With all this talk about journalists embracing digital media, I’d start having a look at where – up to this point – technology hadn’t much impacted on what I was being told about journalism. By finding this, and by exploiting it with new digital ideas, I might find a good way to make a name for myself.

So… what would I choose if I was a reporter now?

Well, I think it would be the contact book. We are all told when we’re starting out that one of the most important thing for a journalist to do is build up their contact book. Nowadays, we’re also told about building up our social media profile too.

But, whilst it’s immensely useful having a lot of interesting people following you on Twitter, the most effective thing about a contact book is that you can contact the right people directly when you need them.

So, if I were a smart journalist trying to build up my contacts, I’d first read up on the basics of the Data Protection Act.

Then I’d start trying to understand how to use a database. I’d develop a way for both me and other people to add to it. If I’ve had a great conversation or got information from someone on social media, I’d politely ask if they give me their email address so we could stay in touch. I’d also ask them if I could drop them a line every so often to let them know what I’m working on.

I’d try and add fields of key words that would mean I could search for relevant people later (even if I’ve forgotten their names).

I’d also figure out how I create email lists out of this database, so when I need to I can contact a range of people who may know something about a topic I’m writing about.

I’d realise this whole process was an utter pain in the arse but, in the long term, what i’m doing is establishing long-term direct contact with potential sources. It would also give me something that a lot of journalists don’t have and brands will potentially pay a lot of money for: a large, direct-contact database. That’s something that could give me the competitive edge in tracking down the right person for my story in the future. It could, done right, also give me one of the most organised, useful contact books in the industry.

Which has to be useful… right?

Every so often though, someone utters a nugget that chimes so clearly with me that it lodges in my brain and becomes part of the structure of my own arguments and thoughts on the topic.

I realised today that two examples of these are from Rupert Murdoch.

They are:

“I can’t tell you how many papers I have visited where they have a wall of journalism prizes – and a rapidly declining circulation. This tells me the editors are producing news for themselves – instead of news that is relevant to their customers. A news organization’s most important asset is the trust it has with its readers – a bond that reflects the readers’ confidence that editors are looking out for their needs and interests.”

— Rupert Murdoch Before the Federal Trade Commission’s Workshop: ”From Town Crier to Bloggers: How Will Journalism Survive the Internet Age?” [PDF]
December 1, 2009

and

“What I worry about much more is our ability to make the necessary cultural changes to meet the new demands. As I said earlier, what is required is a complete transformation of the way we think about our product. Unfortunately, however, I believe too many of us editors and reporters are out of touch with our readers. Too often, the question we ask is “Do we have the story? rather than “Does anyone want the story?”

— Speech by Rupert Murdoch to the American Society of Newspaper Editors
April 13, 2005

It was built by Peter MacRobert from News International‘s R&D Lab. Peter explains a bit more about how it works in the video below:

“The subscription ringer is an Arduino circuit developed in the News International R&D lab. The battery-powered circuit polls an API regularly via a Wifly wireless shield. When the daily subscription count has increased it pulses a solenoid against a bicycle bell.”