Yahoo has survived with its technology

This video is from the Yahoo YouTube Channel. I find it relevant to this post because Yahoo gives hackers the chance to talk about what they're learning and possibly offer something to the company. Innovative? I think so.

Chapter 9 in Newsonomics starts with a very interesting fact: Yahoo is still going strong. Okay, I dumbed it down a little. A lot. There are huge statistics in there which I don't want to misspeak about, so I won't bother to guess, but basically, Yahoo is still strong. I consider this a pretty big feat considering we're in the digital age and Yahoo is not what everyone is talking about anymore. Sure, it seems like everyone has a yahoo email account, but compared with gmail, is it much more?

Then the Newsonomics chapter goes on to say that Yahoo survives because of its technology, not its ad-base. If my head didn't hurt before, it does now. And then, the author dares to say that 90 percent of the work in a company (again, I could be misquoting and this is not my intention -- fact check if you must!) should be carried by the technology and then the other 10 percent by the people. I dumbed down his idea a lot again, but the mere fact is that this author is sayingtechnology is what helps a company survive today. Is that not a little mind blowing? After being in several journalism classes, I was ready to believe it was advertising.

As much as I'm surprised, I'm also kind of not. Because Yahoo is trying to be innovative and one-step ahead, or at least in stride, with everyone else.

Does my project satisfy a news-need?

After feeling out my project, conducting light interviews about it, and talking to class members, my professor conducted a brief Q&A for members of the class to fill out. My professor's questions are listed as the Q's and my general thoughts are the A's. 

Question: I have read your idea and I would like to understand a little more about it. What need does this idea fill? Is this a need that you have yourself? Who would share this need?

Answer: This idea fills the need for reaching a broader audience and getting the news out to more people. As we've experienced in the digital age, journalism accompanied with photos, videos, and hyperlinks has huge success in the online community as well as in print (though hyperlinks make no sense in that context...nor do videos, for that matter). But people like to be engaged. Comic strips have always been the way to engage the biggest audience of any newspaper or magazine, at least I always thought. Of course this fills my own need, as well, because I desire to see the news in a way that interests me. I love comic books and I never have the chance to read them. I also love the news, but I hate reading it. I remember I used to read Newsweek magazine. My favorite part of that magazine were the two political cartoons wedged in the middle pages. Did I understand what I was reading? No, not always, not even half the time when I was younger. But I got more information, more understanding of how little I understood, out of those political cartoons than I ever did in the rest of its pages. 

Q: At this point you should have some idea of who the average user of your product will be. What is the profile of that person?

A: I imagine the majority of my readers would be high-school aged students all the way to the middle aged. But as you can see in my interview with my grandmother, even she would be engaged with my graphic stories. 

Q: Who wants this product that you intend to develop?

A: The people who want this product are the people who are interested in experiencing the worldly news in a new way. They are the people who use multiple senses to get immersed in stories and really retain its messages. More generally, the people who want this product are the people who want to be entertained, engaged, and immersed while they're going through the daily news.

Q: What problem or need are you satisfying for your customers? (Remember, the customers aren't necessarily the people who will be using your product. For example, television audiences aren't customers unless they pay for the product, as in HBO. The customers are advertisers.)

A: I'm satisfying the need for something new and for something engaging for anyone who subscribes to me. For advertisers, I'm presenting a new form of news that has the potential to grab a lot of interest. I imagine that a lot of readers would be engaged with the page, at first anyways, and if people are looking at the page, it's an opportunity for ads to be seen by a lot of people. 

Q: Who wants this product?

A: I think there's a general hunger for seeing the news differently (hence why Stephen Colbert and some other news-comedics are so popular). So I would say a lot of people who want a new experience, though I can't be sure right now.

Q: We all have to live. Where is the money in this product?

A: The money would come from both advertisers and subscribers. Hopefully.

Q: You are a journalist. Where is the journalism in this product?

A: The journalism is in the details of the graphics. A journalist has to pay attention to the surrounding details to make the graphics work, and then fact check with whoever is drawing the graphics. The journalism is also in the captions, descriptions, and dialogue within the graphic news, detailing carefully what information must be written and what information must be drawn.

Q: We've read that passion is key to success of a new venture. Money alone will not sustain it. So where is the passion in your product?

A: I'm just as hungry for this product as my interviewees seemed to be. Not only that, but I love comics. If I can make my news look like a comic book (except not quite), I'm going to go ape. 

The consensus on presenting the news in graphics

The goal of the week was to ask three people what they thought of my project idea.

Interview 1:
I presented the idea first and foremost to Steve. Steve is an electrical engineer major at my school. He loves reading textbooks and informational brochures, he loves to look at maps, and anything with pictures and diagrams.

This is the sort of diagram that Steve looks at on a daily basis. Courtesy photo.

The news in graphics

My idea for my semester project is to present news stories in the same format as a graphic novel.

Basically, I want to present certain news stories in the format of a comic book, where the story is told through captions, dialogue, and well-drawn pictures with details. The stories will vary in length. The iconic, recurring figure will be a made-up reporter who goes into the scenes and has dialogue with the people involved. As Eli suggested in class, I could have one news story a week that can be drawn in this graphic format, and at the end of a year, I could publish an anthology of all the graphic news stories.

Chapter 11 in "Newsenomics"

Reading Newsonomics is both refreshing and sad. The beginning of chapter 11 discusses ways that journalism teachers are trying to prepare students for the outside world.

A possible project about endangered species

When I started my entrepreneurial journalism class, I was told I would have to do a project at some point in the semester.

As of right now, I still don't know my parameters or what I want to do.

This is kind of what my brain looks like.

So anyway, I was contemplating all the things that I really have a passion for. I love wolves. There are many reasons why I love wolves so much, but how to turn that passion into a project is the question I am after!

I think I could maybe do research and compile a list of endangered species and then track one for a year at a time (obviously this is hypothetical). Then I would move onto another endangered species and write about them for a year, gathering information about how they hunt, what they eat. The goal would not be to stalk these animals, but to collect data that's already been gathered and compile it into easy-to-read articles that are both informative and important.

I know it would be somewhat successful because there is at least one human that adores one type of every animal out there, right?

Maybe it's a romantic thought. I don't know. 

But I think it would be a cool project. Or just talk to wolf-specialists and find out what has been going on in the different wolf-populations across the world. I know there is a place in Massachusetts called Wolf Hollow. I went there once. They fed the wolves cheese. It was cute. 

Or maybe I could research different zoos and find out what they do to try to help endangered animals. Or I could compile a list of extinct species that no one really talks about anymore and gather the true information about why they went extinct. Doesn't anyone still care about the sad mammoth?

The disconnect and the out-of-date

If there's one thing I've noticed about journalism lately, it is the general disconnect there can be between institutions.

What do I mean by that?

Well, here's an example. I was doing a story about the revamped transit system on the UNH campus. When I clicked on the UNH Mobile application on my smartphone, there is a news section. Available under the news module are three news sources.

Under the 'news' module on the UNH Mobile app.

Entrepreneur Spotlight: Karen Larson

Karen Larson is the owner of The Candy Bar in downtown Durham, N.H. She hasn't had the business too long, but already she has a strong customer base. The store is filled with old and new music tracks, like songs from the Earth, Wind, and Fire CD as well as Backstreet Boys. Bright colors decorate the walls. The small space holds high-end chocolates, organic items, gluten free options, and cheaper candies for children, as well as old-time favorites. In the middle of our interview, Karen was dipping bacon into chocolate and making candy-apples. Customers kept coming in, and she gave each one her undivided attention.

The Candy Bar's logo.

Michele's Culinary Creations

My best friend's mom has started several personal businesses. She was reluctant to interview because none of her businesses have lasted very long (she's a stay at home mom with four children). I've seen her in action, though, and the woman knows what it takes to get a business going.

I emailed her, called her twice, and emailed her again. After a busy weekend, she was able to email me back (the phone was dead).

So, rather than try to sum up her story, I will transcribe her email below because her explanation is impeccable.

My News "Hobbits" Are Changing

Thanks to the Boston Globe app, the NPR app, and the Flipboard app, I am staying current with my news. My news habits (I referred to Hobbits in my title because it sounds like an accented version of habits, and I'm also in the middle of reading LOTR) have changed a bit since the start of the school year.

I still find myself lacking when it comes to certain news happenings that other people are talking about, and I'm Little Red Riding Hood lost in the woods. But for the bigger stories, I am trying to stay current. The smartphone is a great way to not get lost in boredom. It's my means of being productive even drenched in a downpour of un-productivity. 

So if I am waiting somewhere for an interview, or trying to pass the time while I'm not doing my homework, I click open an app. I typically use Flipboard for entertainment news. I love knowing about what's going on in the film industry, though I can't say I always love the articles they have.

Before I got my Boston Globe subscription back, I used NPR as my main source of news. I like the writing style in NPR typically, but I discussed NPR with a colleague over the summer and he said he didn't like the way NPR is so subtle about their bias. 

It got me thinking, hey, is NPR subtle about their bias, or is this guy a fruit loop? 

It turns out, they're subtle. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is kind of deceptive. I like knowing the FoxNews is almost too-conservative in the way it presents things, rather than believing an article is fair and factual and actually has some twists in it that could eventually turn into something ugly. 

I do find myself getting a lot of my news in a surprising place, though. 

Facebook. 

Who knew? I unsubscribed to a lot of my acquaintances' posts. Then I followed different news organizations, like: 

So between LA Times, NY Times, Boston Globe, and NPR, I get a lot of headlines just on my news feed. And I like it that way because I'm on Facebook anyways, I might as well read some of the stuff they post. They post breaking and interest stories. And then when I scroll down, I get to see some meme a friend posted, and the balance is quite perfect between news and entertainment.

Ways Journalism Is Changing

The Lede is one of the ways journalism is changing. You look over there and it's a blog, but it's a NY Times blog.

Each article is a condensed news story. It has hyperlinks, video, pictures, and other forms of multimedia to tell you everything you need to know about a story.

It's evidence of the way journalism is changing. Someone has figured out that you can't just take a newspaper and stick it online in it's full form. There are an infinite number of things someone can click on and leave the page before they've read the story.

That's a lot of time and hard work that goes ignored.

So The Lede (as well as other websites) condenses the information. I think the key here is that the success of online news relies on its interactive capablities. 

What do I mean by that?

                                                        I mean that when a user gets 

to click around and go deeper with a story

the way they want to...it keeps them interested.

How many people would go through Facebook everyday if they had limited access to how they could interact with it? Would they continue to scroll for hours if they knew that they couldn't like pictures, post things themselves, or share?

I think not. 

The Presidents

Okay, I think I finally conjured something cool for journalism. Will it save journalism? Maybe not. It's definitely in line with my first idea, which was to hyper focus on a topic, get really good at talking about it, and then present it clearly to those who do not understand.

So my idea NOW...

Is a rip-off of Homicide Watch! I know, I'm terrible, but hear me out.

I read about Obama's decisions on Syria today. It's all over the media, how could I not? So then I was thinking, what would it be like to ask retired Presidents what they would do in those situations?

Well, at least this guy agrees. 

So you down with an old President, and you ask, so what do you think about Obama's decision? What would you have done in your presidential term if this mess came on your time? And then, as INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISTS, we would compare any similar decisions the President made during his term to the statements he made about the current situation and see if it could actually be plausible that he would make different decisions if he were in Obama's shoes. 

I know, you're a little blown away by my genius right now. 

It's okay. 

Ahem. Back to business.

Haven't you ever wondered how the other presidents did it? I can't tell you how many times I've wondered about how this economy could be fixed, and I think back to Clinton's presidency. As a democrat, he fixed parts of our economy that haven't been right since he left office. And George W. Bush, a supposed republican, spent more than any democratic president in history! (At least this is what I remember from my history class. Please don't quote me on this.)

I'm sure journalists have covered stuff like this before, so maybe this is not as earth-shattering as I wish it would be. But imagine if this was an entire beat.

I'm terrible with history, but even I would love to sit down with men who make it and ask them about what they wish they did or what they'd do now. 

Two rando-ideas to save journalism?

In class, we were asked to write about 10 ways to save the journalism industry -- because it obviously needs some innovators, educators, and entrepreneurs to get thinkin' on that. Though I'm sure there's already some headway in there somewhere.

So I don't have 10 brilliant ideas, or even one, that could make a difference in journalism.

But I do have... (drum roll anyone? No? Okay.) TWO IDEAS!

That's a start, right?

So each town knows itself well. Each section of each town knows the general happenings. Small towns -- heck, everyone knows everyone in those -- know what's going on. So what if certain sections of towns each reported on a specific niche or beat, if you will?

There would be crime reporters in the local police stations. 

There would be sports reporters hanging out with soccer moms and MLB players.

There would be reporters hanging out in offices and areas of each thing a town cares about. The town could even vote on where the reporters should go, and then hire specific reporters to go out and get active, rather than sit in a newsroom to plan out interviews, phone calls, events....

And THEN the beat reporters could compile their works in a office or something (where editors would be, etc) and throw together a publication with specific stories about the things people care about!!! 

Ground-breaking? No, obviously it sounds just like what people do now, right? (...So then what is this chick talkin' about?)

I mean to say that beat reporters stick to and with their beats. They have extensive knowledge on the history of the area they are in and their beat is more like their passion than their job. 

Okay, maybe it sounds totally dumb.

But then what about considering the news organization to be a non-profit? I'm sure that's been thought of, too. But if ads don't want to pay for their business to be seen and people don't want to pay for news, how do journalists make money? 

I'm just trying to fit every one's needs, here. 

Could it work? Maybe. I'm not out in the "real world" yet. I don't fully understand non-profits or businesses. But at least I've got two ideas down on this blog and it's one step closer to class credit and maybe saving the world! 

lololololololol.

Readership declined in the 40s!?

"Most people assume that technologies like the Internet and cable television caused the decline in newspaper readership, but the percentage of American's reading newspapers actually began to drop in the late 1940s" (Entrepreneurial Journalism: How to Build What's Next for News). 

I can't believe that! I'm so conditioned to all the nay-sayers telling me that newspapers are the best way to get the news and that people have always loved the newspapers. I guess I'm just really surprised. I wonder what older generations would think about that statement. 

But then why would newspaper circulation continue if people started to lose interest in the late 1940s?

"Still, newspaper circulation continued to rise simply because the U.S. population was growing so fast" (Entrepreneurial).

I am so glad I picked this book up! Do I believe everything that the book is telling me? Not necessarily. But what if it is true?

If newspapers have been in decline from the late 1940s, why? In the 1940s, news was very relevant. If people were no longer as interested in newspapers, how did they get their news? What was it about newspapers that was no longer so interesting to them?

And if newspapers are in the decline now, what is the average readership? Has the readership gone up or down in the last century? I think it would be interesting to tie the average readership to the population. Is the population decreasing now that people are being more conscious of abortions and contraception, and if so, is news consumption going down?

I personally don't think it is the end of the world that print journalism (and print books, for that matter) are going away. I can't help but wonder about what will happen if everything turns digital. Will the country be lost to dictatorship or communism and everything we see will be controlled? Will it be more easy for us to be manipulated?

Yes, I love the feeling of holding a book and not burning my eyes out from looking at a screen all day. But if people want digital news, what's the best way, as a journalist, that I can give it to them? 

The reasons why news companies lost so much business

Reading a book called Entrepreneurial Journalism: How to Build What's Next for News. So far, it is teaching me a lot.

I would like to use this particular blog post for my reaction to why revenues declined.

"Revenues declined because traditional media companies jealously guarded their cash cows instead of pushing new lines of business." 

So it wasn't because hard news seems to be in decline, but rather because no one planned for the empire to fall. It actually seems kind of odd that we could go from hand delivering news and letters via a pony to Gutenberg's printing press. And then there. The roadmap kind of stops there when it comes to news when you think about it. We improved the printing press and increased the ad revenue, but has much else really changed?

Oh yeah, we got some color ink. 

But really, the pioneers in the journalism world got as far as printing the news!? My questions is why haven't we come up with something bigger, better, and more geared to what audiences want? Why haven't we already been-there-done-that with digital? 

That's where the revenue declined. Selfishness got in the way. It's kind of amazing.

Just think -- if someone had said, "Guys, this won't last forever. We've been at the top of the mountain for too long. We've gotta have a plan B and C. Where next?" The transition from old to new wouldn't be so drastic or fast.

Rick Edmonds with Poynter said:

"There was an assumption that there would be an orderly transition from the old world to the new." 

Of course, I guess it's easier to look back and say, "Wow, you guys messed up," rather than move forward and take responsibility now. Maybe that was plan B. 

Journalism through twitter

So for my digital journalism class, we are learning the importance of that endless stream of conscience from everyone everywhere at all times.

Why, yes, you did guess it! I am so relieved. Indeed, in my digital journalism class, we are learning the importance of Twitter.

The reason I am posting about it in my entrepreneurial journalism class blog is because I've learned valuable information so far about the way journalism looks on twitter. It's no surprise that journalists use twitter, anyways, is it? It's a good way to get emotion and reaction from people.

And what I've learned from a few articles I've read about it is that it's a good way to give emotion and reaction.

One thing Mallary Jean Tenore highlights in the Poynter article is that people don't want to just see headlines on twitter all the time. They want to see people behind the blue bird. That means real people with real emotions.

Also, in another article (I don't think it is the one linked above), an author recommends that after a journalist writes a story, they should email it to their sources and ask them to tweet it -- and that way, more people see the story.

I am surprised to find that many journalists (at least Tenore believes this) don't use twitter. Do reporters really think it is a waste of time? If anything, you can follow your hobbies on twitter and keep up to date on those. I love to follow C.S. Lewis quotes. That's just me, though.

Some things never change

A reporter is a reporter is a reporter. Today I think I had four or five mini-interviews. About a half hour each, right? 

Each one was so unique. That's the gift of being a journalist. I encounter anything and everything. 

For three of my interviews this week, I had to go back to the same office. Because a bunch of organizations are crammed into one room. I encountered the older student trying to spread her wings and get her feet off the UNH campus. I encountered the girl with pretty yellow-brown eyes that I embarrassingly got a little lost in. I encountered the shoeless president of the sustainability club. 

Pretty much felt like this all day. 

Then the world of Facebook complicates everything, right? It makes dating more awkward, it means you are frenemies for life no matter what you do, and for some reason, no one gets tired of cat memes. 

Well, Facebook complicates journalism, too. Because I sent an email to this organization, and then I got a friend request from some guy and then the guy messaged me on Facebook and told me about all these events I should cover because I write for the newspaper and because sustainability and no shoes and beards and mountains!

So anyways, I go to the local coffee shop to meet with him at three. I look at his Facebook photos because I think that's a good idea when you've never met someone. Then this kid in a green shirt with a tractor on it comes and forces himself into the table next to mine with his laptop. But he looks nothing like any pictures I've seen. He clearly looks intent on whatever he is doing. 

Okay, maybe not that intense. Ahem.

And then I had a sidekick with me (a person, not a mobile device of sorts) who suggested we leave and we talked rather not-quietly about leaving because my interviewee didn't show up. So we walk out into the hot sun and cross the busy road when I get a Facebook message. 

"I'm outside whenever you stroll by!" (This is not a direct quote.)

I almost keep walking, but my moral is just too high for slacker syndrome. So I turn around and green-shirt-tractor kid is walking towards me! My roommate verbalizes the twitter handle for all things awkwardness, and I can barely contain my laughter. 

And the rest of the interview is good, so really, some things never change in journalism, it's just the way we approach them. 

My Idealist View

I think the thing that bugs me most about journalism right now is that it's like a sales team. Journalism is having its ups and downs with consumers, and journalism-people are doing everything they can to make sure it stays afloat.

Counting viewers. Looking for advertisers. Putting up flashy headlines. Scandalous pictures. Yeah, it's always been a mix of this stuff, but has it always been so...obvious?

It's like everyday life has come down to trying to sell a car.

Memes aside -- journalism is about getting viewers to view the news, the recent stuff. Maybe I'm a purist, but I think journalism should be more focused on the important day-to-day. So Miley shook her patootie and Billy Ray cried. Miley is still the one with the spotlight on her when there are more IMPOTANT THINGS GOIN AWN. 

That's a victory face right there.

I guess you could say I'm worried about journalism. But I'm not worried about tabloid-journalism. No, unfortunately it looks like that will never go away. I'm worried about what happens when real reporters start reporting stories that will bring in a lot of attention because of numbers. 

Because the journalists and the editors and the websites want page-views, not a well-educated society. 

You know why I think people have been tuning out the news? You know why I think I've been tuning out the news? It's too hard to tell a fart from a photon these days. 

How can we know what's really important? I think there is more responsibility that falls onto the newsroom than just printing out stories and collecting loyalty. A journalist is the mediator between the questionable events of the world and what the public knows about it. 

Right? 

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think journalists should redefine what makes a story newsworthy. They should put out the everyday experiences of everyday people. And there should still be emphasis on the worldly news, as well as national, and local.

 Yeah, maybe there should be a small segment on Miley's patootie in an article that explains the various happenings at the VMA's. Does her indecent behavior really deserve a bigger spotlight with a full article? Or even a full headline? She's a means to get people to click on a website. Is she not?

So can we get back to what matters in life? Like what's going on with churches, and the environment, and veganism, and ammunition, and gun control, and diseases, and why trains are so cool? 

Come on. Wicked cool, right? How did they even make it look like that!?

What does news look like on the interwebs?

News on the internet, for me at least, looks similar to the way it does on the paper.

There are so many headlines, so many pictures, things ready to jump out of the screen at me. But like the paper, I can ignore what does not relate to me, I can shy from the things that make me uncomfortable, and I can come and go as I please.

I would say there are significant differences, though.

For one, if I buy a newspaper or other form of print journalism, I have paid for each article. On the other hand, if I go to a website and scroll around, but only click on a few articles, what sort of service am I doing for the journalism online?

The waters start to get murky online. I can't tell who or what I'm supporting. I don't know if I'm clicking on ads or articles! I don't know if I'm just another number on their page views or if they actually care to put out news.

Maybe it's because I'm an adult now and I have to pay attention to the news, or maybe it's because it really has changed -- I don't know. But I do know that online news is a constant stream. As one of my professors put it, it's like a river. Twitter, for instance.

It just never shuts up. 

But if you read the paper in the morning when you're drinking coffee or on your way to work, maybe even in the bathroom, you flip through the pages you want, get the news you need, and put it away. There can't be any popups, any additions -- the rest has to wait until tomorrow. The important stuff makes it and the other stuff falls away. 

Have you noticed lately that it seems like everything is BREAKING news?

Or CLICK ME CLICK ME CLICK ME, I'M IMPORTANT TOO!

 Even when it's not? Even when it's about squirrels on Jet-skis? 

No? ...Me neither...