is better for creating pages on which to post your clips. Young demonstrated how to add links to stories and video on each site.
On Wordpress, you can enhance your site through "widgets." Weebly is a bit more user friendly because you build your site by dragging and dropping features into place. On Weebly, you can choose a subdomain of the site or register a new domain for yourself through the site.