Hi everyone, I'm Stuart Clarke (or Disco Stu or Maverick depending on where you meet me), Community Editor at Flightglobal.com, and I'm here to convince you that this is the most exciting time to work in journalism. Okay, so maybe I am mixing up exciting with uncertain, but to me this is a fascinating period in journalism where, as Tim Relf suggests, the journalist can be free to bring in their personality to interact directly with their users, using the latest technologies to inform in new and exciting ways.
My job revolves around daily interaction with our audience and this relationship can be exciting and exasperating in equal measure, but it can never be characterised as dull. Working as a Community Editor is no different than speaking to people down the pub with similar interests so you have to be open to criticism, transparent in the debate and always promoting collaboration.
For too long there has been an assumption that we as news providers are the authority, that user generated content (a term that I think sounds like some kind of science experiment) is dismissed as inaccurate hullabaloo that exists outside or on the fringes of the news agenda.
The community though is that agenda; they are our audience that buys our products or are affected by the latest news. You don't write things in the hope that one person out there will like it, so what is the problem with listening to the hopes and concerns of the people you are providing for to form what you write about.
And with this I move to technology, the thing that Adam actually asked me to talk about. The use of technology is also such an exciting part of working on the web. There really is a movable feast of widgets, infographics and applications out there to explore to make information delivery more dynamic and exciting.
What surprises me is the amount of fear that exists in this industry about these technologies.Part of this fear comes from an ever growing workload and lack of having time to explore new things, both fears that i accept completely. The fear i don't understand revolves around the democratisation that blogging and Twitter brings,meaning that any Tom, Dick or Disco Stu can be a journalist, making good, sound journalism obsolete.
But these technologies are only platforms and won't in themselves strike the death knell of journalism. The sound principles of journalism will always exist; the quality will always shine through. The fall will occur however if we don't adopt these new things quickly, if we don't follow the trends and see how these new technologies best fit our organisation. If nothing else, these new technologies provide an exceptionally exciting opportunity for those willing to take that leap.
The key right now is to keep providing good content that is applicable and useful to your users. Proving this is pivotal our brand's future successes.
What surprises me is the amount of fear that exists in this industry about these technologies.Part of this fear comes from an ever growing workload and lack of having time to explore new things, both fears that i accept completely. The fear i don't understand revolves around the democratisation that blogging and Twitter brings,meaning that any Tom, Dick or Disco Stu can be a journalist, making good, sound journalism obsolete.
But these technologies are only platforms and won't in themselves strike the death knell of journalism. The sound principles of journalism will always exist; the quality will always shine through. The fall will occur however if we don't adopt these new things quickly, if we don't follow the trends and see how these new technologies best fit our organisation. If nothing else, these new technologies provide an exceptionally exciting opportunity for those willing to take that leap.
The key right now is to keep providing good content that is applicable and useful to your users. Proving this is pivotal our brand's future successes.
