NPR and the Digital Media Association, which represents online audio and video companies are asking a federal appeals court to postpone a royalty rate hike expected to take effect on July 15th. The U.S. Copyright Royalty Board had been prepared to raise rates on May 15th, but delayed implementation due to pretty much universal opposition. […]
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Relocating a Journalist
A little over a week ago my wife and I packed up and moved from Princeton, NJ to Brooklyn NY. It wasn’t a long journey, but sometimes it feels like we moved a world away. The first year we lived in Princeton I continued to work full time at WHYY in Philadelphia. Even after I […]
Traditional Media (or public radio) weighs in on email interviews a month later
NPR’s On The Media weighed in this week on the whole “I only do interviews over email” think that spread like wildfire through the blogosphere last month. (Can anything spread through the blogosphere like wildfire? Isn’t a decentralized network kind of resistant to that?) Anyway, a quick refresher. Weblogs Inc founder Jason Calacanis and several […]
Citizen Media Law Project launches
As the line between bloggers and journalists continues to get thinner and thinner, one thing is clear. Citizen journalists/bloggers tend to practice their craft without the backing of major media corporations that can support them in libel lawsuits or other legal matters. The Citizen Media Law Project is a new partnership between Harvard Law School’s […]
The future of newspapers (and newsprint)
Andy Kessler offers his two cents on the future of newspapers in today’s Wall Street Journal. Somewhat ironically, Kessler argues that traditional newspapers aren’t going away anytime soon because newsprint is easier to read than web pages, but then he posts the entire article on his blog (which is nice if you don’t happen to […]
Michael Nutter will (probably) be the next mayor of Philadelphia
I spent much of the last four of five years covering Philadelphia government. I got to know mayor John Street pretty well, and I got to know members of the city council too. For about three years I attended most of Council’s regular Thursday meetings, and I sat just a few feet away from Michael […]
Offshoring journalism
The editor of PasadenaNow, a local news and information website has decided to expand the site’s news coverage by hiring two reporters. Right now the site is basically populated with press releases and event listings, so this is good news, right? But the thing is, PasadenaNow has a small budget, so the site can’t really […]
High fives all around
Well, as the week draws to a close, you’ll probably see fewer top 5 lists floating around the blogosphere. ProBlogger’s group writing project has drawn to a close. As of yesterday, nearly 600 bloggers had written top five posts on something. Here are a few interesting/funny/snarky posts I found in yesterday’s crop of 222 entries: […]
Philadelphia Mayor’s race update
Wow, I just realized I really stink at self-promotion sometimes. I filed a piece for National Public Radio on the Philadelphia mayor’s race the other day. And while I mentioned this story on the blog while I was working on it, it completely slipped my mind that I’d meant to post an update when the […]
How to write for the web
Lost Remote’s Cory Bergman has written up a great manual on writing for the web. While the document is designed for TV news producers, there are some useful tips for anyone looking to tell better stories on the web, be they news stories or personal narratives. The basic premise is that it’s not good enough […]
Can journalists multitask?
Andy Dickinson suggests that there’s a belief out there that journalists can’t multi-task. There seems to be a lot of resistance from print reporters asked to do podcasts, take pictures, produce video, or write a blog. Same goes for radio producers, camera operators, and photographers. But as more and more people are going online to […]
PC World shakeup part 2
Last week PC World editor Harry McCracken tendered his resignation after the magazine’s new CEO told him to kill a story titled “10 Things We Hate About Apple.” What a difference a week makes. Today, McCracken has his job back and that CEO has been demoted to VP of online strategy. The whole story involves […]
One day lists will rule the world
So the other day I wrote up a list of 5 gadgets for podcast and radio producers on a budget. This was part of a “group writing project,” where hundreds of bloggers are writing top 5 lists. The contest/project has been hugely popular, partly because there’s a chance to win $1001 dollars, and partly because […]
5 gadgets for producing radio (or podcasts) on the cheap
Darren Rowse has given me a good excuse to write a post I’ve been meaning to get around to for months. He’s asking bloggers to write up “Top 5” posts as part of a group writing project. So I’m going to write that how to set up a home studio on the cheap post I’ve […]