RJI news
Reynolds Journalism Institute announces 10th fellowship class
Eight fellowships have been awarded for the 2016-2017 academic year by the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute. The projects range from emerging technologies and watchdog journalism to community engagement and navigating new business models. This year’s RJI Fellowships were selected from 369 applicants worldwide. Each spring RJI leadership identifies journalists, technologists, entrepreneurs, business strategists and … Continued
RJI Fellow alumnus leads team launching new social debate application
Team members behind a newly launched social debate application didn’t believe people had an adequate place online to share opinions about the latest news events and gauge support for their views. This led Advance Digital’s incubator Alpha Group to create The Tylt, which lets people vote on news topics such as Apple’s refusal to unlock … Continued
Documentary class in session at RJI with Professor Spike Lee
A highlight of my RJI stay happened last week, 30 feet from my office. Spike Lee gave a master class to documentary and photojournalism students. He was in Columbia, Missouri, to premiere “2 Fists Up: We Gon Be Alright,” a new ESPN documentary on racial unrest at the University of Missouri that uses footage from the … Continued
Dodging the Memory Hole conference receives funding from Institute of Museum and Library Services
Dodging the Memory Hole 2016: Saving Online News was one of 20 initiatives to receive grant funding this week from the Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program. The forum is a part of an event series of the Journalism Digital News Archive at the University of Missouri and will promote the preservation of born-digital news content. The Laura Bush program is part of the … Continued
Can structured news reinvent archives and reimagine objectivity?
In earlier posts I have reviewed the long-term potential of structured journalism to make newsrooms economically sustainable, empower news consumers and future-proof journalism as a profession. However, journalism is not just another business. Its economic and market success is important not only to its shareholders, customers and employees, but also to society in general. Journalism, … Continued
Small paper, small city undergoing big changes in Virginia
For a century, the Culpeper Star-Exponent — whose predecessors date to 1881 — served a small community that changed relatively little. Today, the newspaper is dealing with rapid change in its central Virginia market. Since 1980, Culpeper County has more than doubled its population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, mostly with commuters to the … Continued
How to make online news ‘brain friendly’
Online news can work with or against the brain. When RJI Fellows Alex Remington of The Washington Post and media researcher Paul Bolls applied brain science principles to news design, readers’ comprehension, recall and engagement increased. We interviewed the researchers (audio below) to learn how to make articles “brain friendly.” It’s all about the “reading path,” says Remington. “Classify the … Continued
Screen size and age affect how smartphone owners get mobile news stories
2015 RJI Mobile Media Research Report 4 Owners of large-screen smartphones (phablets) are much more likely than owners of standard-size smartphones to frequently use multiple approaches to access news organization content on their smartphones, according to the latest Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute mobile media poll. The survey also found that smartphone owners between the … Continued
Unholy alliances, superheroes and the ‘drunken walk’
A not-so-subtle theme kept cropping up this week at the Collaboration Culture Symposium (#rjicollab) at the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute: a superhero theme. Speakers conjured up images of caped crusaders in search of new alliances to fight the evils that have befallen The Fourth Estate. Those evils have eroded and disposed of the neophyte … Continued
Serving Hispanic readers is a matter of trust
A recent issue of Nuevas Raices, the Harrisonburg, Virginia, weekly newspaper that serves Hispanic readers in the Old Dominion, had just one small coupon ad. “We don’t trust them,” explains owner Fernando Gamboa, who says his 14,000 readers worry the coupons, standard in U.S. papers, won’t be redeemed. His readers have grown up in countries … Continued