joshuago’s journalism Bookmarks

News can no longer be (only) about the mass update. Stories need to be targeted to those who might be able to improve the situation. And journalism’s products — which are more than its stories — must be designed to facilitate this.

Never tell the whole story in the headline if you want optimal click-through.

After years of trying to broaden the appeal of Reader’s Digest, the publishers are pushing it in a decidedly conservative direction.

The Internet highly values people who know things and can find things out, who can distinguish between what's important and what's not, and who can communicate succinctly and effectively. But it abhors the absence of voice.

An excellent and intriguing backgrounder on how Demand Media makes money from algorithmic determination of demand and low-cost content production.

A mini case study of how the Huffington Post grew its traffic.

There are many shifts coming, but three big ones are an increase in direct participation; an increase in the leverage of the professionals working alongside the amateurs; and a second great age of patronage.

News is important. It’s so important that leaving it to a group of people in an office downtown is and has always been irresponsible.

When news sites, after years of hanging back, embraced the idea of allowing readers to post comments, the near-universal assumption was that anyone could weigh in and remain anonymous. But now, that idea is under attack from several directions, and journalists, more than ever, are questioning whether anonymity should be a given on news sites.

Exploration of the question of how much weight we should ascribe to originality when there is obvious benefit in sharing, reintroduction, and remixing of ideas.