Customer Reviews

The Elements of Online Journalism

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This thin little volume (50 pages) is at the level of a sixth-grade student's understanding of what a journalism career might be like in the context of the Internet. Written in 2006, this is a simplistic gloss that might have added a tiny bit of information had it been written in 1996.

There are 12 chapters in the book; the final chapter is 8 pages; of the remaining chapters, none is more than 5 pages, and most are just 2-3 pages. As an example of the author's simplicity is Chapter 2, entitled, "Online Journalism: Elements of a Digital Story." Here the author simply lists some of the page elements that comprise a story: Headline, Text, Picture, Graphic, Related Links, Audio, Video, Slide Shows, Animation, Interactive Features, Interactive Games, with a short descriptive paragraph of each. There is then a summary that asks, "What qualifies as a good multimedia story?" The answers are: "A) Stories with good quotes; B) Stories involving processes (how to); C) Stories involving historical understanding; D) Stories that are simply fun for an interactive feature; E) Complex stories, which are hard to explain via text alone; F) Stories that might offer an interactive experience for the visitor."

Chapter 11 is entitled, "Jobs in the Multimedia Marketplace" is two pages in length, and lists the following occupations: Graphic Designer/Editor; Online Producer; Content Editor; Database Editor; Programmer; Web Designer or Multimedia Producer. The last paragraph of the chapter provides this profound wisdom:

"News companies are investing a lot of money into multimedia journalism. Many newsrooms are having a hard time coping with the changes in the landscape change (sic). Editors and newsroom managers are having a hard time training their old dogs some new tricks (sic). And so this is where you as a new journalism or multimedia person come in to fill the void."

This book is simply, abysmally awful. I'm truly sorry I wasted $10.

I find this book to be fascinating because it contains a lot of helpful information and new techniques on how to do journalism in this age of the Internet. It's a slim volume so I finished reading the book within 2 hours. Definitely a good book for journalists, educators, computer enthusiasts, and others who use the Internet on a daily basis.