Tools, Tips & Trends | Knight Digital Media Center

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Compounding audience growth with web “stickiness”

Mon, April 27, 2015 | 9:04 p.m. PDT

“Stickiness is like a compounded Internet interest rate: it measures how likely users are to visit, and how often they go beyond the first click to the second or third,” writes Matthew Hindman in a new paper for Harvard’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy. "Sites with above-average stickiness grow their audience share over time, by definition; those with below-average stickiness shrink.“

Verification handbook: Uncovering in-depth reporting techniques

Sun, April 19, 2015 | 10:00 p.m. PDT

by: Nancy Yoshihara

Examples of using user-generated content and open source information for in-depth reporting can be found in the new Verification Handbook for Investigative Reporting, A Guide to Online Search and Research Techniques Using UGC and Open Source Information in Investigations.

24% of teens go online "almost constantly" on their smartphones

Mon, April 13, 2015 | 10:07 p.m. PDT

by: Nancy Yoshihara

Mobile devices have become a primary driver of teen Internet use with 24% of teenagers reporting going online “almost constantly” with their smartphones, according to the first in a series of reports by the Pew Research Center examining teenagers’ use of technology.

Knight study looks at whether nonprofit news sites are "Gaining Ground"

Wed, April 8, 2015 | 3:42 p.m. PDT

by: KDMC Staff

A new study from the Knight Foundation takes a look at 20 nonprofit news sites and their progress in becoming sustainable enterprises. It found that the news sites revenue grew by 73% on average from 2011 to 2013.

New DigitalEd training from MediaShift with partners RJI and BigMarker

Mon, April 6, 2015 | 10:00 p.m. PDT

by: Nancy Yoshihara

PBS MediaShift said the DigitalEd series of live, weekly, one-hour online training sessions will provide participants practical information from instructors at top journalism schools.

Smartphones bridge, worsen the digital divide: Pew report

Tue, March 31, 2015 | 8:13 p.m. PDT

by: Amy Gahran

Nearly two-thirds of Americans now own a smartphone, and nearly 20% rely on their smartphones to some extent for internet access. However, this connection to key digital resources is complicated by financial stress, data caps, and technical problems, exacerbating the digital divide -- according to a new Pew Research Center report.

Local news on Twitter: Hard to find

Tue, March 24, 2015 | 1:08 a.m. PDT

by: Nancy Yoshihara

A yearlong project examining local news on Twitter in three cities showed that national news and other content far outpaced local news on the platform. In addition, keywords about local news were virtually impossible to find with frequency, according to a report by the Pew Research Center.

Creative Instagram approaches used by newsrooms

Sun, March 15, 2015 | 10:00 p.m. PDT

by: Nancy Yoshihara

Now that your organization is on Twitter and Facebook, it may be time to think about powering up your social media arsenal with Instagram, a photo sharing mobile social network.

Pew research: Deep analysis of three local news ecologies

Thu, March 5, 2015 | 3:57 p.m. PST

by: Michele McLellan

A new report from Pew Research Center does a deep dive into the news ecologies of three places – Denver, Colo.; Macon, Georgia; and Sioux City, Iowa. It looks at both news consumption and how news is provided in the digital age.

Lessons learned from New Jersey news startups

Wed, March 4, 2015 | 11:16 a.m. PST

by: Melissa Kaplan

Here are some news startup lessons learned from coach Joe Michaud of Grow & Strengthen, a program from the Center for Cooperative Media to develop New Jersey's news ecosystem.