Several in our class have asked follow-up questions to last week’s class, so I thought I’d provide a few thoughts.
(Of course, you could enroll in Digital Journalism, which is taught every semester. :-)
First of all, you absolutely can host your portfolio site through a content-management system like Wordpress. If you have skills you’re comfortable with and don’t want to upset the apple cart, that’s fine. We will only be looking at the results, not what you went through to get there.
However, if you do decide to set up a code-based portfolio site, I thought I’d provide a few tips and guidelines:
Registering Domains and Acquiring Storage Space
You’ve got to put your site into space that is accessible to Web users. If you want to buy your own Webspace, you can use a registrar (Yahoo Small Business, GoDaddy.com, FatCow, etc.).
When you acquire space, there are two components: registration (the URL that maps browsers to your content) and disk storage (the actual space your files are stored in). These can often be bought in a bundle, but can also be acquired separated.
Services like GoDaddy and Fatcow run about $5 per month for storage, plus about $10 a year registration. Yahoo is easier to use, but is about $10 per month with $10 registration. There are hundreds of choices out there, and most are good for what we’ve assigned. Let me know if you have questions about a given service or your site.
There are a couple of free options, but they are somewhat limited and difficult to use. Let me know if you want to explore those options.
Once you acquire space, you can start building pages and linking them together.
Software
If you want to start with code (to learn everything), I would recommend downloading BBedit Lite. It's a great code editor, and it's free. In it, you can write code (just like we did last week), and save it to your computer.
You will also need an FTP program to upload your pages and images when they're ready. There are dozens, but I recommend Fetch, which is free for 15 days, and if you like it, I have a student code to make the license permanent.
Coding Your Page
Once you have these pieces, then it's just a matter of writing the code, entering your text and graphics, and posting your site to your Web space.
Obviously, if you have access to a WYSIWYG editor (like Dreamweaver or Frontpage) you can use those interfaces to drag and drop Web page designs, and can even upload directly from that software.
Save pages in a folder on your computer or flash drive. Browse saved pages with a Web Browser (use “File>Open File” and browse to your saved pages). This way, you can go back and forth between your editor software (make changes) and your browser (see the changes) until your page looks the way you want it.
Uploading your page
Depending on your hosting service, you will enter the required login information to an FTP client (like Fetch, mentioned above). This will allow you access to the server where your files need to go.
Most FTP clients allow you log in and then drag and drop all your files onto the server window, copying all your files up to the server. Be sure to copy any images, or else they won’t show up when people browser your page.
For our next assignment, it's time to get those portfolio sites off the ground. You will have two weeks to get a basic site up and running. You may build the site from scratch, or enable your blog pages to host the required content listed below.
The personal Web page belongs to the student, but for the purposes of this class it is required that each site contains the following links:
I know several of you in the class are interested in going into sportswriting, and even those who aren't might find this article that ran on June 10 in the Wall Street Journal interesting. I was struck by the number of parallels to political reporting -- especially the part about standing around in a pack of reporters waiting for a canned quote that you probably won't use anyway. It does make me wonder if there isn't better way to do all of this.
It's Time for the Sportswriters to Go
U.S. Media Sees Locker-Room Access as a Birthright, but It's Getting Harder to See the Point
The wait before a Knicks game earlier this season at Madison Square Garden began with me and five other reporters standing in a rough circle in the middle of the visitors' locker room (on a night where the Lakers dressed), keeping vigil for something to happen.
Our cluster multiplied in bursts, like cells morphing and crowding one another under a microscope, doubling and redoubling until it seemed the cement room could barely hold us. Trying to count the reporters was useless, but it was easy to count the number of players as the minutes went by: none. Then one. Oh wait, I see a second. But soon, none again.
Finally, Ron Artest sidled through to get to his locker stall. A small tidal force pushed me toward him where I could make out, "It's good to be back in New York… Always fun…" And, "The Knicks have themselves a good team." A bit of a disclaimer: I could only reasonably assume these were Mr. Artest's words. My head was pressed against the back of a cameraman and pitched forward by someone trying to reach a tape recorder above the fray.
Consider this my moment of clarity when I was struck by a simple question: "Is there a point to this?"
Truth be known, the same notion skitters across the minds of sportswriters and athletes, too, who wonder if this ritualized behavior is worth the trouble. Before and after games at virtually every stadium and arena, reporters dutifully trek to the locker rooms for a quote or two, a postmortem, an injury update or a sliver of insight. Later comes the dash back to the computers for the deadline assault.
It's hard to assess the dividends from all this effort. In the last few days, it was reported that Kevin Bieksa of the Vancouver Canucks called his team's place in the Stanley Cup finals "a huge opportunity" while Dirk Nowitzki, the Dallas Mavericks star, told us, "Ultimately, we have one goal and we came together and fought through some stuff."
Linda Robertson, a columnist for the Miami Herald, says sometimes, after going through the whole tedious process, all reporters have to show for it are "predictable, utterly bland comments you don't end up using."
Let's be clear: This is not a Woe Is Us story. Access is hardly a reporter's entitlement, unless the assignment is the White House or City Hall. Even then, the willingness to wait out a story is a compulsory part of the job. Imagine, too, the view of an athlete, not yet showered and still absorbing a blown save or a missed shot, confronted by a swarm of notepads and microphones and pressed to answer the brain-numbing question: How do you feel?
"What do they expect you to say to that?" asks LaTroy Hawkins, a veteran relief pitcher. "And could they let you get your pants on?"
The relationship between athletes and the press, over generations, has been knotted by distrust. Michael Jordan tangled with reporters. So did Ted Williams. Steve Carlton boycotted them altogether. But beneath the antagonism there was an unwritten code that allowed for small accommodations. We didn't hear much about Mickey Mantle's boozing, but Leo Durocher played cards with reporters during train travel. I saw Billy Martin after road games joined by a cadre of drinking buddies among the press.
For many athletes, the terms of the code were breached in a single moment in 1998 when a reporter spied a bottle of androstenedione in Mark McGwire's locker. "Players remember this," says Hawkins, now with the Brewers. Today, athletes can't even finish a thought before someone camped by their locker posts it to Twitter.
Athletes are bound by league rules to be available to reporters, but not all comply. When they do talk, they slide easily into the abridged remark—or save their breath for Twitter. By the time he announced his retirement, Shaquille O'Neal had nearly four million followers.
There is no serious talk of booting reporters from locker rooms, but leagues are finding ways to reach the fans directly. Major League Baseball's 30 teams, for instance, have a combined 18 million followers on their Facebook pages. The Washington Redskins, like many teams, employs reporters who work for the team's website. "There's been a tremendous transformation," says Sam Smith, who has covered the Chicago Bulls for 25 years, first for the Chicago Tribune and now for Bulls.com. Whereas teams once needed traditional media, he says, "now newspapers need the teams for their circulation."
As a cub reporter for the New York Times in the late 1980's, covering the Mets, Yankees and Rangers, I was aware of an imbalance between athlete and reporter, not so much because of the gulf in pay (sizeable even then), but because we were doing our jobs in their workplace.
What the locker room does for a sportswriter is offer up small truths in quiet images, not necessarily in quotes: Jordan weeping on the locker-room floor after winning his first title after his father's death; Amar'e Stoudemire hobbling from the trainer's room with ice wrapped to his knees; Barry Bonds, deep in a leather recliner in the San Francisco Giants' clubhouse, blanketed to the chin and watching his own personal TV.
These scenes are increasingly harder for the press to see. Reporters don't fly on team planes anymore. Many don't stay at team hotels. Baseball writers are no longer allowed next to the batting cage during batting practice. It's not hard to imagine the day when U.S. teams mimic European soccer and cut locker-room access entirely.
Not long ago, I found myself at Yankee Stadium standing in the middle of the Yankees logo woven into the dark blue carpeting of the clubhouse. With the exception of the stray player, 30 or so reporters had no one to talk to besides themselves. The Yankee players are able to dress in an area that is off limits to the media. Turns out I was waiting in what amounts to a mannequin clubhouse.
Nevertheless, a few reporters held on, talking in hushed voices to editors on cell phones. Mark Feinsand of the (N.Y.) Daily News, who has covered the team for 11 years, says most reporters still feel compelled to "maintain a presence" in the clubhouse, not just to cement ties but to be ready in case something newsworthy happens.
In the end, no matter what becomes of this American tradition, it's probably time to start asking if all this standing around amounts to loitering and is worth the strain it puts on the relationship between press and players. It's not clear that either side derives much from the transaction.
"There's something we ought to remember," says Robertson of the Herald. "These guys are not notable for their oratory. They're notable for how beautifully they perform as athletes."
For our next assignment, we're asking you to do something a little bit different.
Within the ecosystem of journalism, in which the classic wall separating producers and consumers of content appears to be eroding, it is as important for journalists to read and respond to the content of others as it is to produce original content.
This week we'd like you to practice with an interactivity exercise: visiting the class student list, select the student whose name appears above and below yours. Visit those two students' blog, and comment on at least one post featured there. A good response should engage the presented topic in some way: adding personal context, asking a question, providing additional links or resources, etc.
We will be checking for comments on Monday morning, June 20.
For this task, we simply want you to pick one fairly “big” news story – the bin Laden assassination (bonus reading), the Anthony Weiner scandal, the NFL lockout, Katie Couric’s move to ABC daytime, etc. – and compare how it has been reported across various types of media outlets. We’re looking for an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses, from your perspective as a reader/viewer, of each type of medium.
This is not a writing task, so you can do it in bullet points or paragraphs – whatever is easier for you. You can use the chart below as a guide if that’s easier, but responses should be posted to your personal blog.
Be sure to provide a brief paragraph summarizing the general facts of your selected story.
Medium
Strengths/Advantages
Weaknesses/Disadvantages
Newspaper story
(an online edition is okay for this exercise, but pick a mainstream media publication)
Television news story
(a network or cable news program will work here)
Blog
(try to find an appropriate one for your story … Huffington Post is good for politics, TMZ for entertainment news, etc.)
Twitter feeds
(you may need to check several posts to get a good feel for this medium as it relates to the story)
