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the nonprofit news publishers at Pocantico hereby declare that preparations should be immediately made to form a collaboration, the Investigative News Network (working title). Its mission is very simple: to aid and abet, in every conceivable way, individually and collectively, the work and public reach of its member news organizations, including, to the fullest extent possible, their administrative, editorial and financial wellbeing.

As the news business continues to confront fundamental economic challenges, a report, released on Oct. 19, 2009 by Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, proposes new steps for maintaining a vibrant, independent press, with special emphasis on local "accountability journalism" that is essential to civic life. The report, "The Reconstruction of American Journalism," was written by Leonard Downie, Jr., former executive editor of The Washington Post, and Michael Schudson, a Journalism School professor.

"People are way more hungry for news at their local level than even we imagined," said Brian Farnham, editor in chief of Patch. "There's a lot of good sources for news existing at the national level and beyond, but at the local level the cohesive experience is missing."

Top staffers get a salary of about $40,000 a year, and rookies get less, Tucker said. His wife, personal finance writer Jane Bryant Quinn, serves as editorial director and coaches journalists on writing skills and headline writing. Twenty newsroom employees produce content for the 10 sites. The stories focus on local people, and the company currently does not rely on user-generated content. "News gathering is a real profession," Tucker said. "Citizen journalism is a completely false rabbit. It's simply not going to succeed."

Patch, by contrast, solicits citizen contributions for news tips, feedback and announcements and calendars.

relies on software algorithms to collect technology news in real time into what is essentially the front page of an ever-changing industry newspaper.

turns to humans to filter the ever-growing number of articles and blog posts published online each day

Mediagazer, a new sister site for media industry news.

“My Ohio State colleagues took the initiative last November to convene a community conversation to discuss the implications of the report for Columbus. They could not get a single mainstream media news outlet (print or broadcast) to participate—although public and alternative media were well represented…”

“What would it be like to organize an entire college or university education around the idea of journalism? I am not talking here about what we think of as vocational journalism education. The idea is not to make everyone a professional editor or reporter. I am talking, instead, about conceiving an entire program of liberal education that takes as its central theme the idea that the new media phenomenon is potentially making everyone a journalist.

I’ve long believed that basic journalism training would benefit everyone, and that journalistic assignments could start as early as elementary school. Shane points out that his vision of journalism-centered higher education could help solve three major social problems: The shortfall in local news production around the country. The well-documented deficiency in college student writing. Low civic literacy: Americans’ generally poor knowledge about how social institutions work, and who makes the policy decisions that affect their lives. Shane also observed that involving students in local journalism “wins the educational trifecta”: Students would tackle meaningful and intellectually challenging issues. Students enjoy dealing with such issues. Students would develop marketable skills while also learning to function effectively as citizens.

When news sites, after years of hanging back, embraced the idea of allowing readers to post comments, the near-universal assumption was that anyone could weigh in and remain anonymous. But now, that idea is under attack from several directions, and journalists, more than ever, are questioning whether anonymity should be a given on news sites.

anonymity has made comment streams “havens for a level of crudity, bigotry, meanness and plain nastiness that shocks the tattered remnants of our propriety.”

“But a lot of comment boards turn into the equivalent of a barroom brawl, with most of the participants having blood-alcohol levels of 0.10 or higher,” he said. “People who might have something useful to say are less willing to participate in boards where the tomatoes are being thrown.”

New software called PlaceLocal builds display ads automatically, scouring the Internet for references to a neighborhood restaurant, a grocery store or another local business. Then it combines the photographs it finds with reviews, customer comments and other text into a customized online ad for the business.

New software called PlaceLocal builds display ads automatically, scouring the Internet for references to a neighborhood restaurant, a grocery store or another local business. Then it combines the photographs it finds with reviews, customer comments and other text into a customized online ad for the business.

New software called PlaceLocal builds display ads automatically, scouring the Internet for references to a neighborhood restaurant, a grocery store or another local business. Then it combines the photographs it finds with reviews, customer comments and other text into a customized online ad for the business.

Every island in Maine is struggling to keep their schools vibrant and open. In the last 100 years, Maine went from supporting 300 year-round island communities to 15, according to Snyder.

The filmmaker splits her time between Washington, D.C. and the island. If it were up to her, she would be on Isle au Haut year-round, but her job requires her to sit in meetings with people to talk about her documentary projects. Despite this, Wurzburg said she can work remotely and does as often as possible.

The high-speed Internet that her island home is connected to helps a lot.

The State of the News Media 2009 is the sixth edition of our annual report on the health and status of American journalism. Our goals are to take stock of the revolution occurring in how Americans get information and provide a resource for citizens, journalists and researchers to make their own assessments.

The top editor of The Times, Russ Stanton, and several of his deputies vigorously opposed the ad before it was published, but they were overruled by the paper’s business executives, according to people with direct knowledge of the dispute,

Mr. Conroy noted that however unorthodox the ad may be for print, it mirrors a common practice online of having an ad cover part or all of a Web site’s home page for a few seconds.

“It’s taking a concept that we normally apply to new media and reimagining it to a concept in a newspaper,”

Still skeptic about social media, watch this new video” with mind blowing stats

Speaking to investors last month, Mr. Murdoch said that the News Corporation was in “final discussions with a number of publishers, device makers and technology companies” about digital delivery of news and entertainment. “We will soon develop an innovative subscription model that will deliver digital content to consumers wherever and whenever they want it,” he said.

Welcome to the website for The Future of Media and the Information Needs of Communities in a Digital Age. The goal of this project: to help ensure that all Americans have access to vibrant, diverse sources of news and information that will enable them to enrich their families, communities and democracy.