The Future of News

I’m working this fall’s common syllabus for “JOMC 153: News Writing,” the introductory class at UNC’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication. I’ve created a custom RSS feed for students in all 14 sections to use. But I’m also adding this paragraph:

If you are like most Americans, most of your news consumption comes from television. You may also get much of your news via Facebook or other online news sources. In this class you will learn to become a more critical consumer of news from all sources. As you begin to study journalism and mass communication, you may find it particularly useful to read the print edition of a national newspaper like USA Today or The Wall Street Journal as well as a local paper. If you read news critically, you will be circling words, writing notes and highlighting passages.

Is anyone out there using a tool for annotating digital content that you actually find useful? You don’t need to necessarily be able to share the notes but the notes preferably would be persistent from device to device.

I’m happy to announce the new release of Reaching Audiences: A Guide to Media Writing. Jan Yopp and Katherine McAdams were kind enough to invite me to be a co-author on this edition and help update it with a lot of new information about online news, including a whole new chapter on the topic.

My portion of the royalties from all sales of new copies of this book at UNC Student Stores will be going to scholarships for journalism students here.