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JOUR 652: Online Journalism, Spring 2007

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   Instructor: Chris Harvey

   E-mail: charvey@jmail.umd.edu; phone: 301-405-6256 (office) or 301-314-2696 (Maryland Newsline lab on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays). 

   Classes, Section 0101: Wednesdays, 1-3:45  p.m., Room 3103 Journalism Building. Office hours: 3:45 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Wednesdays, in the new-media lab in Room 3117 Journalism, or by appointment.

Goals: This is not a computer class or an art class. It's a journalism course in which we'll use computers and readings and discussions to learn about online news publishing. The class will include lectures on emerging media themes, such as Internet-spawned media partnerships and mergers; the business, ethical and legal implications of publishing online; the characteristics that distinguish news Web sites and their stories from their print and broadcast counterparts; and guidelines for doing research on the Internet. In addition, a core portion of the class will include hands-on assignments: Students will be introduced to basic html and to Web-editing and photo-editing tools. And they'll learn about site structuring and navigation, headline and link writing, and basic page layout, while building a multi-page biography (with photos). 

Prerequisites: JOUR 502, 503 or the equivalent. For journalism majors only.

Assignments/Tests: More detailed instructions on all of these assignments will be supplied in class by your instructor. Assignments are due at the start of each class, unless otherwise noted. Please follow Associated Press style for print on all assignments..

• Feb. 21 (Deadline moved back a week due to snow cancellation Feb. 14): (5 percent of your grade): One-page Web resume due, with text, subheads, internal (anchor) links, an e-mail address link, at least one external hyperlink, and at least one bulleted list. Your resume should also include a horizontal rule. Background colors are optional, as are changed link colors. Each factual mistake will result in one letter-grade deduction, as will each broken link. Unreadable resumes (because of bad color choices for fonts or backgrounds) will result in an automatic F. Assignments lose a full letter grade for each day that they're late.
• March 14: (20 percent of your grade): Midterm (Moved back a week due to snow cancellation in February.)
• April 18: (20 percent of your grade): Four-page Web biography package due. This is an expansion of your resume assignment. You will create a narrative home page and a third and fourth page and link these to your resume to create a package. The nonfiction narrative on the home page should be 300-700 words and include a photo or graphic on the page. The narrative must be compelling and concise and be written in journalistic style. The third page could link to published writing or broadcast samples --news clips, press releases, audio or video clips. Please don't link to unpublished work. Or it and the fourth pages could include a photo montage of friends; a page describing trips; or a page of personal likes and dislikes. The four pages, when linked together, must include lively text, external links, at least three photos and one graphic. The graphic could be created by you in Photoshop or come from free art on the Internet. All links must work; navigation must be consistent on all pages; all text must make sense and be written in AP style. Each factual mistake will result in a full letter-grade deduction, as will each broken link and broken image. This should be something you'd be proud to show a prospective employer. Here are examples of student work from previous semesters:
  Grad students (required to build four pages): Chris Hannas, April Chan, Mary Ellen Slayter, Lisa Tossey
  Undergrads (required to build three pages): Jorge Valencia, Lisa Rassenti,  Elahe Izadi, Damon Curry, Lindsay Smith, Mark Pak, Kendra Nichols, Jacqueline Sauter and Yulia Khabinsky.
• Monday, May 14, 3:30 p.m.: (25 percent of your grade): Final paper due: News Web site analysis. This is an 8- to 10-page double-spaced paper analyzing a news Web site, selected from a list I will circulate in class. You will discuss how well the site uses navigation; how clean its design is; how well it uses photos and graphics, broadcast features (audio and video) and interactive elements (such as chats, blogs, polls, quizzes and searchable databases); how much (if any) original reporting appears to be done by the online staff; and how well stories are written and presented and make use of the medium. You should tell me about any other features you loved or hated and why. And you should tell me what changes editors and publishers might consider to better position themselves for the future.  I recommend that you include an introductory paragraph or two at the start of the paper and a summary paragraph or two at the end. Subheads throughout may help you organize your thoughts. The analysis should be based on your observations of the site throughout the semester and on research you've conducted on the site, using search engines and directories and other tools. I recommend that you do a brief Lexis/Nexis search of the site, to see if you can find background stories about it that may help explain some of its idiosyncrasies. Interviews with at least one high-level designer or editor are required to answer questions that may arise as you are trying to explain why a site is designed the way it is, or why it focuses on a particular type of content, etc. Factual mistakes--including misspelled proper names and faulty URLs--will result in full letter-grade deductions. Information quoted from other sources should be attributed in the text and further identified in foot notes or end notes. Papers must be typed and numbered and turned in on paper under my fourth floor office door and by e-mail to me (so that each will have a time stamp from the e-mail). Papers turned in after deadline will receive an F; no exceptions will be made.
• Class participation (5 percent) and written in-class assignments: (25 percent.) Class attendance is mandatory. You must do the assigned readings and participate in oral and class blog discussions to do well on the class participation grade. Missed written in-class assignments cannot be made up. Only one in-class written grade --your lowest--will be dropped.

Grading: Each assignment will be graded for accuracy, meeting of deadlines, substance, presentation/navigation/links (for Web projects), quality of writing (headlines, story blurbs, photo captions and other text), usability and style. Associate Press print stylebook rules and rules of grammar should be followed on every assignment. Factual errors will result in grade deductions, as noted on each assignment. Letter-grade deductions also will be taken for broken links, including for photos, and for navigation that doesn't work. All written and Web assignments are due at the start of class, unless specifically instructed otherwise. No excuses, other than the hospitalization of the student or the death of a member of the student's immediate family, will be accepted for late assignments. A full letter grade will be deducted for each day an assignment is late, except for the final paper, which will receive an F if turned in after deadline.

Standards, Ethics and Academic Integrity: Students are expected to adhere to the strictest journalistic and academic standards. For this class, you must do all work yourself, without collaboration with classmates or others, unless I tell you otherwise. Along with certain rights, students also have the responsibility to behave honorably in an academic environment. Academic dishonesty, including cheating, fabrication, facilitating academic dishonesty and plagiarism (including use of unauthorized photos, graphics or text from the Web) will not be tolerated. Any abridgement of academic integrity standards will be referred directly to the campus judiciary. Confirmation of such incidents will result in the earning of an "XF" grade for the course and may result in more severe consequences, such as expulsion. Students who are uncertain as to what constitutes academic dishonesty should consult the university publication called "Code of Academic Integrity," administered by the Student Honor Council. This code sets standards for academic integrity at Maryland for all undergraduate and graduate students.  For more information on the code or the council, please visit http://www.studenthonorcouncil.umd.edu/whatis.html.

Books & Materials: We will be using a combination of textbooks and handouts (printed and online) in this course:

• Required texts: Richard Craig's "Online Journalism: Reporting, Writing and Editing for New Media"
• an Associated Press Stylebook and Libel Manual (for print). Please bring the stylebook to class with you to aid in lab work.
• Readings: This syllabus links to various required online reading assignments under the class schedule. In addition, because the field is changing so fast, you'll be expected to do additional reading to keep up. You should on a weekly basis read relevant stories and columns in the Online Journalism Review. 

Computer Access: Our 3rd floor WAM lab is equipped with the Web-editing tool Microsoft FrontPage, and JOUR 352 students may also access software for this class from Rooms 3102 and 3111, when classes are not in session. 

Students with Special Needs: Should talk to the instructor at the end of the first class. 

Class Schedule:

Week 1 Readings: Chapters 1 and 2 in the Craig book ("Why Is Online Journalism Different, and Why Should You Care," and "The Job of the Online Journalist").  Plus "Fear.com" by Chip Brown in the June 1999 issue of American Journalism Review.

Jan. 31: An overview of why newspapers and broadcast outlets are on the Web, and a bit about the unique features news Web sites offer readers--including personalization, multimedia, searchable databases, 24-hour updates, interactive chats and blogs and in-depth special reports. A brief history of the Internet. Then begin discussing search engines, directories and wikis and their reliability. Plus: an in-class tutorial from John R. Henderson, a reference librarian at the Ithaca College Library, on distinguishing between reliable sources and junk on the Web. (Read down to "One More St*p*d Assignment.) And a Web-surfing assignment from the instructor to be counted as an in-class grade.

Week 2 Readings: Chapter 4 in the Craig book ("Web Resources and Databases"). Plus: "A 10-Year Checkup: A Decade Into the E-Health Era, Online Medical Resources Pass a Real-Life Test," by Craig Stoltz, in the Aug. 1, 2006, Washington Post; "Non-traditional sources cloud Google News results," by Eric Ulken in the May 19, 2005, edition of Online Journalism Review; "RSS for journalists: Your own personal Web butler," by Jonathan Dube, in the Feb. 15, 2005, edition of PoynterOnline;  "Wikipedia: Teapot Tempest," by Wade Roush, in the Dec. 7, 2005, issue of Technology Review;" Collaborative Conundrum: Do Wikis Have a Place in the Newsroom?" by Mark Glaser in the Sept. 10, 2004, edition of OJR;  "Dot-com Still the Main Domain," from the May 6, 2002, issue of Wired News. A Web research handout from Harvey will be distributed in class.

Feb. 7: Introduction to basic html, with a discussion of font sizes and faces and instructions on creating horizontal rules, headlines and background colors. Plus: Changing link colors, creating hyperlinks, e-mail links, bulleted lists and anchor (internal page) links. We'll also discuss using html to add graphics and photos to a Web page. Please bring a printed or electronic copy of your resume to class. We'll work together, using a basic html handout from Harvey as a guide.

Week 3 Readings: "The Html Basics" from Webmonkey.com.

Feb. 21: A basic introduction to photo scanning, sizing and cropping in PhotoShop, along with a discussion of shooting and selecting strong photos. Please bring in at least one photo of yourself for possible use in your bio package; we will scan and size it. Ethics, taste and restraint in new media. Also, a discussion of ethics and copyright issues: Just because a news organization can publish something doesn't mean it should. A look at how the speed of the 24-hour news cycle has affected news judgment; whether or not online sites are properly differentiating between editorial and advertising content; corrections and linking policies, and more. Plus: Legal issues in cyberspace. Among the legal questions to consider: Can news sites be held liable for comments posted on bulletin boards? Is it OK to copy source code from another site to mimic design? What about republishing someone else's text, photos and graphics? Can you get in trouble for forwarding a published story to a friend? Complete an ethics assignment in class.

Week 6 Readings: Chapters 6, 7 and 8 in the Craig book ("Online Writing Styles"; "Hooking and Keeping Readers"; Revving Up Your Writing"). Plus Judith Silverstein Gray's "Turning Personal Experience Into Narrative"; Walt Harrington's "How Memories Become Memoirs"; and Poynter.org's Chip Scanlan on "Writing the Personal Essay" and "Tips for Writing a Personal Essay."

Week 7:

March 7: An introduction to a Web-editing tool and to table building. (Tables can be used to create photo and caption boxes, basic page layouts and charts.) I'll have a table-building handout for you in class. Begin discussing online design and navigation issues, eye tracking studies, audience concerns and the importance of folder structure to Web building and Web addresses. You'll be asked to sketch out (or storyboard) the page layouts for your bio packages. These hand-drawn sketches will show where your navigation bar will go on each page and where photos, headlines and stories or other text will go. Navigation must be consistent on all pages. Also, in a Word document, you'll type a brief description of the content and art that will go on each page; be explicit about the background/banner/text color schemes you will use to tie the pages together, along with the font styles and sizes for headlines, photo captions and text. If you're going to change link colors, please note that, too. This will count as an in-class grade; turn in by end of class. We'll review Web design tips and Web site planning in class. And review for midterm.

Readings: Chapters 13 in the Craig book ("Basic Online Layout"). Plus: Webmonkey's "The Foundation of Web Design" and "Information Architecture Tutorial"; and "Surfing the Web for Design Lessons," by Anne Van Wagener, for PoynterOnline, Jan. 31, 2005, edition. Plus: Webmonkey's tutorials on site design; Dan Farber's "Eye tracking Web usability" on ZDNet's "Between the Lines," March 27, 2006; and Edward C. Baig's "Survey Offers a 'Sneak Peak' Into Web Surfers' Brains," on USA Today March 26, 2006.

March 21: SPRING BREAK. NO CLASS.

Week 9:

March 28: Get back bio package layouts. Go over bio package checklist. Then begin unit on: Writing for the Web, Session II: Begin discussing/working on headline writing for the Web. Also, before our next class (April 4), please find a good and not-so-adept headline on one or more news Web sites, and explain why you think so on this class discussion blog: http://online-journalism-for-beginners.blogspot.com/. Please be sure to give the full URL and headline for each. Please don't write anything you don't want the world to see.

Week 9 Readings: Chapter 10 in the Craig book, ("An Uphill Battle: Online Copyediting"). Also check out these headline writing tips from John Schlander, Joel Pisetzner and Wayne Countryman on www.copydesk.org. Plus: Harvey's Writing for the Web handout.

Week 10:

April 18:  I'll allow 15 minutes at the start of class to do last-minute pushes of bio package pages and photo folders to the live server. Then we'll have a discussion/graded class assignment on multimedia packages built by professional Web sites in response to the mass killings on Monday at Virginia Tech. What was done well? What could have been done better? Were stories told in the best format? If time permits, we'll have a discussion of interactive databases on the Web, including issues of privacy vs. the public's right to know. Where should the line be drawn? For example, is it OK to publish the salaries of  low-ranking public employees, coaches, etc.? How about property records? Divorce and death notices?