Majority of bloggers call themselves journalists
On his Journalistics blog, Jeremy Porter assessed a recent PRWeek/PR Newswire survey on blogging and online journalism. Attitudes in both arenas are shifting fast, and this year’s results are markedly different than 2009’s. The highlight is that 52 percent of bloggers now consider themselves journalists. It’s not clear whether that’s because more traditional journalists have blogs or because bloggers are wielding more influence and becoming more established.
Porter tried to tease out what made the two identities different.
… 91 percent of bloggers use blogs and social networks “always” or “sometimes” for research (compared to 35 percent for newspapers). Put differently, most blogs rely on other bloggers — and anybody they find on social networks — as sources. This is part of the reason accurate and misinformation spreads quickly online — many bloggers copy each other.
…
Talking specifics, the study found that 64 percent of bloggers and 36 percent of online reporters use Twitter as a research tool for stories, but only 19 percent of newspaper reporters and 17 percent of print magazine reporters use this social medium as a research. Does this signal a lack of sophistication and comfort with social media among traditional journalists, or do they know something bloggers don’t, like the best sources aren’t found in a sea of tweets? It’s probably a mixture of both.
And here’s a quick summary of the more interesting survey results. Sentences have been edited for brevity and coherence, but most of it is taken directly from the press release.
- Over 70% of respondents in this year’s survey indicate a heavier workload as compared to last.
- 62% are required to write for online news sections, with 39% contributing to their publication’s blog.
- 37% of U.S. journalists also now must maintain a Twitter feed.
- 31% of respondents indicated that “staff cuts/layoffs” most affected their jobs over the past three years,significantly higher than 2009 (22%).
- When asked if building a personal brand was a consideration in their work, the majority of U.S. (52%) media (60%) responded either “extremely important” or “important.”
- Only 20% of bloggers derive the majority of their income from their blog work; a 4% increase from 2009.
- While 91% of bloggers and 68% of online reporters “always” or “sometimes” use blogs for research, only 35% of newspaper and 38% of print magazine journalists suggested the same.
- Overall, 33% of respondents indicated using social networks for research, but blogger usage (48%) was greater than newspaper (31%) and print magazine (27%).
- PR professionals still consider e-mail to be the most effective means for pitching journalists (74%), 43% of journalists report having being pitched through social networks compared to 31% in 2009.
AHCJ member founds local health news site
AHCJ member Dave Gulliver, formerly of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, launched the nonprofit Sarasota Health News late Wednesday night. In less than 24 hours, he posted five stories, including a feature, a computer-assisted piece and plenty of breaking news.
After being laid off in February, Gulliver said he looked around and saw that many important stories, including the watchdog and health business reports in which he had specialized, were going unreported.
“There are great stories that need to be told, that need to be written, and I thought I can still do those,” Gulliver said. “I don’t need a printing plant to do the job.”
Dave Gulliver
He may no longer depend upon the printing press, but Gulliver now relies on something else: community support.
“For now, investigative reporting and news reporting – at least on the Internet – doesn’t have the commercial viability, but there seems to be a lot of philanthropic support out there so I decided to go [the nonprofit] route,” Gulliver said. “I’m fortunate that I live in Sarasota, Fla. which is a pretty progressive community. There are a lot of people out there willing to support a venture like this.”
Sarasota Health News hews to a more traditional news format rather than a more informal, blog-like approach because that’s where Gulliver’s experience lies.
“I think you have to do something to stand out from what’s already out there,” Gulliver said. “I had to go with what my strength was and what would stand out a little bit. It’s what I was doing before, it was really well received, and there’s still an audience for it.”
Gulliver said his content would ultimately depend on what that audience was looking for, but that he would focus on general health care with a heavy focus on watchdog, investigative and explanatory work.
“People really don’t know what’s going on under the hood of health care and I think they really want to know that,” Gulliver said.
Researchers study health bloggers, form community
Last fall, a trio of researchers from the Rijeka School of Medicine in Croatia published a paper examining that peculiar class of people who may be loosely described as health bloggers. Their survey queried 197 English-language medical blogs and they included questions designed to evaluate bloggers’ Internet and blogging habits, blog characteristics, blogging motivations, and, finally, their demographics.
“Medical blogs are frequently picked up by mainstream media; thus, blogs are an important vehicle to influence medical and health policy.”
The results were published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research and found that “medical bloggers are highly educated and devoted blog writers, faithful to their sources and readers. Sharing practical knowledge and skills, as well as influencing the way other people think, were major motivations for blogging among our medical bloggers. Medical blogs are frequently picked up by mainstream media; thus, blogs are an important vehicle to influence medical and health policy.”
Two of the researchers also formed the Health Blogs Observatory, which they call an online community, and published a directory. Ed Silverman reached out to Ivor Kovic, an emergency physician, about the survey and their hopes for their observatory. Find out more about the project.
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