Category: Linkedin

May 1, 2014 media notes: The Atlantic eulogizes Twitter; LinkedIn as online newspaper; former editors on their papers

5/1/2014

For Thursday, May 1, 2014, some media stories of note:

The Atlantic has written a eulogy for Twitter. Adrienne Lafrance and Robinson Meyer believe the social media platform has entered its twilight. People are still signing on, but they're not using it as much. It's the treehouse club that never was, and people are moving on, they write.
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Over at LinkedIn, the developments involve a greater commitment to publishing. Quartz surmises the platform is moving from a social network to an online newspaper. Leo Mirani writes that LinkedIn wants users to read their feeds each morning, as they typically do at Facebook or Twitter.
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While we're on the topic of morphing, the former editors of The New York Times and Wall Street Journal (for that matter, Washington Post) talk about the direction of journalism and of their ex-organizations to Politico's Susan Glasser. In particular, former NYT executive editor Bill Keller says the Times is not going to become BuzzFeed.

March 21, 2014 media notes: Turkey blocks Twitter, Poynter debates value of page views, data journalism's challenges

3/21/2014

For Friday, March 21, 2014, here are some media stories of note:

Turkey has blocked Twitter. The prime minister promised to eradicate it, and soon after it could not be used by the country's 10 million Tweeps. This is the latest in a string of measures to suppress free expression in the country and focus on state-run media to inform citizens. Not surprisingly, there is a large effort to thwart the block, including the use of Google as a workaround.
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Poynter has a healthy debate under way between two of its writers on the value of page views as a metric for online news sites. Rick Edmonds has taken the view that the day has come to ditch the page view and measure other forms of engagement, but News Corp.'s Raju Narisetti argues on Poynter that page views remain important and not only as "vanity" metrics in the business model of journalism. It is a recommended discussion.
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This week's launch of FiveThirtyEight at ESPN has prompted several posts on the value and challenges of data journalism. The Columbia Journalism Review's Tanveer Ali argues it will not succeed without a narrative, without recognizing that numbers are a means to telling the story and not the story itself. Ben Thompson, meanwhile, looks on the stratechery blog at the decline of the newspaper and its incompatibility with the Internet's capacity to find what people want. Self-promotion: I posted this advice to the newspaper on LinkedIn overnight.

February 27, 2014 media notes: Al Jazeera day of protest, LinkedIn's publishing move, phone-hacking trial evidence

2/27/2014

For Thursday, February 27, 2014, here are some media stories of note:

Al Jazeera today deemed a global day of action to protest the trials of four of its journalists in Egypt accused of supporting the now-banned Muslim Brotherhood. The four have been held since December. Their arrests prompted an international outcry, so far to no avail.
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Adam Lashinsky, writing for Fortune, examines the move by LinkedIn to open its blogging platform (eventually) to all its members. He wonders if the company is becoming a publisher. LinkedIn prefers to see itself differently, with its publishing tool as a stronger connector within its network, a better driver of advertising revenue and recruitment information, and an inducement for more premium accounts. Lashinsky believes its next move may be to hire journalists.
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Three News Corp. reporters, a prison guard and a former police official have been charged in the U.K. probe into bribing public officials. Meantime, the phone-hacking trial has heard owner Rupert Murdoch wanted Rebekah Brooks as editor to make the Sun more fun and less about politics and that Brooks consented to payment to a public official for information when she believed there was an overwhelming public interest.

media notes 07.08.13

7/8/2013

Here are some media stories of note for Monday, July 8, 2013:

The newspaper, or at least its content and services in print or digital form, continues to be in demand among millennials. Recent research in the United States indicated 57 per cent of those under 30 are reading the print or digital work of a newspaper weekly. NetNewsCheck writes about the trust in the newspaper content, even though in many cases it is consumed through mobile or online platforms.

Eliza Kern, writing for paidContent, examines the approach LinkedIn takes to content (lots of it, designed to stimulate repeat consumption among a relatively small user base of 225 million) and how that yields important data that serves its other functions of career advertisements and premium membership fees.

Craig Silverman, writing for Poynter, looks at new research that helped identify with 97-per-cent certainty false images on Twitter. The research, in looking at the way fake content spreads and our susceptibility to it, identifies best practices for verification. It is expected there will soon by automated ways to determine authenticity of imagery.

media notes 05.09.13

5/9/2013

Some media stories of note for Thursday, May 9, 2013:

Poynter has two stories that examine the qualities of the reporting of the saving of three women from captivity in Cleveland earlier this week. Eric Deggans writes about some of the flaws of the early reporting of Charles Ramsay, whose interview following the rescue of the women made him an Internet sensation. Was it a case of jumping on a good story without adequate verification? Were there factors that made Ramsay a particularly attractive story? Then Kelly McBride writes about how to fairly cover the impending rape trial in which the three women have already been identified. "Their names are already central to the story, and that cannot be avoided," McBride writes. But there are several ways for media to minimize harm in the coverage by using clear language and reflexivity to avoid further victimization.

Mathew Ingram, writing for paidContent, explores the idea of the "open interview," in which the full discussion is made available publicly. He notes that many journalists don't provide a transcript or tape unless there is some challenge about the context of a quote or a question about its accuracy. Technology easily permits it now, Ingram writes. Even though there are drawbacks --- not all journalists know how to get to the point when asking a question, and some will appear less than authoritative in their interrogations --- Ingram concludes it's a valuable approach to build audience trust.

Ingram also has a look at LinkedIn's evolution as a platform as it ventures more and more into news provision. He notes the changes in LinkedIn Today's stream of business news with a series of content channels that open inside your profile. While Ingram doesn't accept that LinkedIn has become a media empire, he does note that it is finding a way to direct relevant content to a business-oriented audience.

media notes 28.02.13

2/28/2013

Some media stories of note for Thursday, February 28, 2013:

The discipline of verification isn't always disciplined. Craig Silverman, writing for Poynter, examines a Canadian study on media practices to confirm information and finds them inconsistent and a little improvised. The study (full disclosure: some authors are or have been colleagues) found that verification can't always be verified.

Last month The Atlantic ran into criticism for carrying sponsored content featuring information on the Church of Scientology. The episode prompted The Atlantic to take down the content, apologize, and create new standards to reflect those of the editorial work of the organization. Jeff John Roberts, writing for paidContent, discusses the lessons learned --- mainly that this sort of content is difficult to carry off with a news brand.

Lately there have been several pieces touting the value of LinkedIn as an emerging, even established player in the publishing space among social media. Evelyn Rusi of The Wall Street Journal takes a larger look at the impact of the professional network --- what it terms the ugly duckling of social media --- in specializing and commanding a high-end market.

Arketi: How business journalists use the Internet

8/4/2011

A new study of how U.S. business journalists use the Internet has some interesting implications for those who evaluate its impact on standards. It's clear that the journalistic use is primarily information-gathering.

The study for the Arketi Group asked business journalists (it isn't clear in the study how many) how they use the Internet. Not surprisingly, 98 per cent said they use it to read news, while 91 per cent use it for sources and ideas. Industry experts, interested parties and corporate websites are the most frequently used sources.

Slightly more than two-thirds (69%) use the Internet for social networking. Journalists are more likely to have Linkedin accounts (92%) than Facebook (85%) or Twitter (84%) accounts.

As for their own creating, a little more than half (53%) blog. Other top uses include consuming webinars, YouTube and Wikis, producing and listening to podcasts and social bookmarking.

WebWorkerDaily: Social media rules (there aren't any)

1/13/2010

A nice, common sense post from Meryl Evans on WebWorkerDaily identifies the rules of thumb for social media. In essence, there really aren't any.

Having said that, Evans approaches social media smartly and has some discipline about even the free forms of it. Among her rules:

1. Do it the same time daily.
2. Spread the Tweets.
3. Join the right Twitter chats.
4. Review Facebook daily.
5. Update Linkedin at least a few times weekly.
6. Write at least two blog entries weekly.
7. Read others' blogs.

Social media: Twitter babble and little advertising click-through

8/14/2009

Two studies this week chronicle practices in social media. One is an early indication of the challenge of commingling advertising in that conversational space, the other is about the seemingly innocuous traits of that conversation.

Linkshare has determined that only about one in 20 social media users interact with advertising. Banner ads are only clicked through by four per cent of users. That said, fewer than one in five consider advertising intrusive in that space. Still, only five per cent on Linkedin and nine per cent on Facebook felt they were useful.

Then there is a study from Pearanalytics that seems to play into the prevailing criticism of Twitter --- that it's a haven for mindless prattle. The report found little news on Twitter (3.6 per cent, in fact) and a lot of vents and blasts (40.5 per cent). There are plenty of conversations and a fair amount of promotion and spam in the mix.

(My own view is that, when you follow a good group, you get a good reading on Twitter's value. If you simply open up to everything, you don't get value for the experience. Twitter wasn't established as a news distributor, but as a conversational tool --- as a social medium, after all.)

Facebook, MySpace, Linkedin: Great, but not a business

3/21/2008

News organizations have been struggling to sort through the challenges of social networking and their applications to conventional media. Newsrooms I know use Facebook and MySpace for gathering content, and I belong to Linkedin and other social and professional networks for their excellent connective purposes.
The allure is the interactivity and functionality of sharing content and using generated content. But the downside is, well, no one's really making money on the model.
This week's Economist has a compelling take on how social networks may be a big part of the Internet, but not really a business model.