ProPublica has put up a new graphic that shows at a glance where members of Congress stand on gun rights and gun control. Using the now-standard red and blue tints to indicate party affiliation, Republican or Democrat, the graphic shows the NRA’s ratings for both Senate and House members, NRA contributions to each member, and how they voted on the previous assault weapons ban. It’s timely, useful and clear as a bell.  The source of the data for each tab is also clearly noted. Nicely done.

Video journalist Anne Herbst firmly believes in preparation. She does research on stories before leaving the newsroom. She shows up to assignments early so she can meet people and figure out in advance who might be a strong character. And she writes fast–an essential skill when you’re working by yourself and you have to do it all. Herbst is a former TV news photojournalist for KUSA-TV in Denver who now works for the Denver Post, where she shoots, writes and sometimes voices her own stories. She’s able to write fast, she says, because she logs every bit of her video. But that’s not her only trick for writing in a hurry. She also uses her smart phone to help her write on the go. Herbst started writing stories while she was still in local TV because she saw where things were going in the news business. She encourages photojournalists to write VO/SOTs and urges reporters to take out a camera and learn to use it. “You want to be able to do everything,” Herbst says. “I learned it before I had to.” Something else Herbst has learned: how to do interviews when working alone. “Have a person lean on something […]

Contributed by Stephen Hess Many young journalists must wonder what their careers are going to look like. Although the profession will undoubtedly change in significant and unpredictable ways in a digital world, looking back on a generation of journalists offer clues into your future. In Whatever Happened to the Washington Reporters, 1978-2012, I report on the lives of the 450 Washington reporters I first surveyed in 1978. With my students at George Washington University and my interns at the Brookings Institution, we located 90% of them between 2006 and 2011, and re-interviewed 283. We found them in 19 states in addition to the Washington area, as well as Australia, New Zealand, Italy, France, and the UK. So our findings reflect more than the Washington job market. The biggest surprise may be that you are apt to be a journalist-for-life! When I started interviewing in 1977, journalists claimed “I’ll stay til my legs go.” This referenced the high energy level of the job. But also the low pay. When you start worrying about how to pay your kids’ college tuition, it’s time to remove to public relations, or some other occupation where you can cash in on your skills, knowledge, and contacts. But […]

Words have power and the most powerful word in a sentence should come last.  I could have written: Words have power and the last word should be the most powerful one in a sentence. But that would have put the emphasis on “sentence” when I wanted to stress “last.” See the difference? Sometimes, this kind of writing just happens because it’s the way we speak, but often it’s the result of careful revision. Remember that what you write for broadcast isn’t a script at first, it’s a draft.  Make sure to save some time to review and revise what you’ve written and you’ll wind up with a stronger story. And when you do revise, edit backward. Look closely at the ends of sentences. Have you ended with the word that conveys the most meaning? Or have you allowed an unnecessary phrase to sneak in and steal your thunder? A few examples from stories I’ve seen: “They gave up and left the area.” Why not just stop at “left?” “The chrysanthemum show featured 51 varieties of the flower.” Pray tell, what else would it have featured varieties of? Kill “of the flower.” “After fighting breast cancer for 20 years, she died […]

It can take a huge amount of time and effort to build an interactive graphic that’s both visually engaging and informative. That’s why many news organizations only make the effort for projects that will have a long shelf life. CNN made the investment for a long-term project called Home and Away that chronicles casualties from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It’s basically two connected maps–one showing the home towns of those who died in the wars and the other the locations in the country where they died. The company that built the graphic, stamen design, calls the project “a sobering look at the human cost of two wars” and says that explains why it uses “a restrained and sober palette of blacks, whites and greys.” It works on two levels. The opening screen shows the overall impact of each war on every country that sent troops. From there, the user can explore the impact by year, age group and state. The data is searchable, and each entry allows users to share messages and memories. It’s an impressive piece of work that won the top award at this year’s inaugural Information is Beautiful contest. Explore the site to see other examples of data journalism […]