Around the world in 12 weeks.

This week I’m journeying to the inside of my computer, to dissect the world of fashion blogging. Since starting my blog I’ve read others to get inspiration/steal ideas. I’ve become a follower of a few and these are mainly fashion blogs, because my life basically is as shallow as it seems. Last week, I was reading girl with a satchel and came across a post explaining how American blogs were about to come under strict new laws, forcing them to disclose any sort of cash or in-kind payment for product reviewed or discussed on their blog or be fined $11k. At face value we can sit back and think that of course they should disclose this information, otherwise where are their ethics, intergrity, transparency etc. etc. However, magazines remain free from such laws and while this is the case, it is a hugely big, unjust, double standard. I do think that bloggers should be forced to disclose if they are paid to review a product, but surely this should also extend to magazines. As Fashionista’s Britt Aboutaleb put it “If a magazine was forced to disclose everything they received for free, they’d need to publish an entirely separate magazine.”

As many bloggers aren’t journalists, it is important to provide some kind of guidelines so people write responsibly and understand that what they write could affect lots of people. So I’m all for full disclosure, just enforce the regulations across the board.

Do you think it’s important that bloggers disclose any cash or in-kind payment they receive for endorsements?

Should magazines have to follow the same rules?

Fittingly, dedication for my final post (I know all you readers out there will be devo), goes to the eclectic and sometimes bizarre world of blogging. With the internet able to connect so many of us and giving insignificant me in Melbourne the outlet to voice my opinion, there is a blog to suit everyone’s tastes and interests. Thankfully, many people are taking up the gauntlet, so that if we do sift through the chaff we find some real blogging gems. One of these I found last week and have been reading obssessively ever since. It is Style Rookie, written by a thirteen year-old American, who has made waves in the fashion world since starting her blog in 2008. Tavi posts her thoughts on new designer collections, her day, photos of outfits she has put together etc. It leaves me a little bit envious that I’m not as witty/fashionable/individual as she is and I’m a lot older, but I also love that blogging lets people this young show the older people how it’s done. It bamboozles me how accomplished she is. Yes. I’m gushing. I know.

Tavi with Designer Yohji Yamamoto at NY Fashion Week. Courtesy of Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Y-3

After reading about the issue with the new blogging laws in the US, I found it interesting that Tavi is acknowledging payments for each and every item she features on her blog. When she posts pictures of herself sporting weirdly cool outfits, she always attributes each item and if it was sent to her she acknowledges it. It definitely sends the message that she is just one of us, lucky to be good at what she does and reaping the rewards of it. Below are some pretty pictures from Tavi’s blog, of her creative ensembles. Something about her reminds me of Anna Wintour, which is a bit scary. I think it’s the bob combined with the body language.

If these photos have only left you wanting to go search everything about tavi on google (this is a totally understandable reaction), then you might also like to see her vlogs. She comes off a little precocious but also self depricating. I can live with that.

So that concludes my blog and I hate to admit it but I kind of loved this assignment. Sorry Micha for annoying you with inane questions like “how do you do a screen shot?”, at 1am, but it was all for a good cause. I hope renee that it has been a little bit interesting to read, because I’m 99% sure you’re the only one who read any of this. But hey, at least there was someone.

Courtesy of New Science News

This week’s blog post will be dedicated to analysing the trends of readers on the Online City Journal site. As my site meter account has recorded absolutely no visitors to my blog since August, I realised it must be faulty (because no doubt I have been inundated with readers) and so I’m analysing the City Journal’s stats instead.

The City Journal Online is a web publication produced by RMIT communications students. It accompanies the City Journal, a newspaper released about twice every semester. The sites editorial direction is led by students in online classes at RMIT and supervised by lecturer, Renee Barnes. All RMIT students are able to submit content.

Web analytics are extremely valuable as they let us to get to know our reader.

The City Journal Reader:

• Most readers are entering the site via the home page. This is both good and bad. It shows that people are coming to check if the site has been updated and if news is breaking, which can all be found on the home page. However, it is also bad because it means that readers aren’t finding City Journal articles very easily through search engines. This could be because the headlines of stories don’t link well to what the story is about.
• Most readers are also exiting through the home page which could mean they go and check it and then leave because they don’t see anything they like. It could also mean there is good linking through the site so people are able to naviaget home and when they have read enough, leave.
• Most visitors are coming from within Australia, however there are a few from Perth and NSW.
• Average visit length is 6:50, which is good for an online publication.
• Readers are viewing an average of 7 pages per visit which means they find things that interest them on the home page and find pages easy to link through to.
• Between 10am and 12pm visists peak and they also peak on the 8th of each month.
• Readership drops significantly from November to June.

Once we know who our reader is and what they’re doing on our site, we can devise strategies to increase readership.

Strategies to Increase Readership:

1. There seems to be a lot of people viewing the City Journals main story, about the strike. Maybe the featured story could be updated more often, to pull readers back to see an update on the issue or a fresh story.
2. The headlines of stories could be made more explanatory, so when people search on google for a particular topic they are referred to the site.
3. Many readers were also looking at the opinion pages. It could be useful to ahve regular bloggers, so each voice builds up their own readership. people would be drawn back to specific bloggers to see what they ahve to say about an issue. Bloggers could also increase the online visibility of the site by promoting themselves on twitter or facebook to warn readers when new posts were uploaded.
4. Content needs to be more regurlarly uploaded, so people are drawn back to the site all throughout the month, not just around the start of the month. This uploading of content could also be published on twitter and facebook, if the site branched out into these networking services. This could draw readers in, when they are alerted to new content that may interest them. 
5. The uploading of content also needs to be maintained throughout the year. The significant drop in readership after November, is the same time uni goes on break and when the site would be updated the least regurlarly. By updating throughout this period, readership could be maintained and it wouldn’t be so difficult to get readers back after summer, when new content is uploaded.
6. Content should be uploaded before the 10am rush of readers. This would mean people would visit the site, confident that new material would already be uploaded when they get there.

By employing these strategies, site visitation could be increased. Although obviously it is hard to employ these strategies to a student run website, they could see a soar in visitors. Web analysis gives us the basic stats to learn about who our reader is and how to give them what they want.

WEB DESIGN ANALYSIS POST

The Guardian’s website is my favourite online news source. It incorporates all the media available online to create stories which really have an impact on the user.

The guardian online, makes it extremely easy to navigate to the exact information you want, or the topic area you’re interested in. It also provides blogs for interesting comment and podcasts, if you prefer to listen to a discussion of the news or need it on the go. There is also a good use of slideshows and video. Stories are brought together with nearly every element and the major stories have a few different comment pieces, creating a more in depth analysis for online readers. Not only does the website look nice, it effectively presents all of its content, which is of course is the most important thing for a news website. And the UK agrees – the guardian is the UK’s news website of the year.

The Guardian ticks most of the boxes for web design elements.

USABILITY:

The Guardian Online is extremely easy to navigate.

• The toolbar at the top of the page chanegs each time you click through, to give you mroe information on the topic you have chosen. It also gives you a clear path back to where you started. This allows the reader to know where they are on the website and where they can go forward to; what extra information there is for them to read. Below is an example of this.
• Each time you click through to a new page, the top header stays the same with the guardian logo, so you know you can easily link back to the home page.

Home page, click through to United States Section:

From United States Section, click through to further information on topics of interest:

UNITY:

• Guardian web pages work together as the fonts are the same for headings and text etc.
• Bright colour is also used to pull the website together as a whole, as on each page the colours used are uniform.
• The graphics are also displayed in a similiar way.
• No matter what page you’re visitng on the website you know you’re on the guardian online, because of the uniformity.

CONTRAST:

Although the website is uniform, contrast is used on its pages so that all the different elements are distinguishable.

• The navigation bar at the top of the page makes it very easy to find the topic you’re looking for and click through to more specifics (like the example above). The two navigation bars are distinguished by a light contrast in the background colour of the bottom bar.
• The top story is also distinguishable from the others, as the headline font used is larger and bolder. This catches the eye and makes the most important story easily recognisable.
• There are section down the side of the page which are all contained in boxes, which makes it easier to scan.
• Sections on the home page, like business and sport, are also separated from eachother by brightly coloured bold lines, which make it easy to scan down and find what you’re looking for.

HIERACHY:

The homepage of the gaurdian website establishes a hierachy, so the reader is drawn to the most important stories.

• Featured stories and blogs are all paired with a photo, which draws the reader in.
• The top story in the middle column always has a video or photo paired with it, to draw the reader to it.
• The most important story often doesn’t have a photo but has the largest and boldest font on the page which draws your eyes straight to it.
• As you scroll down the page the sections go from most important to least. They begin with the news of the day and go to sport and then culture and blogs, business and money and finally travel. Whatever requires the least amount of scrolling is obviously more important.

CONSISTENCY:

Consistency is extremely important for a website to brand it and create an online identity. It also helps with naviagting around the site, if the navigation bar across the top remains the same as you click thru to further sections.

• The Guardian uses the same naviagtion bar throughout its website, int he same location, so it’s easy to know where you are, where you can go and how you can get back.
• The guardian logo remains at the top of the screen on every one of its pages.
• Colours are used to differentiate sections and wherever you are on the site, these are the same.
• The feature stories that run down the side of the page change for each section you click into but they remain in the same formatting, contained within a grey square.
• The layout remains in the grid layout for each page, with three columns.

The guardian website provides an extremely comprehensive coverage of the news and not only provides a lot of useful content but is easy to navigate, ensuring people’s work is not lost on the computer illiterate. This website is one that people could truly turn to instead of the old newspaper, as it provides analysis, in depth coverage, podcats, videos and photos on almost every story. It captures the viewer and makes you want to return to see how the next story will be covered.

To experience the site for yourself visit www.guardian.co.uk

This week we’re taken to the big apple, New York, where the United Nations General Assembly is taking place. Splashed across the front pages of each participating countries papers are the issues surrounding their own leaders. K Rudd hit The Age headlines online after being called one of the most intelligent and well informed leaders of the world by highly esteemed former American President Bill Clinton. Pat on the back for you Ruddy. England’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown was on the guardian’s website for all the wrong reasons, apparently being ’snubbed’ by Barack Obama over private talks. But there were two stories that did not involve petty complaints and hoo ha. These were the gains made by US President Obama in the issues involving Iran and nuclear weapons. Positive talks were also held on climate change, in which India and China came to the bargaining table for the first time.

• UN General Assembly held in New York
• Gains made in the areas of sanctions on Iran and nuclear weapons.
• Talks held before the Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen at the end of the year.

As always, President Obama impressed the world, delivering speeches to packed out auditoriums. (Sadly the same couldn’t be said for our own K Rudd). Obama always seems to face issues head on and deliver responses that may not be easy but are realistic. He did this again when facing the explosive and sensitive issue of Iran.

Sanctions Against Iran

In a victory for the US and the world, Obama was able to convince Russia to consider more sanctions against Iran, if nucelar talks scheduled for next month failed to make any progress. This was another example of the way in which President Obama is setting himself apart from the Bush presidency, which had a missile defence program very threatening to Russia. The Russian President, Dimitri Medvedev, said “sanctions rarely lead to productive results, but in some cases, sanctions are inevitable.”

Do you think sacntions will help to disarm Iran? Join the discussion below.

It is yet to be seen of course whether these measures will go ahead and there has been talk that Russia only agreed to consider the sanctions after a softened missile program from the US. These factors may lead us tot hink that Russia doesn’t really believe  that sanctions solve anything (which history has shown). But the fact that the leaders are able to discuss these issues and come to some form of agreement, is a good sign.

Personally, I belive that if anyone can unite the world Obama can. He approaches situations with a level-head and does not neccesarily take into account past dealings with nations, willing to discuss matters with any nation. If leaders are willing to open up discussion the world could truly become a more peaceful place.

Below is President Obama’s address to the Assembly:

This week the US have woken up with shock. Obama is apparently not their saviour, the answer to all their problems, with his health care plan slammed by many critics. Obama’s presidency was always going to be a tough gig. With a war in Iraq and Afghanistan to fight and the economic crisis in full swing, he also had other things to deal with that the Bush presidency had failed to, like the backward health care system. Over the past weeks Obama has launched his assault on the system, one of his presidential campaign promises. But the unveiling of his plan has been met with many critics and people began to ask whether Obama could deliver the future they had hoped for (as unrealistic as that may have been). Personally I don’t think Obama was ever going to be able to live up to everyone’s expectations as some people seemed to expect the world from him. As for his health care plan, people often find change scary because it presents the unknown and decisions for the future don’t always look so good in the here and now.

Jimmy Carter’s take on the Criticism Given to Obama

Last week, former US president Jimmy Carter came out and slammed Obama’s critics for being racist. He stated that most of the criticism aimed at Obama’s healthcare reforms was based on racism and that there is an inherent sense in America that no African American should be president. Republicans have replied by insisting their opposition is policy based. The debate has raged in America and the White House is disputing critics are being fuelled by racism. It seems Carter’s comment was really quite unneccesary.

Do you think that the US is too racist to have faith in an African American president?

Do you think opposition to Obama’s healthcare reforms has been fuelled by racism? Leave a comment below.

To view Carter’s comments, watch the video below: 

This story seems to be a bit of a storm in a teacup, although it has struck up some interesting discussion. Online, the guardian has some interesting views on why Carter’s comments were a ‘no-win’ and how the comments were unsurpising as America was built on racism. The discussion tended to agree that some of the comments made against Obama were most likely fuelled by racism, but that all oponents to his plans could not be labelled this. It was also pointed out that there was no point pointing out this racism but instead trying to move forward without drawing attention to it. I would have to disagree with this, I think that if racist comments are made they should be outed as such. However, it seems no one has been openly racist enough to pin point it as such and so Carter’s comments are not really valid. I do believe that racism should not be tolerated but if it is always brought up in political discussion we will never move on from it. If race is not mentioned (as it shouldn’t be) then all people will begin to forget that it was ever a defining factor. If there is an issue with racism then it should be discussed but if it’s not so clear all I can think is to let it go. We can only hope politicians are educated enough not to be so small minded and to be a good example for the citizens of their country. Although from steve fielding’s example, (F-I-S-K-A-L) maybe an education is expecting a bit much.

With glitzy celebrity magazines taking over news stand racks and newspaper’s grappling for advertising in an increasingly competitive market, stories like the one told this week are increasingly few. Journalist’s putting their lives on the line to tell people’s stories and bring truth to the public. These are the crusaders who continue to investigate real stories of people in danger or in suffering, who deserve to have their stories told.

Another brave British journalist was captured last week, while trying to report on the war in Afghanistan. His name was Stephen Farrell, a New York Times journalist.

• NY Times journalist Stephen Farrell and Afghani interpreter, Sultan Munadi, captured by Taliban on September 5
• Rescued by British Special Forces on September 8
• Interpreter killed in crossfire between militants and insurgents

The journalist and his interpreter (an Afghan journalist for the times and other news organisations) were captured by militants last Saturday, after travelling to a village south of Kunduz, to report on the aftermath of NATO airstrikes on Friday that exploded two fuel tankers, hijacked by the taliban. NATO officials are investigating claims that 90 Afghan civilians were killed in the attacks.

Stephen and Sultan travelled to the area and got out to interview some people about the attacks. A crowd began to gather and they were warned that Afghani militants were coming. Soon they heard shouts and armed Taliban ran towards the group and abducted the two journalists. Their driver escaped on foot and finally made it to police in Kunduz. The Times were informed of the abduction on Saturday morning but kept the story quiet to ensure the journalists safety.

Early Wednesday morning, British and Afghan troops swept into the Taliban compound. Mr Farrell said they could hear the sound of approaching helicopters.

“We were all in a room, the Talibs all ran, it was obviously a raid,” Mr Farrell said.

“We thought they would kill us. We thought should we go out.”

Mr Farrell said that as they ran from the compound they could hear gunfire.

“There were bullets all around us. I could hear British and Afghan voices,” he said.

Mr Munadi was gunned down just a few paces ahead of Mr Farrell, who was able to jump into a bunker. It is unclear whose bullet Mr Munadi received.

This story gives me hope that journalists will continue to put their lives on the line to tell the stories of those that need to be heard. These journalists work, which everyday puts them in grave danger, is invaluable. On the New York Times website these journalists have blog posts, on the blog At War, telling the stories of people from the front line. They put a human face to the war we are fighting and make us think twice about the price we have forced the poeple of Afghanistan to pay. In Stephen Farrell’s latest post, he reports on the inhumanities of war, two Afghani children dead and unclaimed. These realities give us perspective on what is actually occurring in Afghanistan. They do not sensationalise the war, but give it a face we can relate to.

How important is it that journalists report from behind enemy lines?

Should journalists risk their lives to report? Add your opinion to the discussion below.

Coverage of the Story

When reading about this story the thing that I found most interesting was the little significance given to the death of the Afghan journalist that occurred during the rescue. Sultan Munadi was not just Mr Farrell’s interpreter, but a respected journalist for the times and other news organisations. He was a journalist who had studied abroad but found it extremely important to return home, to help his people.

On his last post on the blog At War, titled ‘Hell? No. I Won’t Go.” he wrote:

“I have passed the very darkest times of my country, when there was war and insecurity. I was maybe four or five years old when we went from my village into the mountains and the caves to hide, because the Soviets were bombing. I have passed those times, and the time of the Taliban when I could not even go to Kabul, inside my country. It was like being in a prison.

Those times are past now. Now I am hopeful of a better situation. And if I leave this country, if other people like me leave this country, who will come to Afghanistan? Will it be the Taliban who come to govern this country? That is why I want to come back, even if it means cleaning the streets of Kabul. That would be a better job for me, rather than working, for example, in a restaurant in Germany.

Being a journalist is not enough; it will not solve the problems of Afghanistan. I want to work for the education of the country, because the majority of people are illiterate. That is the main problem facing many Afghans. I am really committed to come back and work for my country.”

To lose such an inspiring man is a great loss. All I hope is that his work will be carried on by others inside Afghanistan in his honour, to turn around the situation there. All we can hope for is a stop to fighting and to unclaimed children’s bodies in morgues. He gives hope to this story.

This week we hit the troubled territory of Afghanistan, where polling booths opened last thursday (20/8), for the 2009 presidential elections.  

• Hamid Karzai, current president, expected to be re-elected
• last election held in 2004
• 41 candidates, up from 18 in last election 
• Obama sends another 4000 soldiers to Afghanistan

With American, and Australian troops for that matter, still in Afghanistan, these elections are meant to be some kind of victory for peace and democracy. But are they? Voters are down on the last election and it is expected that the current president, Hamid Karzai, will return to power, despite reports he has dissapointed people outside Kabul. To add to this, constant and very real threats of Taliban insurgents keep people away from polling booths. This doesn’t seem like a win for democracy but another excuse for the taliban to incite hatred and violence.

The polling booths may be open, but where are you Afghanistan?

There was plenty of coverage of the election when the polling booths first opened, but when I went to look for follow up information I was surprised to see there wasn’t much coverage of the progress of the election. Maybe it was because it had unfortunately dissolved into what we had expected? Or maybe we don’t like to see that despite the heroic efforts of our troops, and tragic losses, we have been unable to make much difference in Afghanistan? If you have an opinion of your own, please share it below.

I did find a few interesting opinion pieces on the online edition’s of the guardian, the age and UK’s, the times.

The Polling Booths are Empty

It is hardly surprising that few voters are turning out to vote in an election which could cost you your life. Just two days ago, a bomb killed six police, only a few days after a militant ambush disrupted voting in the same province. The ambush, launched by the taliban, left two police and 30 militants dead and managed to stop voting.

The head of the election commision, Azizulah Lodin, said

“We had to tell our people to save your (ballot) boxes and save yourselves.”

I wouldn’t go to the polling booths if my life was in danger. With a corrupt regime at the helm of their country, many Afghani’s also believe they are only banging their heads against a brick wall and that is not something you would risk your life for.

Do you think people should risk their lives to vote?

Should elections be held when they cause so much violence and loss of life? Join the discussion below.

Human Rights Abuses

Apart from the taliban, another hugely troubling issue in Afghanistan is human rights abuses. When Australia and America occupy Afghanistan and support an unstable government, we must question what kind of government we are supporting. It should not be enough that some form of democracy operates. Not when women are persecuted against everyday. To secure the Shiite vote, the Karzai government has approved laws which allow Shiite men to punish their wives for not meeting their sexual demands and puts women under the ownership of the men in their family. I understand Australia is trying to improve conditions in Afghanistan for the future, but how can we allow this behaviour and this suffering?

Watch the video below to learn more about the situation faced by Afghan women:

In a world where terrorism is society’s greatest fear, the last thing you expect to see in the paper is “terrorist released from prison”. But this week in Scotland, that’s exactly what happened, when the mastermind of the Lockerbie bombing was released. For those of you too young to know what the Lockerbie bombing was (like I am), here is a quick run down:

The Lockerbie Bombing

• In 1988 a terrorist bomb was denoted on Pan Am flight 103, killing 270 people. The aircraft was destroyed over the Scottish town of Lockerbie.
• Everyone on board was killed along with 11 people on the ground.
• Two Libyan men were charged with the bombing, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi and Al-Amin Khalifah Fhimah.
• In 2001, Megrahi is convicted of mass murder and sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 27 years. His co-accused is found not guilty.
• Just eight years later, Megrahi is released to return home to Libya and the Lockerbie disaster is splashed across the papers again.

Why was he released?

Megrahi was released on compassionate grounds as his health is in bad shape and he isn’t expected live for much longer. He has terminal prostate cancer that has progressed to a stage where he reporterdly, only has months, if not weeks, to live. He has returned to Libya to live with his wife and four children.

Outrage and Opinion

Not surprisingly, some members of the Obama administration and families of the bombing victims have expressed outrage at the compassionate release of the convicted mass murderer. However, it has also been argued that Megrahi could be innocent and lots of people in the UK do support his release. Most significantly, Hillary Clinton has spoken out against his release and even called the Scottish justice secretary, Kenny MacAskill, to ask that he remain detained. When so many people have been killed and the man who masterminded it is allowed to go free, I’m sure the UK were aware they would be creating a storm of controversy. But the UK has had a tradition of compassionate release. It is easy to understand why both his release would be supported and objected.

After already causing so much pain to the families of those dead, does Megrahi deserve to be freed if it will just cause more suffering?

Do you think compassion should be shown to a mass murderer? Voice your thoughts below.

Below, Hillary Clinton voices her opinion on the release.

Online Media Coverage

First prize for Online Media coverage of the story goes to the Guardian. The Guardian’s coverage was dynamic, engaging and just really interesting. It covered the issue properly from start to finish and I defy anyone to think of a scrap of worthwhile information they didn’t find on the Guardian’s site. And it wasn’t just all on there but it was easy to find too. As this was a big story in the UK, there was a lot more to report on then there was in Australia. The issue had a page devoted to it, from where the reader was able to navigate to different reports, opinion pieces, video’s and photo galleries. Because the bombings happened so long ago, you could see a timeline of everything that had happened since the bombing. There was also a q&a section, where the main points of the issue were explained. There was links to meaningful video’s, like diplomats press conferences, where they voiced their opinions and video’s of Megrahi’s return to Libya – things that really added to the reporting and didn’t just repeat in a video what was written. Below the headline of each article, the number of comments left on it was also shown and one had over 250 comments. This shows how easy the Guardian makes it for readers to leave there comments and also how engaging the content is, with so many people busting to give their opinion. The information was organised so well that it was easy to find everything but I didn’t feel bombarded (and it would have been easy to, because there was a lot of information).

This week we travel to Myanmar, where trapped pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, was sentenced by the Burmese military regime to further house arrest.

• Suu Kyi sentenced to 18 months house arrest
• Major world leaders call for her release
• Suu Kyi set to appeal sentence

The verdict was hardly a surprise – a further 18 months house arrest will take Suu Kyi out of the race for president just long enough for her to miss the next election, which will be held next year. There have been cries of condemnation from the leaders of the world, however no one is taking any hard and fast action. It has now been announced that Suu Kyi will appeal the sentence.

If you happened to miss the story, below is SBS’s report.

Do you think the international community should take action to free Suu Kyi? Join the discussion below.

As the story’s unfolded over the week, there have been plenty of angles to cover. Online, some sites have done better than others in engaging online readers in, what I think is a compelling story.

The Herald Sun’s Online Report:

The Herald Sun did a very unconvincing job of making this story interesting for online readers. The report posted online, the exact article that appeared in their newspaper and didn’t bother to add any links to previous articles (of which I’m sure there would be plenty). There weren’t any photos or chunking of information and this left the page looking bland and boring. There was an area to leave comments, but no one had left any. this could be because the article didn’t raise any direct questions or really invite comments. At the end of the article, readers could have been asked to comment on the story and what they thought of a certain aspect of it, which would have invited more discussion.

The Herald Sun’s bland report

A blog out of Washington, Political Daily:

Political Daily’s coverage of the story was more interesting than the Herald Sun’s. The coverage itself was more of a commentary on the situation and pointed out some interesting facts that had not been covered by other, traditional news stories. This more personal coverage of the story invited more discussion as people were provided a better forum to voice their opinions. Up the very top of the screen was a link called “join the discussion” and this invitation right at the top of the page tells the reader from the outset that the blogger wants your opinion. Comments had been left on the blog and they were all easy to view, under the main post. The only thing lacking was any sort of multimedia – an odd photo or video would have been nice.

The UK Times Online Coverage:

The Times online coverage of the Suu Kyi story was the most interesting and engaging I could find. The poms have really learnt to use the internet to its full capacity. The page had a photo gallery on it, which transitioned from photo to photo automatically. Running alongside the story was also links to other photo galleries and a box titled “The Times Recommends”, which contained related articles and opinion pieces. There was also another box with links to other related pages and further multimedia. All this culminated in an interesting page, on which many people had left comments – I must not have been the only one who liked The Times’ use of multimedia and links. The only thing really lacking was some good chunking, which would have made the article itself easier to read through; it took quite a few scrolls to reach the bottom of the page. A video could also have helped illustrate the story or its background. As a whole though I found this report the most interesting and engaging for an online reader.

Almost everyone would recognise the picture of missing Brit, Madeleine McCaan. After her absence from the news cycle she was back on the front page this week, with the claims that an Australian man is linked to her dissapearance. This first blog post will analyse the online media’s coverage of the story, on Australian news websites and in blogs.

The actual content of the stories on most websites was very similiar as this was a breaking news story, with very little initial information. However, the coverage of the story differed significantly on different sites. The Age and The Australian didn’t take advantage of the internet to convey the story. The Age report allowed people to comment on the article on twitter but didn’t publish these comments on the page. The only other medium used was a photo of the girl and was nothing new. Similiarly, The Australian’s article was not conducive to online as it appeared as a slab of text and had no links to other articles or even a photo. The Herald Sun’s coverage was more succesful with readers able to post comments on the page, creating a forum for discussion and interaction; but it didn’t reach the heights of reporting by news.com.au or the Courier Mail. News.com’s coverage included bullet points of important information and links to previous articles, along with comments from readers. The Courier Mail had these elements along with a multimedia package from sky news, reporting the story. The package was interesting and added a different element for readers but information in the story was repeated in the package, making one or the other redundant. The package could have instead showed how the investigation has played out and why it has led to Australia now.

The story was also reported on a missing children’s blog. The blog was very interesting as it used different elements to illustrate the story. It included a map of where key sightings of Madeleine have occurred, since she was abducted and also had links to other reports on the story and previous reports, which would be useful for people needing more background information. It also had testimonials from her parents which were interesting to read. It was good to get a more personal angle from the blog, rather than the news stories featured on other sites.