KMD Digital Journalism 2010

The positioning of the reporter is correct and must be kept.Ms. Buchanan has a special attention with the details like the New Journalism school of Wolfe, Capote and others. Regarding the readers,the people like to read on chocking crimes, scandals, things thus. I am enthusiastic of the new technologies and believe that new medias can enrich the covering of news. A example that is a brazilian magazine of science and technology called "Super Interesting" recently it published a game on as science helps to solve crimes. Seemed with CSI.The content was published in the site of the magazine, as complementary text the substance. Unhappyly it is in Portuguese, is a great example.
link to follow - http://super.abril.com.br/jogos/crime/index.shtml - it is an example of as to upgrade the work of the reporter using new technologies.
About verification of info, contacts and datas. I believe that the curiosity and the capital stock, as charisma and good talk is the differentials to have access to the betters contacts, datas and infos.something fortified with the social medias.

I think there are a couple of lessons in the story that people can take away. Edna was widely known in Miami as covering a certain beat, and she had a huge network of contacts.

Similarly, I think writers these days can benefit by making it widely known what beat they cover, and by building a similar network of contacts that will help funnel information their way. If you write about the sports scene in Sacramento, make sure that everyone knows it (make it clear on your website, Twitter page, and broadcast it in real life).

Contrary to what someone said earlier, I'd venture to say that cultivating contacts is much becoming easier. In addition to using the telephone as Edna did, we can use channels like email and twitter to reach out to sources. Add to that the fact that the internet/Google trumps the be-jeesis outta the phone book as a people directory, and I'd say that building and managing an 'Edna-like' network of contacts has never been easier.

One of the most striking aspects of the article for me was actually the discussion of Edna's writing style. Very few of the digital hard news resources I use actually find a balance between neutrality and wit in writing. The article points out her distrust of editors, but I wonder if the increase in personality-rich content in blogs and other online sources has helped to push the personality and wit out of official hard news journalism sources. The article actually made me nostalgic for for (largely) unbiased, smart, hard news.

While blogging and other digital expression channels have dramatically increased the voice of a great many amateur writers, I think the departure of places like the Sun, that hired writers with very little experience, but gave them a lot very quickly, may be missed as institutions to pass on cultures of unbias, ethics, and style. Of course, there have been huge number of unofficial journalism sources that have taken up this mantel, and are still putting out great, ethical, and smart journalism.

Regarding the part about Edna Buchanan not joining the TV station:

"One reason, she now says, is that she faced the fact that crime could never be covered on local television with the details and the subtleties possible in a newspaper story.”

This somehow suggests that there is a natural advantage of print journalism over video when it comes to details. But is that really true?

Regarding the natural advantage of written journalism, it will always be possible to add details from a video (e.g. an incident shot on an iPhone) to a story, whereas with video, once the moment is over, just about the best solution seems to be reconstructions.

Overall I think the article showed that the industry has in some ways changed (Are there still people afforded the time Edna was for research for a decent salary? Do the huge rooms of editors still exist?) but have to admit, I find sources the biggest challenge.

The best stories seem to be the ones you don't get to write - the gossip you hear on the side - and converting that into a story can take month, if you can do so at all. In a digital world, it seems a lot of stories are broken on short, concise blog posts, in chat rooms and on platforms such as Twitter.

With this in mind, another question that interests me is the short, high-impact sentences discussed in the article. With the huge volume of news and information we get today, I wonder whether these sentences are still a necessity, and even worry how many people read longer and more detailed features to the end (I got to the end of the piece on Edna, but I am not sure I feel I needed to in today's world.)

Take an organization such as Mashable: short snappy articles interpret PR, point out viral vids etc. and are complemented by analyses when the eds feel it necessary later on. All this happens with coverage sent out through social media. By the time you get an article in the paper by tech's version of Edna, people are somewhere else, reading the next thing that has not been written to her exceptionally high standards.

A final point, not so much on crime but on reporting overall, that I wonder about, is whether there are not now organizations away from what would be considered media in the traditional sense. Think Creative Commons and Pirate Bay on copyright, or Wikileaks on the right to freedom of speech. Edna seems to have a lot of competition when it comes to making a statement these days.

Regarding the natural advantage of written journalism, it will always be possible to add details from a video (e.g. an incident shot on an iPhone) to a story, whereas with video, once the moment is over, just about the best solution seems to be reconstructions.

Overall I think the article showed that the industry has in some ways changed (Are there still people afforded the time Edna was for research for a decent salary? Do the huge rooms of editors still exist?) but have to admit, I find sources the biggest challenge.

The best stories seem to be the ones you don't get to write - the gossip you hear on the side - and converting that into a story can take month, if you can do so at all. In a digital world, it seems a lot of stories are broken on short, concise blog posts, in chat rooms and on platforms such as Twitter.

With this in mind, another question that interests me is the short, high-impact sentences discussed in the article. With the huge volume of news and information we get today, I wonder whether these sentences are still a necessity, and even worry how many people read longer and more detailed features to the end (I got to the end of the piece on Edna, but I am not sure I feel I needed to in today's world.)

Take an organization such as Mashable: short snappy articles interpret PR, point out viral vids etc. and are complemented by analyses when the eds feel it necessary later on. All this happens with coverage sent out through social media. By the time you get an article in the paper by tech's version of Edna, people are somewhere else, reading the next thing that has not been written to her exceptionally high standards.

A final point, not so much on crime but on reporting overall, that I wonder about, is whether there are not now organizations away from what would be considered media in the traditional sense. Think Creative Commons and Pirate Bay on copyright, or Wikileaks on the right to freedom of speech. Edna seems to have a lot of competition when it comes to making a statement these days.

Hey Guys and girls,

I’ve just finished reading the article. To be honest, it’s been a long time that I did not read an article as long as this one. As a tech engineer and a start up leader, I’m used to reading short and specific articles may be because of the tremendous growth and broadening in technology. Reading a lot of short articles enabled me to stay updated in many fields and have an overview of what’s happening.

At the same time, I enjoyed reading the article because I remembered my old days when I was in primary and early secondary school (just before immersing into Maths, physics and later computing). I was reading a lot and also had a passion for writing (including poetry).

I think that what happened to me happened to a lot of people and the article showed this evidence. I think if Edna is still reporting nowadays, she would not make a lot of phone calls neither ask a lot of questions and may be would accept the TV offer.

I believe the environment affects the individual and so technology affected journalism. Now, it’s for the journalist to know how to best use technology in order to offer good content and thus attracts readership and make them loyal.
To this point, I agree with Gilmar as he said: “A documentary on tv or a transmedia storytelling in the internet can it can be so good and rich in details like the newspaper. This depends on the devotion, persistence and creativity of the journalist. The wealth of a covering is independent of the media.”

I agree with many of the comments already mentioned, particularly the idea that many of our most readily available and consumed news sources are fast and concise microblogs rather than traditional in-depth articles.

However, I think these shorter pieces serve as a springboard for more exhaustive individual research on the part of the reader. Because of the massive amount of information available to us nowadays, it has become harder to distinguish what information we want to or should know. Shorter news pieces make it easier to absorb a larger range of data and then decide what stories we actually want more details for. For example, I may skim through many concise local news articles about Tokyo and find one that mentions the banker-like earning power of the top hostesses in Japan (NYTimes). Because this article may include a particularly fascinating detail about hostess lifestyles, I may find myself suddenly embarking on exhaustive research to find every last detail about hostess culture to satisfy my personal curiosity. Just like Edna was drawn in by seemingly frivolous details that differentiated the crimes she wrote about, I often find myself seeking out the unique details that create vivid stories, regardless of how long it takes to read or find.

While this exhaustive research and vivid individual stories could be written up by a team of professional journalists and crafted into longer, more complex narratives in a traditional news medium, I find that because there are more resources available to regular people, readers are more motivated to dig for every facet of a story through their own channels, discovering new and potentially unrelated topics which could lead to new ideas, new leads. As opposed to letting the journalists decide what we should know more about, we can build our own news experience.

As a sidenote about journalistic writing style, I do believe that many of the writing devices that Edna used have evolved to take on new literary characteristics (though this of course depends on the reader's background). For example, from a American youth's perspective, the Miller Chop is likely to sound more appropriate in the narration for a television crime re-dramatization or a highly-stylized screenplay than an actual serious news piece.

What I like the most is that the article creates a bigger picture of Miami in those times. All those criminals and drugs and murders... it gives me goosebumps. I find it amazing how Edna came across all those information in the time of pen-and-paper. This has obviously changed in the times of social media, but others have already mentioned that and how. The author did a good job with a right mixture of humor and details on Edna's personality.

The way on how to cover the cops is a good example of how our craving for information has changed in the recent years. If I compare the reporting she did, focusing on all the little personal details, like what movie the victim watched before it was murdered, the difference today is that we want fast facts and especially medical facts in a CSI-manner. We don't care about what the victim's dog's name was but how many times the victim was stabbed and in what places its skull was fractured. We became more indifferent to personal stories and can only be shocked by the cruel facts.

I tried to find Edna's blog if she has one, but I couldn't. It's probably against her old fashioned principles to have one. I'd really like to ask her what she thinks about that.

Edna Buchanan's style of reporting is investigative and well rounded and multifaceted. Modern day blogger's research one specific theme and then usually write a bunch of different articles related to that subject. Today's journalism is so much more collaborative, and with this strong element intercommunication, it therefore arms modern day citizen journalists have the ability to tell the stories we did not get to hear about in the past, raising awareness on a local level than ever before. The advent of the web and social media recently has opened up new channels and opportunities for everyone to have a voice.

Readers of today, would have a hard time reading old style journalism because as a society our cultural attention span has changed. Now we live on a landscape with a sea of cell phones, i phones, i pads, nooks, and so forth. People want their news in a sound bite type of fashion, or 140 characters like we find on twitter. I call this "Main Idea Journalism" - In fact my project is going to be based on this concept. Would love to hear from all of you.

Racheal O. Mack

Wow! It has been forever since I read an article that long. It was great and I am glad I did. I felt it was very well written and was able to pull life into it that is relatable. Edna is real to me. I feel the article was as much about reporting and writing today as it was Edna and the author did a great job combining the two. Journalism has changed so much but the fundamentals are still there. Having something of import and interest to say and saying it. How we say it and where are what has changed in a way that more people can say what they want.

I enjoyed being able to connect to Edna and knowing that my biggest hurdle is just doing it. For her it is a way of life and just does it. I need to just write. Just start somewhere and create a bank of my wealth of knowledge and make it known. There is so much I want to say that getting started is a little daunting.

Edna, jumped in with both feet and went for it all the way with persistance and dedication. Thanks Edan for your example and thanks Calvin for sharing it with the world.