In her 13-minute commencement address to the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism Class of 2009, Arianna Huffington, the outspoken editor-and-chief of the Huffington Post, told the graduates that the eternal truths of journalism including the need to speak truth to power remain as important in the era of Twitter and Facebook as at any time in the past.
“Read this,” I instructed several CUNY J-School students in a recent email. “Read every word of it. He’s talking about you.” I had provided a link to David Carr’s latest Media Equation column, “The Fall and Rise of Media.”
Crowdfunding, while not a tool in the technical sense, may turn out to be an indispensable business tool in the new ecosystem of journalism. While the idea of getting many people to donate small amounts of cash to fund a project is not new — charities do it, political campaigns do it — some forward-thinking journalists and entrepreneurs are starting to apply the same crowdfunding concept to the news.
If you’re looking for the cost and size advantages of a compact/point-and-shoot camera that can produce the kind of image quality that solid visual journalism requires, this is the one for you.
Several Web sites offer – often for free – tools for managing and sharing large files (e.g. Mediafire, Megaupload, Box.net, YouSendIt, Drop.io, etc.). But, none have improved my workflow more than Dropbox.