Learning something doesn’t always mean learning something

The election is over. It seems like only yesterday when the country united to tell The Conservatives that we kinda wanted them in power but not enough to give them anything to really brag about. But whilst we all got lost in the excitement of who would get the opportunity to pull the country out of the ground and then run it back in for shits and giggles, I was in the middle of researching a local candidate by the name of John Hemming. Hemming was, and still is, the MP for Birmingham Yardley, representing the Liberal Democrats with a face made for a Spitting Image puppet and a stronghold over his loyal constituents. I researched his name, his past, his voting patterns within the House of Commons, subscribed to his blog, and what did I learn in the end?

Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero. Fuck -fucking- all.

In my naive stupidity leading up to the big May 6th political massacre of 2010, I was excited to be able to learn about the candidates in my given area and follow them via their social media platforms. That was a mistake. Turns out, politicians can’t all be as down and with it as Tom Watson MP of West Bromwich East. Of all six candidates representing Lib Dem, Labour, Conservative, the British National Party, the United Kingdom Independence Party and the National Front (oh my…), not one had a Twitter account, and only one made use of Facebook: Lynnette Kelly of Labour. No Twitter for her (if you google ‘Lynnette Kelly twitter’, the closest result is one of my tweets related to her), and her usage of the Facebook page and her personal blog died on, you guessed it, May 6th. Hemming had a blog and a personal website but updates are few and far between on the blog, whilst the website reminds me of my youthful early teen years when Geocities was all the rage. The times; politicians haven’t caught up just yet.

You’d also be surprised at how little online information there is about candidates in small areas, especially when targeting specific areas of interest such as the environment. Other than using TheyWorkForYou to discover how Hemming has voted during his time in power, and numerous stories of scandal and sleaze related to the BNP (I know, you’re as stunned as I wasn’t), it was almost impossible to discover anything from concrete sources whether using Google, party websites or social networking in any capacity below putting in some effort.

Looking back, I handled it all wrong. I messed up. I screwed up. I fuc… you get it. Sadly, I didn’t. Here’s why.

When you’re an online journalism student, everything seems quite easy in the early going because you are effectively using the internet almost exclusively. Tweets, blogs, searches, podcasts, audioboos, you name it, we cover it. We find news stories on various websites we saved in our Delicious folders and fed into our Google Readers. Then, we republished them with a new slant using social mediums and online contacts. Those stories made it onto our online news website for our online readers to view, and repeat ad nauseum until the end.

When you’re an online journalism student, doing online journalism, you must always, ALWAYS remember the real world. People always talk about how much influence the internet has over society and how popular and ground-breaking and life-changing it all is. But is it, though? Paul Morris didn’t think so. Meirion Jenkins didn’t think so. Lynnette Kelly only thought so until she lost. John Hemming thinks so… but only just. Sometimes, the news is simply not going to come to you just because of what we, as the internet, think of the internet. I didn’t learn from what Simon Jenner told me at the very start of this entire module; the most important thing about social media and having an online presence is going out and creating relationships in the flesh. Who else did what I did? Who else went searching for information on their candidates over the internet and found nothing? Wouldn’t it have been great had I gone out, met these people, collected information and audio snippets and pictures and videos and put them online so that there was no longer a hole where open information should have been? Hindsight is 20/20 and upon reflection, so much more could have been done on my part. I wrote many times about going out and being the story, and engaging with people. I didn’t do it. I hoped that the story would notify me through Facebook, reply to me on Twitter and pop up on Google. Of course, it didn’t. Why would it?

I say that I didn’t learn anything but I think I have, even if it is at my own expense. I’ve written on this blog about building communities, finding stories and being more than a good writer. We can add one more thing to that list: where there is nothing, make something. If that means going out into the real tangible world, gathering information that is not actively available online, and then uploading it all yourself, that’s what you should do. The internet is an open world of freedom – freedom to information, freedom to opinion, freedom to knowledge. The internet in its current form, however, is only a snapshot of what is really going on out there. Look out of your window: is your garden on the internet? Are your flowers on the internet? Is your walk down the road on the internet? Not everything is on the internet, but that’s just more reason to go out, find those gaps and fill them yourself.

Every week, we learnt about what new and exciting websites and tolls could be used to gather information – websites to talk, read, argue, agree; sites to ask, request, share, discover. I made the foolish mistake of thinking that everything was here for me to, pardon the environmental pun, recycle. It isn’t. Were I smart, there would be whole pages telling you everything you need to know about BNP candidate Tanya Lumby. Now, there may never be. I approached it wrong, and if I could have done it all over again, there would be Yahoo Pipes and word clouds flying out of my pants with information. Again, I missed a trick there.

It may seem like these blogs are nothing but a guy beating himself up about mistakes. They are pretty much just that. But I also note them not just for my own reflection, but on the off-chance that the class of 2010-2011 will also read this and take heed for next year.

Well, if they can afford to…

5 days of… nah. EnFri-roment… nope. The one where I do things on a Friday for five weeks… maybe.

At this stage of the Online Journalism module, about halfway through thus far, it’s easy to start feeling the excitement of writing about the environment every week waning, drifting away as you desperately claw towards your computer in the hope that – by some divine intervention – the journo-God of inspiration will slap the keyboard into your lazy little face until six paragraphs of enviro-excellence and a page full of Delicious links magically appear on the screen. It rarely happens that way, though; the higher being almost certainly ends up being your own two hands violently launching your head towards the keys but purposefully missing and smashing it into a solid brick wall. Still, as long as the story is written, the tweets are tweeted, and the Delicious links are as plentiful as they are tasty, that’s all that matters.

In actuality, though, it’s not that simple. As I wrote in a previous blog post, online journalism is no longer about just writing stories. There are so many more things to consider: Twitter searches, blog searches, comments, conversations, links, community building, etc and so forth. You may be able to blag your way around six lines of bulls**t for a newspaper article, but you’re wide open in the social media world for everyone to see. If you’re not up to scratch, people will leave you behind without a second thought.

With this in mind, I asked myself if I’m doing enough with social media to really make a difference. What separates me from everyone else on the Birmingham Recycled website, or any other website in the world? Well clearly, they are all working hard and forming stories that mean something to their audience. Some of them know what they’re talking about. A select few even practise what they write. I feel like I’m doing none of those. So why not do all three?

Thus, my idea…

One day each week, for five weeks, in which I, Mitchell A. Jones, dedicate my life to the environment. Each week will be dedicated to a different aspect of the environment, possibly all five categories listed on B’ham Recycled or potentially limited to just conservation (although the former would be more fun). For just one day, via the use of tweets, a live blog, photos, video, audio and an eventual full recap on the main website, I would chronicle my life as someone who clearly knows sweet FA about anything, blossoming throughout the day until the caterpillar turns into a beautiful butterfly at the end of the night.

And that’s the last time I will ever refer to myself as a butterfly.

There are lots of exciting possibilities for the challenge – one clear example being that the use of Twitter could allow me to interact with people who may wish to join me and do something similar, or maybe even suggest new ideas, or even lead me out into the wild to meet them in person so that we can share our experience together. This isn’t chasing a story; this is me creating a new story, and even being the story. And you would be the story too. There’s too much emphasis on looking around at blogs and RSS feeds to find news. In reality, we can all be the news if we use the tools at our disposal as a platform to join and create.

A couple of students had a great idea for something similar, in that they are creating their own news. Clearly, their idea is much better because it’s focused and organic, but that doesn’t mean that I should give up on my idea. On the contrary, I have given myself a week or two for fine-tuning and finding the USP to focus my efforts on. Once I know where I stand, I’ll begin to walk. Boy, aren’t I doing well with the metaphorical jargon tonight.

I do know one thing through this, though: I’m great at alliteration.

But also, I’m bored of rewriting stories like I’m a Daily Mail journalist salivating outside the BBC head office for the slightest hint of disarray. At this point, as we hit the 45 heading towards 90, the realisation of online journalism is hitting home. This isn’t what journalism is, and I’ve done a really poor job of being one. So I want to learn. I want to get better. Why shouldn’t I share that process with you? Maybe you’ll teach me something as well.

And that’s the secret to keeping online journalism fresh and relevant. That, and a social life. But hey – we can’t have everything.

FOUR social media tips I’ve learnt this year

Given that we’ve only just hit the third of twelve long and often tedious months on the yearly calendar, my online journalism course has offered up a surprising amount of excitement with two Friday-morning coffee trips and an e-mail inbox full of registration confirmations to new websites. With all the work that we as a class are doing on Birmingham Recycled, our lecturer has added an extra dimension to our learning process by throwing us out into the real world and encouraging us to broaden ourselves beyond good writing of good stories. Social media is more than reporting on stories online with a link posted to a Twitter account; it’s about communities, networking and bridging the gap between the journalist and the consumer. These are the four key points that I feel that I’ve learnt over the past few weeks:

1) “Build your community one person at a time.”

When Sian Jones and I spoke to Simon Jenner of the Urban Coffee Company, he uttered a single line that stuck with me without even needing to write it down to remember verbatim. A community is not built overnight, nor can it ever please all people all the time. Every community needs to start with one person and slowly build on that. If one person finds your blog, entice them to read and respond. Reply to their response. Encourage more from them and then use that to pull another person into reading and responding. Do it over and over again. The more you focus on people as people instead of as a letter, number or demographic, the more that they will feel a part of your community and want to engage with you within it. A large, broad audience is a gift that so few can obtain without putting in the hard work to make everyone feel special as an individual within a group, and this is something that I have to remember whenever I post a tweet, a blog post or a news story.

2) “Being a good writer is not enough any more.”

Journalists are not just pen-pushing word repeaters. Arguably, they never were. A journalist can come in all shapes and sizes, doing things that people would never associate with the tradition use of the word “journalism.” A picture is worth a thousand words and a word can generate a thousand pictures, but the delivery is key. An Audioboo can convey the emotion of a story much like a tweet can condense a novel for the few into a sentence for the many. When you write for the masses, encourage the masses to write for you. Engage, interact and build. And then keep on building. A good spellchecker and a swallowed Thesaurus doesn’t mean a thing if no one cares about what you’ve written. Why do you think that Charlie Brooker is as revered as he is? The writing isn’t exactly William Blake but his readers don’t care because it reaches out to them and the Guardian comments section, plus his use of Twitter, allow them to respond and converse not only with him but with each other as well. This is what we should aspire for, but without so many masturbation gags. Unless that’s your thing.

3) “I am social media.”

When you are asked to attend an event in-person – the Birmingham Social Media Cafe, for example – it’s probably wise to introduce yourself calmly and professionally, as opposed to a mock-shout of “I am social media.” That someone was kind enough to walk past and respond “Hi, social media” saved the moment from being a complete embarrassment, but it’s best to keep things low-key and in order. Similarly, whilst a conversation about the difference between American and British culture is considered charming, a heated debate concerning the semen of The Invisible Man is not, no matter how valid the discussion is (and it really is).

4) Face-to-Face

It does, however, raise a serious and interesting point about the true value of social media. No matter how many blog posts, baby pictures and tea-time podcasts you record, humans are programmed by nature to converse in person. Nothing can replace a face-to-face interaction with other people, no matter how hard Google and Skype will try to convince us otherwise. The easiest way to earn trust from those in your community is to go out and meet them; attend gatherings, arrange coffee meetings, go round to their homes and cook them dinner if you must. Make your presence known in the real world and be as open and honest as you can be. If people know that they can trust you, they will be far more receptive and loyal to you. Nothing is more personable than a person, so get it out there.

Environmental? Well I’m a little crazy but I wouldn’t go that far…

Last week, a group of online journalism students from Birmingham City University were asked to meet in a cafe in Birmingham, armed with our fancy laptops and overpriced hand-held computer bricks with unlimited texts and a 3G network that barely works at the best of times, let alone in an underground coffee bunker. We were given the name of a social media ‘expert’ and told to go and find them for an in-person chat. Sian and I ran around the city with nothing but Twitter and our own intuition, eventually finding our hunted treasure for a brief meeting about his Urban Coffee company and how the use of social media can help businesses and people in general. The audioboo of said meeting is here.

So it makes sense, in the light of our hard work, that we have been punished rewarded with co-editor roles for Birmingham Recycled. As our specialised area is conservation (as opposed to conversation or constipation, the latter of which I could probably write a book on at this precise moment) we have been given the authority to lead the group on our respective seminar days (Sian on Mondays, myself on Fridays) which entails… well, I’m not quite sure, actually. What does an editor do, exactly? More to the point, what does an editor do when their knowledge on the topic at hand is limited at best?

It’s tough to psych yourself into something you know very little about. When there’s additional responsibility thrown on top of that, it makes it almost impossible to think about your next move. The environment isn’t on the list of conversation starters during my day (it’s rare to watch a mucky movie and wonder how eco-friendly the scenery is, for example) but that doesn’t mean I can’t learn and do a good job at this. Sian has already began working exceptionally hard on keeping her team up to date with new stories and potential leads, which leaves me with the unenviable task of keeping up which I shall begin with a vigour on Friday when I meet my team and ask them to join hands for a collective prayer of hope and, if not too much to ask for, a miracle or two.

By the end of the week, I hope that my outlook will have changed. With any luck, by Friday afternoon I’ll be able to blog once more about what has been discussed and concluded during our seminar. I shall keep you abreast of the latest developments both here and on Twitter. It’s a daunting task but one that has the potential to not only reflect well on Sian and I (on paper and in our grades) but also to develop our understanding and appreciation of conservation and social media, and that’s what this is all about… right?

BSMTH Boo

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Simon Jenner on social media

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Online Journalism Intro

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