I was recently interviewed by Tanja Aitamurto, a journalist and researcher from Finland who’s studying Spot.Us as a case study in new forms of journalism. For those of you unfamiliar, Spot.Us is a journalism startup pioneering “community-funded reporting” in the Bay Area. Basically, freelance journalists (or the organization) will pitch stories on the Spot.Us website and tap the public as well as news organizations for micro-donations to fund projects and pay reporters. Raising money through donations from the public is also known as “crowd funding,” and Spot.Us is experimenting with the concept as one method to sustain quality journalism in the ever-changing media landscape we are watching unfold before our eyes.

Aitamurto is researching the way crowd funding and crowd sourcing change the journalistic process, and as both an intern and reporter for Spot.Us, I wanted to share my experience. First, I want to make one very important disclaimer:  I’m a young reporter with little experience in

It’s NYC Fashion Week and I am putting in 10+ hour days of editing and shooting so please excuse my absence. On top of these commitments, I started my gig with Sundance Channel last week. I am essentially blogging for my boss, Patrick McMullan.  I go out once a week to some party and take in all the sights and talk to whoever he wants me to meet (last week that was Amerie and Taylor Hanson), all while he tells me his thoughts on the night. Yes, life could be much worse. Check out the first post here.

It’s been a long time coming, but the investigation into school food that I’ve been working on, in collaboration with Spot.us and the Santa Cruz Weekly, was finally published yesterday–on newsprint, even! I must admit that it felt good to see my byline in black ink after about a year without being published in print. I’ll provide more background on my experience freelancing through Spot.us later today, but for now, check out the article online here.

I reluctantly subscribed to Gawker two days ago, reluctantly only because my Google Reader feed is out of control and they are notorious for posting. A post this morning made my increasingly chaos-theory-proving Reader worth the headache.

A Gawker blogger made fun of an article in the Washington Post about a “generation guru,” a woman paid obscene amounts of money to explain to adults how us kiddos think and work and all that rot. Gawker pulled three excerpts from the article, with the longest one hitting 93 words. Unlike some reposting, however, the Gawker blogger put in commentary and analysis instead of just block quoting the article. Fair usage, right? Guess not, at least not for the Washington Post. The journalist, Ian Shapira, is furious that his hard work is being ripped off and making someone else money while pulling the best (ie funniest) bits and he said as much in a response on WP’s Outlook and Opinion page.
Gawker’s Gabriel Snyder brought the pain in her take on the whole thing to my utter de

I am coming across a boatload of writing and/or photo contest today and I thought it would be nice to share and really drum up some competition (that is, if I can get over this heat induced laziness).

This writing contest has an Oasis theme and was put out by nycgo.com, Jet Blue, Trazzler and AKA. Winning this gig could get you a two week “residency” in NYC working on 10k worth of assignments for Trazzler or a freelance contract worth some loot. I for one am particularly inspired by the poetry of the contest description.
Modern life can often feel like a trek through the desert. For this contest, we want you to write about a place that not only satisfies your thirst for a change of scenery, but goes beyond this, breaking the spell of everyday existence and providing the “refuge, relief, or pleasant contrast” that we all crave, especially in the summer.
You have to sign up for Trazzler, which so far seems pretty innocuous. Deadline: August 17th.

Narrative Magazine is seeking “short shorts, short s

Youtube recently rolled out Reporter’s Center, a selection of videos for journalists on topics such as developing a story and tips for interviewing from some of the biggest players in the game including Katie Couric, Nicholas Kristof and Ariana Huffington.
From the page’s profile:
The YouTube Reporters’ Center is a new resource to help you learn more about how to report the news. It features some of the nation’s top journalists and news organizations sharing instructional videos with tips and advice for better reporting.
While it might be geared to “citizen journalists,” it couldn’t hurt to look around and brush up on how to do investigate journalism by one of the greats, eh?

jackie and i are working, slowly but steadily, on our most ambitious project to date:

a feature-length historical documentary/where are they now?/social investigation about the international phenomenon that was/is FMILLEST.
what’s an FMillest, you say? it was/is our crew from our more formidable years, a group of people brought together by rollerblading. but it turned into much more than a skate crew.

so when jackie was down here a few weeks ago, we decided to:
A) see where everyone was, and what they’re doing
B) see if we can scare up as many old photos/videos/letters/etc. from that time as possible, and
C) put it all together as a documentary

we are now in the interviewing and old-media-gathering phase of the project, which we expect will last a long time. my conservative estimate for completion is one year. each interview, thus far, has been at least an hour. we’re looking at the possibility of acquiring THOUSANDS of stills, and HOURS UPON HOURS of old skate/party video.

Wesside

I wrote awhile back about pitching City Scoops and now the fruits of my labor are online for all to see. Check out my article (and photo) here.

As a bit of peek into editing, below is my original intro. Besides taking out my first two sentences (which I was quite proud of) City Scoops pretty much just moved things around. Hurray for maintaing the integrity of my work!
Horses are a lot like most of the other fauna regularly seen in New York City. They’re typically found near parks and are a common enough sight that no self-respecting New Yorker whips out a Blackberry to take a photo. Beyond the police patrols and the tourist bating buggies that have become associated with horses in New York, a rich history of riding thrives today. At least a half-dozen stables in the city rent horses for scenic trails rides, beach rides, lessons or even parties.

While the unaccustomed runner in Central Park might jaw drop at the sight of a horse and rider out for a stroll, horses have always been part of the cultura

It was five minutes till 9am and the Mission Bay Conference Center at UCSF was already brimming with 20 and 30 somethings eager for the daylong Wordcamp San Francisco to begin. While I noticed scattered heads of gray hair, the vast majority of attendees were young; many of whom wore glasses and scanned their laptops and iPhones before the first speaker took the stage. I overheard the group behind me discussing how long they had been blogging and what they write about. A blonde girl to my front left quickly updated her Twitter page as the young Asian man to my right checked his Buddy Press. All the while, I was sitting alone with nothing but a notepad, asking myself what I was doing there.

I was reminded when Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek, took the mic and began his talk on “How to blog without killing yourself.” He started off by reiterating all of the opportunities blogging provides (besides just attending geeky camps) and he opened up the process behind his high-traffic personal

Over on A Photo Editor, Rob Haggart links to a great list of successful pitches made by writer Dan Baum and his wife Margaret Knox, the same list Jackie wrote about a couple posts ago on this blog. An important thing that Haggart points out is that it’s not just a skill for writers – a photographer should be able to write a good pitch as well.