Web Journalist Blog

So, I’ve started doing The Scientific 7-minute Workout that was written about in the NYTimes recently.

Maybe I was doing it wrong, but keeping the exercises, times and cycles seemed a little more challenging than it needed to be.

So, using their graphic/chart, I converted it into a timed, animated GIF:

Let me know what you think of The Scientific 7-minute Workout Timed, Animated GIF!

UPDATE: Posted this on imgur and, well, people liked it: http://imgur.com/gallery/qaBLnIr

As some of you know, I’ve been playing with a Vine hack by Chris Medina. I wrote a blog post walking you through how to do it but, after a Vina app update, I thought the hack/trick was killed.

Turns out it still works. I updated my ‘how-to’ blog post with how I did this series of Vines based on videosI edited in iMovie (of all places) and uploaded into the app.

An homage to one of the bestest game intros ever.

These were taken from this YouTube video… hence the visual quality isn’t the greatest: http://youtu.be/_rkaiKYEkDQ

Google Glass is clearly in its early stages, but it is emerging as a platform that merits our attention as news and information distributors.

The NYTimes has an app, but I think it really falls short of understanding and using this new platform.

Inspired by Thomas Baekdal‘s Google Glass for news post, here are my Glass app ideas for other news orgs… to help spark ideas and conversation.

These app ideas are practical and based on reality… not hypothetical futuristic dream apps.

// LATimes (or any regional/local news org)
Offer the Glass user an app card with trending/editor selected keywords/topics. The Los Angeles Times already does the keyword selection with their sub-navigation called “trending now.” Today’s (5/23) included: L.A. Mayor’s race, U.S. drones, Boy Scouts, London Attack, Helen Mirren, Lebron James.

Via Glass, the user could say, “Okay LATimes, tell me about [TOPIC]” and it will load the headline and nutgraph… it will of course offer a longer version of the story, perhaps in audio form.

Newspapers and print media also have an opportunity with Glass to embed and launch multimedia elements like videos or photo galleries from their print pages. ​That QR code may finally have value!

// NPR
This one, for now, is the most traditional app to do. The app is a card that plays, when a user opts in, the latest Hourly News Summary that is traditionally read on the air.

These apps are fairly simple tapping into the existing technology and framework. These do not are not “futuristic” apps. Naturally, if we tap into the GPS, we can create an app that brings you the latest news from “around you.”

// @BreakingNews (or other breaking news Twitter accounts)
The obvious option for this essential Twitter account is just to notify the Glass user with every breaking news tweet… but that can be overwhelming.

I’d suggest creating an app where the tweets that get the most retweets at a faster rate get a category of “important,” and those items notify the Glass user. Think of the classic breaking news interruption.

// Circa news app
This new news platform is actually a great fit for Glass. They have broken down a story into bullet points, and they add points to the story as it develops. It knows what you’ve read about the story when you return.

What they should offer is a list of headlines, and, as you do know, you can follow the story for updates. Their app would notify you when a story has been updated. Since the information is a bullet point, it wouldn’t be overwhelming.

// Newsbound
This visual-storytelling platform presents information like a PowerPoint presentation, but it’s compelling. What’s also powerful about this format is that these slides add up to tell a long form piece.

Yes, long form storytelling for Glass.

// SoundGecko
If a visual version of long form doesn’t work, check out SoundGecko, which converts text — any text — into audio.

Yes, at this stage it’s like Siri trying to read you a story, but when you are on the go and you actually want to consume a long form piece, this new technology may be good enough.

Well, since I am pitching Glass app ideas, here are some more “future” and obvious ones:

• Eventually be apps that are ​GPS aware to give information/news feeds.
• Based on video’s audio as a timeline, tie bonus material content to the broadcast news story. (This already happens with DVDs/movies and will eventually become available to us.)
• In terms of TV production, have Glass replace the TV new anchor’s Teletrompter and ear piece.

Two extremely obvious and simple ones:

• ​Live stream a press conference, but audio quality is not ideal. You can at least do a live POV shot of a scene.
• Using Glass as your second screen as you watch a live event either on TV on in person… like we do with tweets via hashtag.

I hope news organizations take advantage of this new type of platform and I look forward to what we will produce.

Personally, as a Google Glass Explorer (which gives me the “privilege” to buy and experiment with Glass early), I can’t wait to try these things out to see what works and what doesn’t.

At this stage, this is more a hypothesis… I want your reactions to this concept.

It’s based on my past successes and failures in projects/development. I, like all of us, have strengths and weaknesses in different categories, but for successful product developments, you need each… equally… at different times, perhaps, but constantly evolving and influencing the project.

Again, these requirements are in constant flux through different stages of the project, actively influencing each other.

Think: You have to have a creative, useful idea.

Listen: You have to truly listen/hear and adapt to wants/needs. From your community to stakeholders.

Build: You can talk. You can listen. But to have traction, you have to build something. A mockup, a demo or a working beta. Very much from the “show your work” model.

Sell: For journos, this is a new phase. But you have to promo your project… sell it to people. From your supervisor to actual investors.

I’ll try to write/explain more about this later… but I wanted to post this before I forget it… and I also want to collect reactions.

I want you to take a moment and recognize something: Google Glass looks as technologically cutting-edge as the first Motorola Razr did in 2004.

This incredibly thin phone, which was a leap from its predecessor Motorola StarTAC, was fashionable and functional, making it the best-selling clamshell phone in the world to date and causing a dent into Nokia’s indestructible brick phones.

Everyone had to have one and no one could believe how small it was.

For some tech context, in 2004 Google was still a private company.

iTunes was finally was made compatible with Windows machines, which made the iPod have its largest year since its launch in 2001.

AOL was still known as America Online.

The New York Times, and many other sites, looked like this: http://web.archive.org/web/20040306074613/http://www.nytimes.com/

We thought we knew tech. I thought we were in the future because I could text a question to GOOGLE and get an answer back.

(For more context, know that Facebook in 2011 was as big as the entire Internet was in 2004.)

Now, I want you to realize that Google Glass is at an earlier stage than that. Much earlier.

Think Zack Morris phone.

Think back when mobile phones were just for yuppies.

Who would ever want to carry a phone around with them?

Only those elitist businesses people who can afford that ridiculous technology… like Gordon Gekko

Check out this report on cellphones and yuppies:

Anyway you look at it, Glass is in its early stages. And it will soon look so outdated. It’ll look like the first iPod.

Embarrassingly dated.

(Don’t get me started on the short-lived pagers.)

“The Pressman”

– 30 –

This is gold.

“As we all know, it’s easier to do trivial things that are urgent, than it is to do important things that are not urgent, like thinking. And it’s also easier to do little things that we know we can do, than to start on big things that we’re not to sure about.”
— John Cleese

GOLD!!!

This post by Maria Popova on her brainpickings.org site is gold! Go there and give it deserved traffic: http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/04/12/john-cleese-on-creativity-1991/

Go there! Click… and even donate!

So, why am I posting parts of it here?

If you haven’t noticed, this “blog” is more for me… and I want to remember this post. I want to find it easily… and get the inspiration from it when I need it.

John Cleese’s entire talk on being creative:

John Cleese’s factors to make your life more creative:

1. Space
2. Time
3. Time
4. Confidence
5. Humor

“Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating.”
— John Cleese

UPDATE 06.10.2013: I can confirm the trick still works: http://blog.webjournalist.org/2013/06/10/intro-to-ninja-gaiden-via-vine/.

—

I tweeted this a few days back and thought I should add it here too.

On Monday a 6-second preview of The Wolverine was posted on Vine:

Clearly, this wasn’t made through the Vine app… which got me thinking, how could I post my own edited content onto Vine too?

Less than six seconds later I found the answer on YouTube:

I created this URL linking to the video: http://bit.ly/vineupload

After stumbling a little — the video isn’t perfect — I was able to create my own 6-second trailer:

Before we get into the steps, let me tell you where I got my video:

• I downloaded the Dune trailer video from YouTube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwPTIEWTYEI via SaveVid or something like it.
• I imported the video into iMovie. (I wanted to test this thing fast and quality didn’t matter to me.)
• After editing and creating a 6-second video, I exported as an MP4. Here is that file.
• Critical step: I ran the video though HandBrake and re-encoded/re-exported my video as an MP4. I have Version 0.9.6 x86_64 (2012022800). This was the key step to get these videos to work: http://bit.ly/ninjagaidenvine. For those who are curious, this is a screenshot of my Handbrake settings. They are the default settings, I believe, for ‘regular.’

Then I proceeded to follow the steps outlined in the video, but I am adding more details from my experiences.

Here are the steps, thanks to the video and my own experience doing it:

So what’s cool about this?

Imagine content creators using this method to promo their content. An edited video Tweet that is a teaser to your produced Web video. Try it out!

Here’s an easy link to this post: http://bit.ly/uploadtovine

P.S. I uploaded the entire RickRoll video to Vine and it got published… but the app killed it. The video was 13.4MBs and 3:33 minutes, so quite large and much longer than 6 seconds. I uploaded a 30-second version, which was 2.7 MBs and that also didn’t work. I tried again with a 10-second clip, which was 914kb, and it worked:

This isn’t a post defending why I love journalism. Nor is it one condemning those that have left it.

This post is a plea.

This morning I saw a tweet that led me to this sad reality:

A new study finds that, in 42% of companies, low performers actually report being more engaged – more motivated and more likely to enjoy working at their organization, for example – than middle and high performers do.”

That line made me reflect on my life… and the lives of the peers I truly respect. We’re all frustrated and “unhappy.” Well, according to some people.

Why?

Because we are passionate.

Because we are not satisfied.

Because we know what it could be, which is so much more than what it currently is.

And we’re fighting for it. It’s a struggle… but we do it.

In many of my peers’ careers, including mine, you look around the organization and are in shock.

In shock because while we bust our collective asses in our struggle, others – these “low performers” – have moved up along side us.

They have failed up.

Don’t tell me you can’t immediately think of at least one name in your newsroom right now.

They’ve been there forever. Before you got there and started trying to change things… and quite honestly, they’ll be there after you leave. These people mean well… but they don’t fight for their beliefs like we do.

We – and I am not saying this is healthy – break down in tears from the frustration of our struggle. We question our own value, despite our incredible track records of change and success. We question our life and doubt all the sacrifices we’ve made along the way… even though we’d do it all over again.

But, which is understandable, we burn out. And we leave. Leave the heartbreak. (Or, which happens too, we leave the company for a better one. But we will inevitably be unsatisfied again.)

In all this… we also leave behind those satisfied “low performers” … and that’s how they move up.

Back to my plea.

I know it sucks. I know it is so crippling at times. I know you question the direction of your life. I know you think you are crazy (you must be, right, because no one is freaking out as much as you are). I know all this.

But I also know you are not alone. That you are not crazy. And that we are better off with you fighting for your beliefs.

We are better off with you in journalism – or in what ever industry you are frustratingly passionate about.

Take a break. Make a change. But don’t give up… and don’t you dare get falsely satisfied.

Stay hungry. I know it hurts sometimes, but stay hungry.

When you have doubts, look to your passionate peers. Remember Horizontal Loyalty. Re-read the Holstee Manifesto. And, occasionally, watch videos like this or this.

But stay. And make the difference.

PS: Please read this back to me if/when you see me doubting/questioning myself. Please.

It was about a year that I was boarding my plane headed back to the West Coast, recharged and inspired by SXSW12.

By the time I landed, I had coded and launched this new project.

Man, what a difference a year makes.

Frustrated (and starting to get desperate) with finding partners to collaborate/experiment with, I figured I should put off the inevitable and teach myself code. I know I wouldn’t be the best coder — like I’m not the best audio storytelling or photographer — but I respected the craft and know its power.

I had been director of development for seattletimes.com where we designed and built cool shit, which was ahead of its time… and now feels… so… quaint.

In my quest for dev skills, I tried a variety of different non-journalism, code classes… from video to web-based tutorials. I, as ONA pre-conference and NAHJ conference coordinator, recruited friends and colleagues to craft custom journalism focused all-day coding workshops.

I even offered a (nearly free) all-day, intro to Python bootcamp at USC Annenberg thanks to the awesome PyLadies.

For the record, while this benefited the community as a whole, I was doing it for me. And none of it worked… for me.

But after SXSW, inspired by Codecademy‘s Code Year (even though I had given up on it like other New Year’s resolutions) and a curious user of Google+ Hangouts, I created the Learn Code for Journalism with Me project.

Yes, it’s a loooooong name. My partner-in-crime Kim Bui openly hates it. I know.

But it comes from a series of projects I’ve hung around the domain journalismwith.me.

Anyway, the idea was a simple one and the reaction to it was overwhelming. I was clearly on to something… and I wasn’t the only one trying to solve this.

Cindy Royal of Texas State University was trying to build a curriculum, Dave Stanton (who was joining two other friends and myself in launching a cooperative consulting firm) had expressed interest and I’m sure others were trying to grapple with this issue.

But, again, what a difference a year makes.

As I wait for my plane to take me back to the City of Angels still recovering from SXSW13, the landscape for this has completely changed.

There are two projects I want to point out:

First is Sisi Wei‘s Code with me project that offers weekend coding bootcamps for about $85.

Second is For Journalism, the successfully-funded kickstarter from Stanton, which will create journalism-focused coding tutorials.

Outside giving money to For Journalism and being a cross-country supporter of Code with me, I had nothing to do with their launches.

Even if their project names sound familiar, as people have point out … to be fair, my loooong title clearly had all the right words required for any successful coding for journalism project aimed to empower the community.

For my little project that is reaching its year anniversary, I didn’t have the bandwidth to make tshirts to use crowd funding.

It was just me.

Actually, it’s not just me anymore.

It’s me and my amazing cohort of determined classmates-turned-friends that still meet every Monday at 3PM PT via Google+ Hangouts since April of last year.

We’ve abandoned Code Year and have been developing our own journalism-based, project-focused coding lessons. We’re teaching each other code and hoping to share what we learn with others.

You can hear about the LCFJWM phase 2 in this View Source podcast interview or read about what I’ve learned in this post.

What a difference a year makes. And I am so glad talented people have come into this mix and found ways to address this need… in ways I couldn’t have for lack of the bandwidth or connections.

God only knows what the next year will bring, but we all know we’re going to benefit from this work.