I attended Day 1 (Web Reporting) of The Toronto Star-sponsored Web Multimedia Workshops conducted by Robb Montgomery, the globe-trotting CEO of Visual Editors who recognized me from my avatar and greeted me in the lobby where I was asking for directions. Shortly after that, I had the pleasure of finally meeting Roger Gillespie, The Star’s Senior editor for Training & Development. Previously, I’d only been in contact with him by email and phone.
By my rough count, there were seventy-five people at the sold-out event which was conducted in The Star’s third-floor auditorium. More tables and power bars had to be fetched to accommodate the overflow.
The audience consisted of reporters who indicated that they were working full-time at dailies, freelance journalists and several high-school, college and university-level journalism educators. Some people came from as far away as Hamilton, Burlington and St. Catherines. And at least one person drove in from Ottawa.
I had my twitter feed up and going, and used the #CampVJ for my tweets as I covered the presentation on several of my accounts (TariAkpodiete, SoloJourno, VJproject and GBCjournos). Much of the material covered was familiar to me already since I use and teach these methods and techniques, but what I found most interesting was the reactions of some of my fellow attendees.
There’s a stereotype that journalists - especially Western ones involved in print - are a bit behind the times when it comes to technology. Sure they use computers now, and have email, and of course, mobile phones, but many are resistant to taking it to the next level. They’re rumoured to take their time adopting anything new. I definitely detected some skepticism and bafflement when a number of concepts such as twitter and delicious were introduced. Still, there was a lively curiosity too. Those expressing a bit of cynicism seemed to be concerned about the quality of information from such sources as twitter as well as the value of using such tools.
During the break, I had a number of discussions with several of my fellow workshop goers. I mentioned that some time ago, I too had been of the opinion that twitter was a time-waster, but once I’d gotten into it, I’d realized its potential power and value in my work. Just because some people on twitter like to discuss what they had for lunch, that fact that their child pooped, and that their dog is scratching its unmentionables, doesn’t negate the value of the service. At least one 20-something full-timer continued to express some disdain and wasn’t able to see how twitter had any value beyond that of a distracting nuisance.
All the same, change is coming - including how news is gathered and disseminated - and newspapers, excuse me, news organizations realize that. Or rather their management does. It’s survival of the fittest, and if these companies don’t adapt, they’ll die. As these changes are integrated from the top down, employees will be along for the ride, whether they want to be or not. Depending on their schools, newer journalists will come well-equipped to deal with the new news process, while those currently employed will have to adapt. Whether they want to, or not.
Tomorrow’s topic is Visual Reporting covering “Low-cost visual multimedia tools and techniques. Learn how to create embeddable slideshows, clickable graphics, interactive maps, and quickly visualize data for Web audiences.”
photo credit: thru the night.
