Tag Archives: martinbelam

The app that bridges them all, also a future for journalism?

Martin Belam:

Georgi Kobilarov illustrated the difference that aggregated linked data should make in the lives of people. He said that on his smartphone, he can download apps from Qype and Yelp and Foursquare and any number of data providers about listings or venues, using geolocation to tailor the content to where he is. But he doesn't want to have to check a multitude of data sources to find out what to do. He doesn't care about the apps themselves, or the app provider, he cares about the information that will help him plan his evening. He wants an app that bridges them all, and uses information from Facebook and Twitter to say 'There is a pretty lousy bar around the corner, but two of your old high school friends are there, so it is probably your best bet right now'.

The news and journalism version: "Accident has happened in a remote location, you have friends currently on vacation there… send them a message on Facebook to see if they are ok?"

Source

"Websites that surprise and delight us": The future of web design

Martin Belam:

There is a lot of excitement around HTML5's ability to embed video directly in the page without having to use Flash or Silverlight as a wrapper, but personally, as an information architect on a news site, it is new tags like <header>, <nav>,

and <time> which look immediately useful to me.

This is absolutely the case and the significance of improvements like these are being completely ignored. Prospective online and multimedia journalists should take note!

External link

Del.ici.us tags: html5 webdesign martinbelam

Do journalists need to learn to be programmers? Yes. And no. – Martin Belam

    Martin Belam hits the nail on the head:

    "I've yet to see a software developer stand up and say that "citizen coders" will inevitably devalue the work that they do, and lead to job losses and a lack of quality in the sector.

    [...]

    The second thing is the whole premise itself – do journalists need to be able to program?

    I think the ability to mark-up some HTML and understand why <span>, <div>, classes and IDs are important for CSS and Javascript is essential for anyone publishing in the web.

    But my answer is that no, journalists don't all need to be able to write program, but the ability to think like a programmer is an invaluable skill."

    Question remains, which is the best way to teach someone to think like a programmer?

    Whilst I was at Teesside University we ditched Dreamweaver for CMS/template based design, and we're about to enter the same discussions at Bournemouth University over the summer. Looking forward to it ;)

    External link

    Del.ici.us tags: journalists practice webdesign programming future martinbelam

Martin Belam: "Journalism in the digital age: trends, tools and technologies"

A social media and digital General Election timeline – Martin Belam

    A social media and digital General Election timeline – Martin Belam

    Excellent digital election timeline by Martin Belam.

    "There has already been plenty of heated debate about whether this is going to be seen as the 'digital election' or the 'social media election'. I've been compiling a Dipity timeline of interesting bits of the digital campaign.

    [...]

    I'm interested in digital and social media activities by political parties, innovation from news organisations, and interesting election related web content and applications from any source.

    If you spot something you think I should include during the General Election campaign, then please leave a comment here, drop me an email at martin.belam@currybet.net, or message me on Twitter – @currybet."

    Del.ici.us tags: election2010 martinbelam campaign history timeline