Media stories of note for Friday, April 19, 2013:

Ryan Chittum, writing for the Columbia Journalism Review, casts his eyes on the way digital media was able to report on the overnight manhunt for two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings and the killing Thursday night of a police officer of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Through social media and many advanced techniques of international investigation, many organizations were able to amass stories rich in detail in short order. Here, for instance, is the New York Times account only hours after the manhunt resulted in one suspect dead and the other at-large.

Ken Doctor, writing for the Nieman Journalism Lab, looks at the connection between investment in journalism and awards. He examines the economics (or newsonomics, a term he coined some time ago) of editorial and how newsrooms that have retained their spending have fared better with industry recognition. Mainly, though, his column is a call for a stronger examination of whether certain metrics are bound to confer good business practices for the craft.

Fujitsu has developed technology that turns paper (or any surface, for that matter) into a touchscreen-like property. The advancement, reported by DigInfoTV, permits the seamless transfer of data between the virtual and real world. "Using this technology, information can be imported from a document as data, by selecting the necessary parts with your finger," it reports. A video explaining the technology is here.

 
 
In its annual forecast, The Economist suggests worldwide advertising spending will rebound in the year ahead in most countries --- North America excepted. Even the presence of the 2010 Winter Olympics and the U.S. mid-term elections won't reverse the 2009 declines.

As for online growth, the forecast suggests harnessing social media will be key because conventional online display won't drive growth.

A possible key: The growth in social gaming and advertising placement in it.
 

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