Work must flow
We’ve had some fun, so far, diving into multimedia and
online journalism.
But it hasn’t been easy.
We’ve spent hours of our own time learning the basics of audio and video
to try to deepen our work. Now it’s time to put all of this to good use and
just make it a part of our jobs. It’s
time to stop talking and start etching these new skills into our everyday
lives.
You’d think our new cutting edge skills would be reason to
celebrate.
Not always.
“We’ve got a paper to put out.”
“Quit playing with the new toys.”
“Don’t put that story online this afternoon. People won’t have anything to read in the
paper tomorrow morning.”
Those required to make on-line a part of their jobs can’t be
expected to simply add it to their current workload. The new tasks must become a respected part of a reporter’s or
photographer’s workday.
Creating and maintaining news blogs is as difficult as
writing a column. An audio slide show
is as challenging as writing a story.
Video? More so.
We need to figure out how to write the story, edit the
audio, video, and get it all on-line.
It can be done. Think on-line
first. Write shorter stories. Use extra
information in multimedia. Stories that
don’t fully bloom, put as quick hits on a blog. Use blog items as briefs for print.
Reporters need time to make the couple of extra calls needed
to covert an on-line item into a short story.
Editors need to have multimedia skills.
But it has to become a part of the job.
This isn’t extra
stuff. It’s the stuff.