Yesterday three great things happened. Firstly, I became a member of the Online News Association. I don’t write news as part of my role here at MSN, but I have some involvement with the daily entertainment news desk which is run by our brilliant Senior Editor Colleen Last. There may be the whole debate about ‘is curation actually journalism’ but, as a publisher, we are still responsible for the the news we serve up, be it from PA or Reuters. So the same strict attention to detail is part of the process. Plus, visitors will always vote with their feet, or eyeballs if the news is late or lame.
Anyway, I’ve joined ONA to give me a further insight into the complexities of news reporting. I’ve only been to the one session so far with guest speaker Guido Fawkes, but that was good enough. I look forward to loads more interesting debates.
The second great thing that happened this week – Mike Ward, head of the Department of Journalism at the University of Central Lancashire, visited us. It was good to exchange questions and get a little closer to the issues he is involved in. At MSN I’ve taken for granted the multi-tasked nature of our roles. We don’t have the formal structures that, say, a newspaper might adopt in an online team. If a team member has the talent (or inclination) then they might be writing blogs, shooting and editing video, recording podcasts, scripting shows etc. Does this produce a Jack of all trades master of none? I think it encourages editors to think about the different ways they can tell a story with the tools that are available to them. But, Mike certainly got me thinking about the expectations we place on journalists to get the job done.
Lastly, in the evening I attended a session on ‘Google and the Digitisation of Books’ organised by the Stationer’s Company. Here, Santiago de la Mora discussed Google’s strategy in this area and details around the Google Book settlement issue. Very interesting and left me with the following questions:
- Will the settlement result in Google actually getting a copyright agreement passed into US law?
- Will Google start to charge for these books?
- Will Google adopt a DRM approach to digitalisation? If so, look what DRM did for the music industry with disastrous consequences.
- Will Google start providing a commercial digitalisation service where companies can use their technology, but not their distribution network?
So, there you go. Three great things. All I need to do is top that today and I’ll be lined up for an excellent weekend. Until next time.
