Introduction to Blogging and Science Journalism

•Blogging 101

•Twitter 101

•Science Journalism

•Homework

Outline

•Blog = web + log

•Originally was used more as an online journal

•Updated frequently

•Implies a community (writers AND readers)

•Promotes collaboration

•A resource (just like our class blog is!)

•Reverse Chronological entries (blog posts)

•Effective E-Portoflio i.e. business card!

What is a blog?

ALES 204 blog

NOTE:

What is Twitter?

How to Use Twitter

•Send class tweets to me, @JessL

•Use our class hashtag, #ALES204

Twitter for ALES 204

Use your laptop, smart phone, friend’s laptop etc… to:

•Tweet me something that you just learned about twitter.

Remember, send to me (@JessL) and use our class hashtag

Pop Quiz

•It is a branch of journalism that uses reporting to convey information about science topics to the public.

•The communication of scientific knowledge through mass media requires a special relationship between the world of science and news media, which is still just beginning to form.

•Read more on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_journalism

What is Science journalism?

They must

“render the very detailed, specific and often jargon-laden information produced by scientists into a form that the average

media consumer can understand and appreciate, while still communicating the

information accurately.”

What are science journalists?

Example: At the Intelligent Systems for Molecular Biology meeting in July 2009, 1400 researchers came togetherHardly any maintained lengthy face-to-face contact…instead,They tweeted and blogged about:•research as it was presented•followed parallel sessions •provided an opportunity for researchers not at the meeting, as well as a far wider community, to actively participate

Interestingly, the “virtual coverage” of the conference was so complete, that it was used to write an authoritative conference summary published in PLoS Computational Biology: http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000263

Social Media and Science Journalism

•“a Project that basically puts action where the mouth is,” i.e. instead of blogging the 'eek, oh my, what's happening to the news media world?' – it is instead an ambitious and pragmatic attempt at getting the next generation of science journalists well equipped with some solid science and new media skills

•It promotes professional best practice and is seeking to implement a transparent advertising revenue exchange programme

New Science Journalism Project

With a partner or in a group of 3:

Visit the New Science Journalism Project, choose a tag (energy, environment, health) and read a couple of articles

Discuss them with your partner/in your group

Each person in the group must then tweet (@JessL):

a short synopsis of each article (one tweet per article)

why the New Science Journalism project is important (@JessL and @nsjproject)

Activity

New Science Journalism

Come to next class having read:

Public Library of Science (PLoS): http://blogs.plos.org/blogosphere/

Scientopia: http://scientopia.org/blogs/

Not Exactly Rocket Science:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/

Homework