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"The obsession with clicks is said to be responsible for a degradation of online content: clickbait headlines, listicles of best burger places, and videos of adorable kittens that do little to turn readers into enlightened citizens. Such a critical perspective is important and necessary. Yet my findings show that the effect of metrics is more complex than this. In my research, I analyze online news in two countries, the United States and France, which have different journalistic traditions. I rely on ethnographic methods, a mix of observations and interviews, to systematically compare what editors and writers say about their work with what they actually do when they are in front of their computers. After more than 400 hours of observation spent in the editorial departments of six online publications, as well as a hundred interviews with writers and editors, here is what I learned:"

The business plan of Varsity Monitor is simple. Major universities like North Carolina, Nebraska and Oklahoma pay $7,000 to $10,000 a year and Varsity Monitor keeps an online eye on their athletes. Among the services the company and others like it provide is a computer application that searches social media sites that athletes are active on, looking for obscenities, offensive commentary or words like "free," which could indicate that a player has accepted a gift in violation of N.C.A.A. rules.

An op-ed that argues that schools should be able to discipline students for school related online speech. "The Supreme Court must abandon the Tinker standard in these cases of off-campus school-related speech and create a new standard that restores dignity and respect for school officials."

Two conflicting online student speech rights cases are scheduled to be reheard on June 3. The decisions, which are likely to be appealed to the Supreme Court, will govern Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey and the Virgin Islands and dictate the authority schools have over what students write on social networking sites.

Don't you hate ordering something online and getting the wrong size in the mail? So does Tom Boddingham. The 6-foot-7 Londoner needs two different Caters News Agency shoe sizes: 13 for one foot and 14.5 for the other. But due to a decimal error at the Chinese factory that manufactures the slippers he ordered online, instead of getting a size 14.5, he got a size 1,450!

These are among the findings of a new study appearing this week in First Monday, a peer-reviewed online journal. The four co-authors of the study argue that such age restrictions, inspired by the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, or COPPA, are mostly ignored by kids and parents and only encourage dishonesty.

"mong several federal appeals court rulings on student speech in the spring and summer of 2011 were five involving high school students punished for off-campus, online speech. The issue appears increasingly likely to reach the U.S. Supreme Court to resolve an apparent split among several circuits and to address confusion about whether the Supreme Court's standards for censoring or punishing student speech should extend off campus."

Taking it off campus New court decisions focus on online student expression

A lot, apparently. Apple's new iPhone is called the iPhone 4S. But what people really wanted was the iPhone 5. The rumors online had predicted the second coming - or, rather, the fifth coming. It would be wedge-shaped! It would be completely transparent! It would clean your basement, pick you up at the airport and eliminate unsightly blemishes!

The rumors online had predicted the second coming - or, rather, the fifth coming. It would be wedge-shaped! It would be completely transparent! It would clean your basement, pick you up at the airport and eliminate unsightly blemishes! Instead, what showed up was a new iPhone that looks just like the last one: black or white, glass front and back, silver metal band around the sides. And on paper, at least, the new phone does only four new things.

New iPhone Conceals Sheer Magic A lot, apparently. Apple's new iPhone is called the iPhone 4S. But what people really wanted was the iPhone 5. The rumors online had predicted the second coming - or, rather, the fifth coming.

"Two high school football players in the US state of Ohio have been found guilty of raping a 16-year-old girl. The case came to light via text messages, online videos and social media posts made the morning after, attracting nationwide attention. The two were sentenced to at least a year in juvenile detention and the judge said both might stay in detention until they reach 21. The case was thrust into the national spotlight after attention by bloggers and the hacker activist group Anonymous. Some claimed that the community - including local police - had sought to cover up the crime to protect the accused, who were members of a celebrated high school football team."

Article that deals with how cyberbullying laws like the one in New Jersey might impact student free speech rights. Includes an interview with Avery Doninger.

Katherine Evans said she was frustrated with her English teacher for ignoring her pleas for help with assignments and a brusque reproach when she missed class to attend a school blood drive. So Evans, who was then a high school senior and honor student, logged onto the networking site Facebook and wrote a rant against the teacher, Sarah Phelps. "To those select students who have had the displeasure of having Sarah Phelps, or simply knowing her and her insane antics: Here is the place to express your feelings of hatred," she wrote. Her posting drew a handful of responses, some of which were in support of the teacher and critical of Evans. "Whatever your reasons for hating her are, they're probably very immature," a former student of Phelps wrote in her defense. A few days later, Evans removed the post from her Facebook page and went about the business of preparing for graduation and studying journalism in the fall. But two months after her online venting, Evans was called into the principal's office and was told she was being suspended for "cyberbullying," a blemish on her record that she said she feared could keep her from getting into graduate schools or landing her dream job.

"Even in New York, the media capital, only 1 in 8 public high schools have a student newspaper, The New York Times reported in May, and many publish only a few times a year. Nationally, about two-thirds of public high schools have newspapers, according to a 2011 media study by the Center for Scholastic Journalism at Kent State University. But whether on paper or online, student newspapers tend to be absent from lower-income schools and lower-income students. That's sad because, as Robert Fulghum titled his best-seller, "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten," I often feel as though I learned all I really needed to know about journalism in high school. Newspapers of all sorts have been battered for decades by television and widespread illiteracy. With the explosion of Internet traffic, too few youngsters are learning good news literacy. As Mrs. Kindell taught, you need to be a good reporter before you start giving your opinion. Today's world of blogging and tweeting encourages the opposite. Too bad we don't have more Mrs. Kindells to go around."

"The new student of multimedia narrative may want to bookmark an archive on digital storytelling by Mark Berkey-Gerard, who teaches online journalism at Rowan University, in New Jersey. A Columbia Graduate School of Journalism alum who has won awards for innovative teaching, Berkey-Gerard logged resources and learning tools on a site called Campfire Journalism: Notes on Digital Storytelling"

"Every public school district in New Jersey would be required to set guidelines on how its employees communicate with students online under legislation set for a vote in the state Senate today. The bill (S441) would require that the policy be written, and include "provisions designed to prevent improper communications between school employees and students made via e-mail, cellular phones, social networking websites, and other Internet-based social media." If it passes both houses and is signed by Gov. Chris Christie, school districts would have four months to adopt the policy."

"his long introduction leads me to a page one story in Poynter's Tampa Bay Times by one of my favorite writers Stephanie Hayes, known for her edgy versatility. It's newspaper title was "Teen Bieber fever…and those who wait." (The online title was "Outside Justin Bieber concert, parents find their own groove.") An editor approached Hayes two days before the Justin Bieber concert with news there would be a waiting room for parents. "Did I want to check it out?," she writes in an email, "Duh, of course I did. If there's a chance to find a black truffle in a bin of carrots, you must try." The story, which we're honoring as part of Poynter's Excellence Project, is quite short, but s"

"When we started doing online and especially with YouTube, people would say, "Young people don't care about international news. They don't have an attention span, so keep it short." Of course, that was all wrong. ...."

The 3rd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Pennsylvania ordered on Friday that the conflicting rulings in two student online speech cases be vacated and heard by the full court in June. This order nullifies the previous decisions, which were each made by panels of three judges each, and will replace them with decisions made by the entire panel of 3rd Circuit judges, after a hearing on June 3.

Doninger must file for appeal with the Supreme Court by July 25, and Blue Mountain School District must file by Sept. 12. The Supreme Court will then decide if it will hear either of the cases. They would be the first rulings from the high court on students' right to free speech on the Interne