online resource for Illinois broadcast news managers, reporters, producers, photographers and students
We can all work to improve our news writing. As our friend Ken Keller noted several years ago, we can also work on our rewriting. The suggestions below are excerpted from a column Ken used to write in INBA Tune IN. Thanks Ken!
We do a lot of quick writing in this deadline crunch business of broadcast news, More
Good reporters are always trying to get better at their job. Everyone wants great stories and wants to avoid mistakes. Here is a series of online tutorials that can make you better at verification!
This training will help you avoid mistakes that could undermine the work you do. More
This tip comes from NPR, but its good for commercial radio & TV as well.
Click here for the full article.
The NPR Training Site has six tips for catching your writing mistakes & and protecting your credibility.
The article linked above goes in-depth on these six tips with links to a variety of helpful sites including news checklists. More
Our Tip of the Week comes from The Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at Arizona State University.
To cover a local or regional economy, you need to know what makes it tick. Find a few lists, or compile them on your own:
• Fortune 500 companies based in your area
• Other local publicly held companies
• The largest privately owned companies in your region
• The 10 largest employers in your locality. More
There is a big election coming up in Chicago. Some of the issues are entirely parochial. Others have a wider impact. There is room for the Chicago mayoral election in newscasts across the state. That coverage can be very selective and focused. You need to tell your audience what’s important and even why they should care.
This one comes from Poynter. It’s one of the reasons why I threw a little money their way during their end of year fundraising campaign.
Ren LaForme listed the top 10 tools for journalism from the past year. They are worth a look. This one caught my attention. More
Journalist’s Resource is out with a tip sheet on interviewing white-collar prisoners. They come from Eugene Soltes who shared what he learned while doing research for Why They Do It: Inside the Mind of the White-Collar Criminal. Here are the bullet points on that article and a link to the full discussion that adds good context to these suggestions. More
And our Tip Of The Week
Whether you are a reporter or manager, you probably feel at times like your newsroom is rudderless and lacking a clear sense of direction. It happens almost everywhere. Goal setting and the related discussions often help in these instances. Maybe you would like to get the news staff on the same page. More
During the the final month of the year, we are going through the archives of Tip Of The Week. Here is one to check every month.
In our Tip Of The Week this time, a way to keep tabs on potential layoffs in your area. More
Tip Of The Week has been a IBANewsroom feature since we launched in June. Here was one of the early tips.
This week’s tip might seem basic, but it’s always important, as someone once said, “to be brilliant on the basics.” A good infielder takes a lot of ground balls in practice. More