By Steven Roll
ASBPE President
In a recent speech delivered via Twitter BusinessWeek.com’s John A. Byrne (@JOHNABYRNE) emphasized that the next phase of journalism will require editors and writers to get readers involved with every step of the process, from generating story ideas to filling in the missing details of a published story.
For example, Byrne said that when one of BW’s editors did a story early last year about Twitter, he tweeted the topic sentences and asked “tweeps” (his followers on Twitter) to fill in the rest. “This created terrific engagement among readers, seeded an audience for the story, and was truly innovative, Byrne said.
Part of being an editor or writer today, he noted, is learning how to create and build communities and then how to serve them.
One of BW’s editors did this last year with a story called “Social Media Will Change Your Business.” He created the story by asking readers of his blog to comment about what had changed about a story he had written three years ago on the same topic. The result was that all of that interaction was used to inform the reporting of the story and the end result really resonated, Byrne said.
Another reason why reader engagement is so important, Byrne said, is that it helps editors make better editorial judgments. “Most journalists get their respect and their reinforcement from colleagues — not the people who consume their writing. We need to understand the people we’re writing for and open up the process of journalism to improve our ability to serve them.”
Despite all of the turmoil and pain in the industry, this is an incredibly exhilarating time in journalism, Byrne said. “Never before have journalists had access to so many tools to perform their jobs more creatively than now. Never before have journalists had the advantage of having their own printing presses to do their own thing. We’ve spent too much time whining about the changes out there and not enough time taking advantage of the new opportunities.”
“You can become an entrepreneur. You can engage your readers as true partners. You can change the very nature of journalism,” Byrne concluded.
Journalism and Web 2.0 are beginning to make more sense to those participating in #editorchat on Twitter from 8:30 to 10 p.m. on Wednesdays. #editorchat is one of the many group discussions on various topics are held on Twitter during the week.
Why the funny looking title? You follow the dialogue on Twitter by doing a search for the term “#editorchat.” Because Twitter provides live search results, responses to the conversation pop up as they are made. Tracking the discussion in this manner also helps to avoid having to wade through tweets that are not part of #editorchat.
See you on #editorchat next Wednesday!
Follow me on Twitter at @b2beditor.