• Charlie Beckett, POLIS Director » Blog Archive » 4IP: What (or who) is Channel 4’s £50 million digital fund for?
  So I think that puts in a very good position to lead the way in creating a form of Networked Broadcasting along the lines of my idea of Networked Journalism.
• newsobserver.com | N&O subscriber sues the paper for cutting staff
  A News & Observer subscriber is suing the newspaper for cutting staff and the size of the paper.
  Keith Hempstead says the paper is now not worth what he signed up for.
  (tags: journalism newspapers)
• BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » Newsroom economics
  As most newsrooms shrink today, however, I often don’t see strategic planning that goes into the structure. Buyouts are offered; talented people leave (and I still say they should be offered a blog network); the rest move desks on the deck…
  (tags: business journalism newspapers)
• Just give up, Jarvis says (Lucas Grindley’s blog | Exploring the new way for journalism)
  stop thinking that you have to create your own special CMS or Flash platform or you name it. Use what’s there. Put your resources, talent, experience, value, brands, and communities to their best use
  (tags: innovation journalism newspapers)
• Global user-generated content portal Allvoices is now fully operational – editorsweblog
  Citizen media like text, images and video is blended with content from news outlets to offer an innovative integrated news resource.
  (tags: community crowdsourcing journalism)

My Google Reader is a mess:

My messy Google Reader inbox

Over 600 posts from Birmingham bloggers unread and goodness knows how many posts from journalism blogs.

So, taking inspiration from Stef Lewandowski’s email blitz, I have decided to attack my RSS feeds in a similar merciless style.

I want to hack back, which means being more selective about the blogs that I read on a daily basis.

So my plan at the moment is to keep three main areas of interest “Journalism”, “Birmingham” and “Technology”.

Within each category there will be two folders. One folder for the “must read” stuff to check daily, the other for me to check when I’ve got more time on my hands.

In the “must read” category I suspect I want no more than ten blogs per folder.

Journalism: Buzzmachine, Online Journalism Blog and Greenslade.

Technology: Mashable, Paid Content and TechCrunch.

Birmingham: Created in Birmingham…

… I find the Birmingham section difficult because it’s like getting rid of friends! I think I could take more blogs if they are from individuals that don’t update that regularly. Yet, I know I’m going to have to bite the bullet and streamline Google Reader, so any suggestions would be most gratefully received.

• Guardian Media Group Buys paidContent for $30 Million | Kara Swisher | BoomTown | AllThingsD
  Guardian Media Group is set to announce this morning that it will buy the company that runs the high-profile digital media news site paidContent for a price “north of $30 million.”
  (tags: business guardian)
• Readership Institute: Get Smart About Your Readers
  Readership among 18-24-year-olds in the general population continues to slowly decline; but the habit is fairly stable for 45-plus.
  (tags: journalism newspapers)

• Journalism.co.uk Editors’ Blog » Blog Archive » FT.com embeds video in news pages
  FT.com has started embedding video footage in its news story pages
  (tags: video,)
• How to Develop a Social Media Plan for Your Business in 5 Steps
  Social media can be an incredible tool for your business, providing you with more customer insight, direct communication channels and the ability to measure the effectiveness of these conversations very closely.
  (tags: social business)
• NxE’s Fifty Most Influential ‘Female’ Bloggers at Weekly Articles About Blogging – NxE
  As it is often the case with technology, blogging can seem like a boys’ club to many, but the average blogger is no longer (if they ever were) a geeky, twenty-something man from the US. Strong, interesting women are taking over the blogging world.
  (tags: blogging business technology bloggers)
• BuzzMachine – Google as the new pressroom
  Heck, an online paper isn’t much more than a complicated Blogger.com. If Google can provide free hosting to the “citizen journalists” who are making life difficult for the newspapers, Google should be able to host the newspapers for free as well.
  (tags: bloggers blogging google business)

This evening I had that very rare and precious of things: time on my hands. But, unfortunately, it appears that when given space to think I don’t always use it that wisely.

As I was pounding on the cross-trainer in the gym my mind definitely wandered.

Ignoring some of the more fundemental historical reasons for their being, it occurred to me that many newspaper names in this country might be accused of reinforcing the “we shout, you listen” mentality.

The Post, although I hope developing a reputation to the contrary, is a case in point.

Then there’s The Mail, The Mercury (the winged messenger of the Gods no less!), The Standard, The Telegraph… even The Guardian seems a little paternalistic.

So, I mused, in this brave new world of crowd-sourcing, participation and reader inclusion what should a news publicaton be called?

The Consult? The Listener?

The we-try-and-take-your-opinions-into-account-but sometimes-we-run-out-of-time-er?

I plumped for “The Collaborator”.

It did, however, occur to me that this didn’t sound very Web 2.0 in comparison to the many new social media applications springing up across the interwebs.

Perhaps it would be better to design a cute little mascot-cum-logo and give the publication a title such as “Storeez” or “Gnewz” (oddly gnewz.com goes to the campaign website of Douglas Geiss, Democratic candidate for State Representative Committee in Michigan).

• BBC – Today Sir Tim-Berners-Lee
  The pioneer of the world wide web is now looking ahead to a new and more sophisticated way of using the internet known as the semantic web. Sir Tim Berners-Lee explains.
  Story Tools
  (tags: internet)
• Construction Deaths – Topics – Las Vegas Sun
  Really nice demonstration of how pictures, video, maps and text can work well together without over-complexity. Does anyone know what this is powered by?
  (tags: mashup mapping multimedia, video,)
• The BBC annual report, in words | PDA: The Digital Content Blog | guardian.co.uk
  The BBC’s annual reports came out yesterday, in case you missed them. We reviewed the whole lot:
  (tags: bbc)

• Digital @ Leadership Network
  It appears I’m being used as part of an argument to encourage crowdsourced ministry.
  (tags: blogging church)
• “It’s worth fighting for” – Jessica DaSilva writes about the cuts at the Tampa Tribune
  This post, and the comments that it has produced, will be studied for many years to come. I think it epitomises the junction we find ourselves at in this industry and the issues which divide people.
  (tags: blogging future journalism newspapers)

• The 5 Best Ways to Track Your Comments on the Web
  Co.mments offers a very simple way to selectively track conversations on blogs
  (tags: social comments mashup)

• Analysis: Journalism (transcript)
  Here’s a simple enough question: what’s the point of the press? What are our newspapers for?
  (tags: newspapers journalism,)

• Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity | Video on TED.com
  (tags: development innovation creativity ted)