Wordblog

The plan is that fairly quickly Suffolk Post (I have not mentioned the name of the local news and info site before) will employ journalists. The first will probably be freelance but before any can be recruited there will have to be income and that means advertising salespeople.

But the site (you don’t even need to do a spreadsheet to see this) will depend heavily on contributed material which is uploaded by the writers for final checking before publishing.

The scale of of this was underlined in a post last year when I quoted, Keith Harrison, deputy editor of the Express & Star, Wolverhampton, telling  journalism.co.uk:

If you promise ultra-local, you’ve got to be able to deliver it. The number of journalists we have [60] is huge compared with many other regional papers — but, even with that many, we can’t deliver ultra-local news all the time. To do it, we’re going to need another 500 reporters - we can’t take them on, they’re going to need to be citizen journalists.

I am using the term contributors because I think few of those who I hope will provide content would think of themselves as journalists. So the phrase “citizen journalists” is being avoided.

Most will be people who already send items about their club, association, parish council, business or anything else to newspapers, parish magazines, trade mags and a host of other outlets. They will have more in common with PR people than journalists.

I hope local bands will post video clips as well as stories and gigs listings. Earlier this year when I was still teaching I noticed the largest numbers of hits on a student news site were coming from a “band of the week” feature. Clearly, word-of-mouth was bringing an audience to the site.

The contributors will, I believe, not only provide content but also market the site telling friends and neighbours where to see their reports and get information.

A pub landlord who posts a story about a fund raising event will be acting out of an interest in telling the community as well as promoting the hostelry. If the pub has a music night it may be the the landlord or the band that posts details in the listings section.

Much of the content will come from people seeking publicity for one reason or another. More will come from people who feel strongly about something and some will come from those who want to be journalists and see Suffolk Post as a way of getting started.

Young people may see a chance to do something in the community which will be fun and look good on university and job applications.

I think we will need to do more for these contributors than provide them with a vehicle for publication. It is clear from advertisements that there are a lot of people around who want to improve their writing skills.

This is why an important part of Suffolk Post will be a writing guide for registered users. There will be sections on writing news, features, reviews, taking picture and shooting video. FAQs including the difference between “its” and “it’s” and few examples of dangling modifiers will be there to help. A forum will be used to discuss writing and establish a feeling of belonging.

Direct feedback to individual contributors with praise and suggestions will also be essential and the editor’s blog will include praise too. The contributors will need to feel they are receiving useful training.

This, of course, is in the interests of the site — intros like, “Members and guests gathered at…” are not going to work on the web. The site will have to establish a culture of good writing that quickly gets to the point.

I am sure that here is much more that can be done to support contributors and  create a community. Suggestions will be welcome.