By Susan Older
Founder, Displaced Journalists & Real World Media

A former colleague from UPI posted a comment on my Real World Media blog yesterday jokingly lamenting the fact that it took him a year to respond to my commentary of March 14, 2010, regarding sloppy copy.

I responded that the issue is still relevant. As we all know, it seems to be getting worse. I can honestly say that it’s rare to find a story on the website of a major publication, one I once respected, that is free of grammatical or spelling errors.

As we all know, readers who see errors in spelling and grammar are likely to wonder whether there are also errors in reporting, quotes, and in the substance of the story.

There is another comment on the same blog post, also from a former colleague, a guy I worked with back at USA Today.

The original commentary, “The World Needs a Good Editor,” appeared on my Real World Media blog and here on Displaced Journalists.

Both comments are from journalists I respect. They both hit the nail on the head.

I think there are far too few seasoned editors in newsrooms these days; they’ve all been laid off, bought out, fired or otherwise cast adrift.

This leaves a few exceedingly busy seasoned reporters (if you’re lucky) to show young journalists the ropes, to mentor them, to teach them why perfection is not optional, to help them resolve ethical dilemmas, to teach them how to file an FOI request and why you would want to, and to help them learn to craft their stories well, keeping the readers’ needs in mind.

Gone are the pros, the journalists who’ve been around, the ones who held us accountable when we still had a lot to learn.

Remember how much passion there was in newsrooms in the old days? People cared, so much so that they were willing to fight over matters of principle.

Remember the gut-wrenching sound of a pica pole whacked on your desk just inches from your quivering hand? That’s what learning from the newsroom culture feels like.

Remember when you woke up in a cold sweat at 4 a.m. because your brain finally got around to telling you that you made a huge, embarrassing error on Page 1? That’s what learning from your own mistakes feels like.

These were the checks and balances that made our profession so great. I know plenty of young people are going to J-school these days, so there must be something about the profession that draws new recruits. I don’t mean to knock these students or recent graduates, either. I think it’s fantastic that people want to be journalists, and I think the new grads are just as smart as we were. I just don’t believe there are enough dyed-in-the-wool pros left in newsrooms to teach them well.

If you are a displaced journalist, you have probably been replaced – usually by someone who has less experience and is willing to work for far less money than you earned. However, too many of these replacements lack the education, the on-the-job training and the mentoring we received. I realize I’m generalizing, but I think this is largely accurate.

I think we all feel that it’s especially painful to see stories riddled with errors on the websites of The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, USA Today, etc.

The really sad thing is that many of us love our profession so much that we would probably work for the same wages younger journalists make if it meant a once-trusted publication could turn out perfect copy again. Isn’t it odd that they won’t hire us?

I know why our cover letters and resumes get deleted without a response. Those at the top of news organizations see us as trouble. We know too much. We have opinions and we’re not afraid to express them. We might cause trouble. We might want to take their jobs or incite discontent. We might shake things up. They can’t have that, now, can they? Working in the newsroom of a financial site for just a year in the past decade taught me that.

For the most part, I like the new era. I love the Internet and I love digital media. I think with some proper guidance, it will all shake out to be good – different, but good – much the same as we once progressed from radio to television.

Standing up for what you know to be right? That era is largely gone, along with the insistence on perfection. That was our era. This is a new one.

That’s why I started Displaced Journalists. That’s why I seek funding to create an innovative news operation bearing my existing company name, Real World Media. It would need to embody all the old fervor, fair compensation and high standards, while working as a digital operation on a digital platform. I do believe it can be done.

But back to my point: Errors sap trust. Hire some copy editors.

Nobody wants to read sloppy copy.

By Aaron Crowe
Tales of an Underemployed Dad

I’m taking meetings for the next two weeks as I try to decide if my career choice to be a journalist is a dying profession or a thriving one. I think it’s a thriving one where storytellers are still needed.

Aaron Crowe

Instead of going door to door, applying for jobs online or seeking out businesses to hire me, I’m turning the tables and offering my services for the next two weeks so I can be an exclusive writer/editor for companies that need such work. I’m calling it “Rent a Journalist.”

As a freelance journalist since being laid off at a newspaper about three years ago, I’ve spent a lot of my time chasing down job leads, applying for jobs, and doing everything I can to get the next freelance assignment. I’ve had steady work for most of that time, writing personal finance stories for WalletPop. But that’s going to change soon.

The AOL site is being absorbed into another website as part of the Huffington Post acquisition by AOL. I work on a monthly contract and have been told to reapply for my job as a fulltime writer, which I’ve done, but I’m unsure if I’ll be hired fulltime. Since the company has offices in New York and Los Angeles, and I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, I don’t know if they’ll hire me fulltime to work from home, as many writers/editors at WalletPop do.

If we come to an agreement, great. If not, this is part of my backup plan, which I’m trying out for the next two weeks as I offer my writing and editing services, among other things, such as social media liaison, to businesses. I’m pitching my services to existing or past clients, abut I’m also approaching websites I’d like to work for, the ones who I think would like my work.

This is my pitch:

Instead of wondering if I’ll be available to write for your website or publication in the future, you can lock me in with an offer now to work for you. I’ve covered personal finance for WalletPop for a little more than two years, and have some of the highest-trafficked posts on the website. I can do the same for you.

I’m open to long-term contracts or month-to-month; but what I’m mainly looking for is steady work and a commitment. It can be exclusive on a subject — family finances, for example — but that will take a longer commitment, such as daily blog posts. Or it can be a weekly column on something like personal finance and the food industry, that will still be a long-term contract but will only be for writing once a week.

The advantages to your company in signing me now? You get my time and work before anyone else does, guaranteeing you a steady stream of quality work that will be unique to your publication. As a journalist I’m trained in general assignment stories, and can provide original reporting and writing on any topics you need. Again, I’ve specialized in personal finance writing for the past few years, so I can write for your site on those issues, or expand to tech, families, food, retail, education, health, and many others. For example, I currently write for Dealnews.com about the psychology of shopping each week, so I wouldn’t be available to write about that topic for other sites.

I have other services I can provide, including helping with social media campaigns, writing publicity and press releases, covering corporate events, and photography.

Don’t let this opportunity pass. Rent a journalist — this journalist — before it’s too late.

WASHINGTON (March 8, 2011) — The Fund for Investigative Journalism (FIJ) is seeking grant proposals for independent investigative projects from journalists who need support for travel and other reporting expenses.

The deadline for proposals is 5 p.m. EDT, April 11.

FIJ is particularly interested in proposals from reporters investigating issues in the United States, involving governmental accountability, the environment, and local or regional issues with national implications. Applications from ethnic media are strongly encouraged.

These grants are made possible through generous funding from the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, the Park Foundation, the Green Park Foundation, the Gannett Foundation, and the public.

For more than forty years, the Fund for Investigative Journalism has supported work by independent and freelance reporters who do not have the resources to do their investigations. Grants average $5,000. The awards support the costs of reporting, such as travel and document production expenses, but do not cover salaries or writing fees.

FIJ accepts applications through its website, www.fij.org. Questions about the application process should be directed to executive director Sandy Bergo, fundfij@gmail.com.

In partnership with Investigative Reporters and Editors, the FIJ also matches grant recipients with veteran journalists who serve as mentors, at the recipient’s request.

The Fund depends on donations from foundations and individuals. Donations can be made online or by mail to The Fund for Investigative Journalism, 1331 H Street NW – Suite 701, Washington DC 20005.

For more information contact:

Sandy Bergo

202-391-0206

fundfij@gmail.com

CUNY’s Jeremy Caplan chats with media entrepreneur Elizabeth Spiers – Feb. 8, 2011. Spiers is the newly appointed editor-in-chief of The New York Observer. Caplan is director of education for the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism at CUNY. He is also a Ford Fellow in Entrepreneurial Journalism at the Poynter Institute. Video from CUNY Grad School of Journalism on Vimeo.

By Alan D. Mutter
Reflections of a Newsosaur
Monday, Jan. 31 2011

The Daily, which is set to launch this week, could be a captivating hit, a spectacular miss or something in between. But one thing is sure:

Rupert Murdoch, the last swashbuckling publisher of our time, will shake up the media world on Wednesday when he introduces the first iPad-only news product, which is expected to be sold in subscriptions costing 99 cents a week.

While it is too early to tell how well The Daily will do, here are the key factors that will determine its fate:

Why it could succeed

• No baggage. As an all-new product built specifically for the iPad, The Daily can take advantage of the full multimedia and interactive capabilities of this exciting new platform. Thus, The Daily can avoid the common mistake among the legacy print and broadcast media of trying to replicate their existing products on the iPad, instead of creating something refreshingly new.

• Wealth of content. As the pet project du jour of Mr. Murdoch, The Daily is likely to be able to pull from the global, cross-media content resources of News Corp. This includes not only such varied publications as the Wall Street Journal, The Times of London and the New York Post but presumably also the rich media and reporting produced by Fox Cable News and the Fox Television Network, which has outlets in almost every market in the United States.Powerful promotion. The unsurpassed reach of News Corp.’s diversified media properties means The Daily will have millions of free (or deeply discounted) marketing impressions every hour of every day, around the world and around the clock.

• Deep pockets. With $33 billion in sales and $5.7 billion in operating profit, News Corp. is well positioned to subsidize The Daily for as long as Mr. Murdoch cares to pursue the project.

How it could fail

• It’s not free. While publishers from the Augusta Chronicle to the New York Times increasingly are moving in the direction of charging for the news they digitally delivered for free for 1½ decades, any number of alternative news sources are likely to eschew charging for content for as far as the eye can see. The business models of ventures like Huffington Post and Patch.Com call for them to generate as many page views as they can to build their ad inventories. HuffPo, among many others, specializes in summarizing stories originating at other sites. When The Daily publishes worthwhile stories, it’s likely that HuffPo will want to crib from it, too. And they’ll be free.

• Embedded competition. Widely presumed to be a general-interest national news product, The Daily will compete with well-established…. To read more of this post, click here.

Alan D. Mutter is perhaps the only CEO in Silicon Valley who knows how to set type one letter at a time. Mutter began his career as a newspaper columnist and editor at the Chicago Daily News and later rose to City Editor of the Chicago Sun-Times. In 1984, he became No. 2 editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. He left the newspaper business in 1988 to join InterMedia Partners, a start-up that became one of the largest cable-TV companies in the U.S. Mutter was the COO of InterMedia when he moved to Silicon Valley in 1996 to join the first of the three start-up companies he led as CEO. The companies he headed were a pioneering Internet service provider and two enterprise-software companies. Mutter now is a consultant specializing in corporate initiatives and new media ventures involving journalism and technology. He ordinarily does not write about clients or subjects that will affect their interests. In the rare event he does, this will be fully disclosed. Mutter also is on the adjunct faculty of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley. To see his entire profile, click here.

By Brenna Ehrlich, Mashable

Remember how we were all freaking out on New Year’s Eve, 1999, convinced that the world as we know it would end — at the hands of machines, of course? Well, we weathered that storm and then some. Still, as we shamble forward into the next decade, it might be prudent to take pause and take stock of the years behind us. Translation: Back up your stuff.

Think of it as stockpiling food and building a fallout shelter for the 21st century. We have a ton of information, photos and memories scattered around the web that we would be loathe to lose, and while it’s unlikely that the entire Internet is going to come crashing down in the next week or so, it still might be wise to put some of that stuff in an iron box for safe keeping.

Read more here (on Mashable.com) to find out how to back up your Facebook traffic and photos, your Twitter activity, your Blog, your WordPress blog and your Flickr photos.

Way back when — in April, 2009 — I called Writers Lifeguard No. 16, “Mantrae for Our Times.”

Jules Older

It had but four markers of change:

• Screen is the new Paper
• Short is the new Deep
• Pictures are the new Words
• Free is the new Pay

Now, more than a year further into our climb — or plunge — from Gutenberg Era into the Digital Age, I’m ready to add six more

• Canon is the new Nikon (which was once the new Leica)
• Apps are the new Websites
• YouTube is the new Home Movie
• Video is the new Still Photography
• Twitter is the new Pac-Man [Can you guess why?]
• Blogs are the new Poetry. [This time I’ll tell you why. Both are written by many, read by few.]

And so the world turns.

If you have other new mantrae (mantrae being the plural of mantra) to add, shoot ‘em my way. And tell me — are we climbing into sunshine or plunging into darkness?

Jules

– 30 –

Jules Older (amazingly, no relation to Susan Older) is a freelance travel writer, the author of children’s books, the creator of the iPhone app San Francisco Restaurants, a speaker, a broadcaster and a consultant. Learn more about Jules here. To become a Lifeguard, just drop Jules a line at jules@julesolder.com, saying, “I’m a writer. Sign me up!”

Travelwritten is a how-to site and blog for travel writers who want to become writer-publishers on the Web. Author Durant Imboden has been co-owner, publisher and editor of Europe for Visitors for nine years. He was with MSN, About.com, and other online companies from 1995 until 2001.

Durant Imboden

By Durant Imboden, Europe for Visitors

The Timeses, they are a-changin’. And not only the Timeses: The Chronicles, Tribunes, Presses, Heralds, and Travel Holidays are changing or disappearing, too.

Fact is, the classic freelance model of “I submit article, editor sends money” is becoming less sustainable in today’s publishing environment. Traditional print markets are shrinking, and for a variety of reasons (some legitimate), online markets typically pay less for articles than magazines and Sunday newspapers do or did.

Similarly, guidebook publishers are struggling to preserve their traditional print franchises while searching for new revenues online – and when publishers feel pinched, writers get squeezed.

Bad news for freelancers? Of course. But there’s an upside, too: As long ago as 2004, the U.S. Travel Association reported that two-thirds of all American travelers were online, with some 63.8 million U.S. travelers using the Internet to plan trips. A recent article on the European Travel Commission’s NewMedia TrendWatch site stated:

“Most people begin the holiday research process by searching for destination guides (typically through Google). Often, these in-depth guides either don’t exist, or consumers don’t realise that they exist, on major travel booking sites. By not offering this extra level of information, travel sites risk people leaving and finding this information elsewhere.”

That’s where we, as professional travel writers, come in: We can be that “elsewhere” by leveraging our expertise to create best-of-breed travel-planning sites about specific destinations or travel experiences. Because we’re travel journalists, as opposed to travel marketers or publicists, we can approach our topic whether it’s New York, Newcastle, or New Age karma camps – from a traveler’s perspective.

Just as important, the Web makes it possible for any writer (or at least any writer with editorial and publishing skills) to profit from being a writer and a publisher. On the Web, production costs are minimal, distribution is free, and monthly operating costs– a.k.a. Web hosting – can be less than you’d pay for dinner for two at a chain restaurant.

What’s more, if you focus on “evergreen” travel-planning content, your backlist of existing content will earn money day after day, week after week, year after year with occasional updating – and each new page will be an additional source of revenue (unlike freelance assignments, which typically replace the one-time fees that you earned last week, last month, or the month before).

Caveats:

There are no guarantees of success. Just because you’ve written for newspapers or magazines doesn’t mean you’re ready to be an editor and publisher. There’s also more competition than there was 15 years ago when I created my first travel site, or nearly 10 years ago when my wife and I launched our current family of sites at Europeforvisitors.com.

Even if you do succeed, you won’t get rich overnight. Depending on how much time you can invest, it may take two years or longer to build a site that generates significant income. Web publishing – like book authorship – is more like running a marathon than sprinting: It’s an occupation for writers who have patience, stamina, and long attention spans.

On the brighter side:

The publishing landscape isn’t static–in print or on the Web. Whenever the owner of an existing site dies, retires, sells out to a competitor, or loses interest in updating the site’s content, there’s an opportunity for a new Web publisher to step in and attract an audience.

As the Timeses and Tribunes change, are you ready to change? If so, you could find yourself earning more money and enjoying more editorial freedom than you ever did as a freelancer. Or your efforts could fail miserably – just as an effort to write and sell a book or break into new freelance markets could be a flop.

In my experience, the rewards of self-publishing a travel-planning site outweigh the risks, but–to internationalize a popular expression–your mileage or km/L may vary.

– 30 –

By Michael Gauger

For nearly 20 years, I was a newspaper copy editor in Milwaukee, where I was born and grew up. But in the last few years, the Journal Sentinel had been cutting its staff through buyouts. In the summer of ’09, a round of buyouts didn’t yield enough cuts for the company, and in August I was laid off, among dozens in the newsroom who lost their jobs.

One year later, I’m happy to report, I have landed in a rewarding position: grant officer/writer for the Columbia St. Mary’s Foundation, which cultivates philanthropic support for the healthcare system serving the Milwaukee area.  When I told this to Susan Older, whose Displaced Journalists online community shines light in a gloomy time for journalism and employment, she urged me to write about it, to show out-of-work journalists that we should and could survive, even in a wretched economy. So I’m writing this for Susan, for my friend and fellow writer Julie Weber, who writes a blog that I recommend  (Tales from an Unemployed Interior Designer ) – and for you.

I knew that I could do the job with the foundation. And I wanted to do the job, as I would be writing applications for grants to support programs such as free health clinics for the poor. I would be telling important stories about a vital resource, and how it could be brought to people who lacked access to it. Like journalism, the foundation would call on my communications skills to comfort the afflicted. For me, it was the right opportunity at the right time.

Yes, before making that case and getting the job, I needed to hear numerous résumé critiques and make revisions, to do lots of networking and to profit from luck. Most important, however, was that I could talk about significant transferable skills from journalism: writing, editing, research, working on my own and as a member of a team to meet deadlines. (That set complemented one from my background as a scholar in American history and political science.)

Earlier, I had put those skills to work for scholars who had me edit their grant applications. More recently, I used the tools in volunteer work for two nonprofit groups. I sought out the work after getting excellent advice from a grant officer who was kind enough to give me an informational interview. Build a track record, he said. So I did some cold-calling, got a lead from a networking contact, consulted websites listing volunteer opportunities, and found Make a Difference – Wisconsin and Daystar Inc. The former recruits and trains volunteer instructors who present seminars on basic financial literacy (how to handle credit, make a budget and manage a checking account, for example) to teenagers. The latter operates a long-term shelter for women who are recovering from domestic violence. My work for these groups was very gratifying because it enhanced my credentials and references, showed initiative, gave me a chance to do some good work, and allowed me to add nonprofit experience on my résumé.

In the meantime, I was taking courses at Milwaukee Area Technical College for a certificate in information design and publishing: introduction to digital media, website development, Photoshop and InDesign. The coursework was a step toward another important credential (I need just two more classes to finish): It showed employers that I wasn’t standing still during unemployment, and it let me meet instructors and students who gave me job leads, contacts and valuable advice.

All these things put me in a good position to get the job that I’m fortunate, grateful and proud to have. I’m glad to tell this story, and share some advice that I hope will be helpful, even if it isn’t new to you:

• Get out there and network, network, network. And network on the Web, especially on LinkedIn. If you’re not on LinkedIn, get busy and get connected.
• Get some retraining. Go to school or seek resources on the Web that will add to your knowledge.
• Do volunteer work. You will feel better for it, you will help someone with your skills, and you will make good networking contacts.
• Seek out informational interviews with people who work in jobs or at companies in which you’re interested. They can give you valuable information and lead to job contacts.
• Identify transferable skills and promote them. Journalists: Remember that grant writing requires the type of skills that you have honed for years. So does RFP (request for proposal) writing. Think of how you can communicate important messages, for your own cause and for others you make your own.
• When you see a need for your skills, offer to fill it. You’ve seen many business brochures, PowerPoint presentations and promotional and informational literature filled with typos, grammatical errors and infelicities. So fix them. Look at it as a chance to make freelance money, or to do pro bono work that will make you feel good and gain networking contacts.
• Even though opportunities aren’t abundant in this economy, do not – do not – give up easily. Find a place for yourself. Make a place for yourself.

– 30 –

Michael Gauger blogs here. His LinkedIn profile is here.  On Twitter he is @mtgauger.

By Alan D. Mutter

Posted Monday, June 7, 2010, on Reflections of a Newsosaur

Fed up with furloughs and down-sizing – or forced involuntarily out of their jobs – journalists across the land are taking matters into their own hands by starting their own news sites.

While I applaud these brave and commendable efforts, I fear a good many journalistic entrepreneurs are doomed to fail because they are not objectively confronting the steep odds they face – or putting nearly enough thought and effort into giving themselves a fighting chance to succeed.

After talking to one enterprising journalist after another, I have found almost uniformly that they are making the mistake that has proven to be the downfall of many an entrepreneur: Instead of trying to build a business, they are trying to give themselves the job they always wanted.

The passion for the product they are creating causes entrepreneurs to work so hard on their journalism that it distracts them from the real job of building an enterprise that not only sustains itself for the good of the community but also provides a sustainable lifestyle for the journalist himself.

In an effort to calibrate the daunting, come-from-behind challenge faced by virtually every journalism start-up, I decided to compare…. Read more at Mutter’s blog Reflections of a Newsoaur.

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ALAN MUTTER
Alan D. Mutter is perhaps the only CEO in Silicon Valley who knows how to set type one letter at a time, just like his hero, Benjamin Franklin. Mutter began his career as a newspaper columnist and editor in Chicago, starting at the Chicago Daily News and later rising to City Editor of the Chicago Sun-Times. In 1984, he became the No. 2 editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. He left the newspaper business in 1988 to join InterMedia Partners, a start-up company that became one of the largest cable-TV companies in the U.S. Mutter was the COO of InterMedia when he moved to Silicon Valley in 1996 to lead the first of the three start-up companies he led as CEO. The companies he headed were a pioneering Internet service provider and two enterprise-software companies. Mutter now is a consultant specializing in corporate initiatives and new media ventures that combine his twin passions, journalism and technology. He also is on the adjunct faculty of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California- Berkeley, where he teaches a class entitled “Journalism in an Age of Disruption.”