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The Convergence Newsletter From the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of South Carolina.

The Convergence Newsletter provides an editorially neutral forum for discussion of the theoretical and professional meaning of media convergence. We welcome articles on any topic directly related to media convergence. We also welcome information about conferences, publications and related links.

17/01/2014
DECEMBER 2013

http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v10no6.html

The impact of social media has forced news organizations to better concentrate their efforts and strategies on nontraditional sites. Especially during emergencies, Facebook and Twitter have become primary outlets. But considering that consumers use these sites in various ways, are news organizations...

10/12/2013
THE CONVERGENCE NEWSLETTER - OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2013

It's no secret the newspaper industry has faced increasingly difficult economic restrictions over the past two decades. Regardless of size or quality, every newspaper has dealt with severe cutbacks. One of the proposed solutions has been "hyperlocal" news sites. In larger areas, they have been touted as a way to restore the community connections that metro dailies lost as cities spilled over into ever-widening suburbs and newsrooms struggled to keep up. In smaller areas, while community journalism has remained relatively strong, such sites have been tried as a way to help those smaller organizations retain relevance in an always-on online world.

In this issue, we have two pieces that deal with hyperlocal coverage and its challenges. K. Paul Mallasch started the Muncie Free Press in 2005 and while financial success has been low to moderate, the website can lay a foundation for future local news sites. Richard Puffer runs through the recently departed Harstville Today website, which he believes can still be an influential example of local journalism.

http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v10no5.html

Respond to Mr. Mallasch's and Mr. Puffer's article at The Convergence Newsletter blog and at the newsletter's Facebook or Google+ pages.

28/08/2013
CONVERGENCE NEWSLETTER - MARCH 2013

With more skills required for entry-level journalists, one of the challenges is shaping classes to not only what students need to know but also the skills they already bring. Dr. Jeff Wilkinson of Houston Baptist University writes about the effective steps for building a better journalism program, the decisions that need to be made in the trenches. He says it's vital for educators to assess their program in three areas.

While attempting to shape curriculum, journalism programs across the country face similar, complex issues to keep pace with today's evolving field. With more skills required for entry-level journalists, one of the challenges is shaping classes to not only what students need to know but also the skil...

28/08/2013
Convergence Newsletter - FEBRUARY 2013

Shixin Ivy Zhang and David Edwards of the University of Nottingham in Ningbo, China, attempt to better understand the future of journalism and how that will change the future of its education. They see the future of journalism education in three dimensions: depth, breadth, and diversity and speed.

As new technology continues to rapidly change the way people get news, educators are faced with a difficult task of preparing their students for the ever-changing media world. How can we teach young journalists going forward if we do not know what the future holds?

19/12/2012
DECEMBER 2012

A journalism professor questions whether convergence partnerships between American newspapers and universities provide meaningful benefits. Read Larry Dailey's provocative article in the latest edition of The Convergence Newsletter.

As American newspapers work through the trauma of the digital disruption, and college journalism programs search for new models, a researcher urges caution in forging partnerships.

30/11/2012

The new technology explosion requires that media audiences learn and maintain new skills for information literacy so they can find, filter, evaluate, and use information.
In the new issue of The Convergence Newsletter, Alex Gorelik and Anton Bezuglov of Benedict College report on their experiment to determine how students seek and evaluate information.

http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v9no9.html #10

20/09/2012
SEPTEMBER 2012

In September's featured article, two veterans of nonprofit news startups in the Midwest explore the different set of challenges nonprofits face in filling the void left by shrinking traditional newsrooms.

http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v9no7.html

As the Great Recession accelerated the decline of traditional news operations in the U.S. and some other countries, the number of nonprofit news ventures has increased to fill the reporting void. In a new article, two veterans of nonprofit startups explore the different set of challenges nonprofits ...

21/08/2012
THE CONVERGENCE NEWSLETTER - AUGUST 2012

As you head back to the classroom, our latest edition has a pair of articles to stir your strategic thinking about convergence. What are you planning for the fall?

In our back-to-school edition, two news professionals demonstrate that experience is still the best teacher – for the instructor and the student.

19/06/2012
The Convergence Newsletter - JUNE 2012

When an emergency happens, journalists are likely to find the community already has started a digital conversation. As Carrie Brown-Smith of the University of Memphis found, non-journalists often quickly create Twitter hashtags to report, share, and discuss emergency information. Her findings provide useful insights into how news media can embrace participatory journalism and respond to the community's concerns.

http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v9no5.html

When an emergency happens, journalists are likely to find the community already has started a digital conversation. As Carrie Brown-Smith of the University of Memphis found, non-journalists often quickly create Twitter hashtags to report, share, and discuss emergency information. Her findings provid...

06/03/2012
CONVERGENCE NEWSLETTER - FEBRUARY 2012

Barbara Selvin of Stony Brook University sparked an extensive, sometimes heated, and occasionally international discussion of the use of video on news websites. The debate hits several important issues: experimentation versus productivity, timeliness versus production value, specialization versus cross-training. Read her article in the current edition of The Convergence Newsletter, then join the conversation.

Want to make a newspaper photographer furious? Suggest that newspapers cut down on the amount of video they put on their websites.

27/02/2012
CONVERGENCE NEWSLETTER - FEBRUARY 2012

How do reader comments affect perceptions of online news? Yan Yan, a doctoral student at the University of Alabama, explores this important question in the latest edition of The Convergence Newsletter.

Since the 1980s, a handful of studies have reported the power of news content in priming readers to view an issue a certain way[1]. With online journalism, however, news is more than the staff-created content but a package with multiple elements, including website formats, advertisements, links, and...

22/02/2012

Check your email in boxes. The February edition has just gone out. We'll post a link her later this week.

20/12/2011

Is some research threatened?

The article by Jake Batsell and Camille Kraeplin not only continues their significant research into the evolving nature of convergence, but also includes an observation that signals potential concern for researchers: "Our difficulty soliciting responses suggests that, in an age of information overload, email surveys are becoming a less effective mechanism for conducting newsroom research."

They found that many large and midsize TV stations and groups have adopted "no survey" policies. Others begged off, citing an increasingly burdensome workload. Such surveys have, in the past decade, become an important method of gathering significant information about changes in the field. Are you finding the same problems?

We'd like to hear from you, problems or no, about your views on this and whether you think it could be a significant problem for some research. Email us at [email protected], or comment here.

Thanks,
Doug Fisher and Chris Frear

20/12/2011
Convergence Newsletter - December 2011

New edition of TCN is out - two important articles as noted last week, one tracking the change in convergence partnerships between news orgs and the other challenging some of the assumptions about digital natives:
http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v8no9.html

The grand experiment of convergence requires constant smaller ones by researchers and professionals. One early form of news convergence – the partnership of newspapers and television stations – has evolved with the advent of social media and wider acceptance of user-generated content. Jake Batsell a...

15/12/2011
The Convergence Newsletter

Look for the December edition early next week. Two important articles:
-- Jake Batsell and Camille Kraeplin find some significant changes in convergence partnerships in phase three of their longitudinal study.
-- Michael Scott Sheerin and Moses Shumow challenge some of the assumptions about "digital natives."

Subscribe (free): [email protected]

or:
http://convergencenl.blogspot.com/

or
http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/index.html

In a Skype video call to the 10th Annual Convergence and Society Conference, Rob Curley explained his strategy for doing hyperlocal and "Big J" journalism that wins readers and awards and generating the revenue to pay for it in the process. Read a recap of Curley's lively presentation at the confere...

06/12/2011
NOVEMBER 2011

How can you train students to handle social media adeptly? Storify it, says Kelly Fincham of Hofstra. "Social media plays a huge role in journalism today, so much so that entry-level journalists are expected to work with new sources of content in ways that were unimaginable when I went into journalism in the early 1980s," she writes in the latest edition of The Convergence Newsletter. Read her account from the 10th Annual Convergence and Society Conference of how she has transformed her teaching and is helping students "make sense of it all."
http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v8no8.html #10

Social media plays a huge role in journalism today, so much so that entry-level journalists are expected to work with new sources of content in ways that were unimaginable when I went into journalism in the early 1980s.

21/10/2011
The Convergence Newsletter - October 2011

Blogging demands a different work routine for sports writers, but some are finding more rewarding connections to readers in the process. Read Brian Moritz's analysis in the new edition of The Convergence Newsletter.

Once the final buzzer sounds at the college basketball game he's covering, Brad has one job. Before he types the lead to his game story, before he interviews either coach or any player, before even leaving his seat on press row, he updates his blog on his newspaper's website with the final score.

20/10/2011

Don't miss insights from professionals in sports reporting and public relations. Look for the new edition of The Convergence Newsletter in your email today. Or subscribe by sending a message to [email protected].

30/09/2011

At Texas Christian University, Assistant Professor Aaron Chimbel helps students navigate the demands of combining four news operations -- newspaper, television, webcasts and magazine -- into one news website. How do you coordinate coverage? Who has the final say? And can you hold a meeting for 50 reporters and editors? In an update to his 2010 article, Chimbel reports on TCU's progress in Starting a Converged Campus News Website in the new edition of The Convergence Newsletter, http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v8no6.html #27

27/09/2011
SEPTEMBER 2011

Journalism educators are training students to take the lead in converged newsrooms at TCU and Utah. Read their experiences in the new edition of The Convergence Newsletter.

To learn news convergence, students eventually must take the lead and experience the challenges of working in a converged newsroom. In the process, they figure out how to overcome technical obstacles, negotiate through staff conflicts, and provide readers rich, multimedia content on deadline.

26/09/2011

Look for the new edition of The Convergence Newsletter tomorrow with insights from classroom convergence projects at Utah and TCU.

19/09/2011

To those of you coming here and - we hope - "liking" us based on the postcard from the Texas Center for Community Journalism, welcome. We'd love for you to subscribe (and contribute articles) to the newsletter. It's free. Please send us a note at [email protected], and we'll put you on the monthly mailing list.

08/09/2011

What's the hardest obstacle you've overcome in changing your journalism courses or program?

08/09/2011
THE CONVERGENCE NEWSLETTER: AUGUST 2011

Journalism education must change at the program and classroom levels. Read how two educators at different universities are facing the challenge.

It falls to us as educators to help students discover the best ways to tell a story, but what happens when we are not sure of the best way to do that? What if the curriculum is entrenched in the status quo?

22/08/2011

The new Convergence Newsletter comes out tomorrow! Make sure you check out Annemarie Franczyk's and Jennifer Cox's articles on convergence at the classroom and program levels.

05/07/2011
June 2011

Are we doing the best job we possibly can in teaching journalism in the digital sense? The latest edition of The Convergence Newsletter is asking for your help in redefining journalism in the digital sense:

There isn't much about media that isn't digital now, but that continues to raise questions about whether education systems internationally are equipped to meet the needs of the digital creative industries. EU nations and the U.S. have been on different paths in approaching the issue: The U.S., as mi

03/06/2011
April/May 2011

The latest issue of The Convergence Newsletter features articles by Chris Vadnais and Anne Anderson. Check it out! http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v8no3.html

With convergence comes great responsibility and opportunity - opportunity that the University of South Florida's Anne Anderson says many newspapers still seem to be missing. In her discussion of media platform convergence, Anderson highlights the industry's neglect of younger audiences even as studi

04/04/2011
March 2011

Check out the latest issue of TCN, featuring Jon Turner's insight of multicultural convergence in Cambodia. http://sc.edu/cmcis/news/convergence/v8no2.html

While it's no secret converging newsrooms face many challenges, such as staff restructuring, the convergence of two newspapers written in different languages for diverse target audiences creates its own set of issues.

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