'Opinion Pool' tide is rising.As this issue of The Masthead mast·head n. 1. Nautical The top of a mast. 2. The listing in a newspaper or periodical of information about its staff, operation, and circulation. 3. goes to press, The Opinion Pool's first round of research has been completed. Focus groups were held in Seattle, Des Moines Des Moines, city, United States Des Moines (dĭ moin`), city (1990 pop. 193,187), state capital and seat of Polk co., S central Iowa, at the junction of the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers; inc. , and Vero Beach, Florida Vero Beach is a city in Indian River County, Florida, USA. According to the U.S. Census Bureau's 2006 estimates, the city had a population of 19,916.[2] It is the county seat of Indian River CountyGR6. . Four groups of local citizens convened over two evenings at each locale. My early impression of the results: Editorial pages are still in the game. There is no reason to think that we can't be a big player in convening local communities through new media. We have work to do--not least in understanding and anticipating how people use many means to find and follow information on which they base their opinions about local affairs. How, for example, they start with search functions or RSS feeds. Or how, literally, they expect information to find them. I was encouraged by the conversations. More than a few participants didn't know exactly what it is we do. But many seem to value the kinds of things we aspire to aspire to verb aim for, desire, pursue, hope for, long for, crave, seek out, wish for, dream about, yearn for, hunger for, hanker after, be eager for, set your heart on, set your sights on, be ambitious for be: keen and honest analysts who promote incisive and thoughtful conversation with many points of view about public affairs--having fun along the way. You be the judge. Full transcripts of the sessions, along with some video excerpts, should be available online by the time you read this page. They should be accompanied by podcast post-mortems that observers produced at the end of each session--recordings discussing what they saw as the main takeaways. [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] The focus groups couldn't have been carried off without the extraordinary expertise and extravagant time volunteered by Reg Murphy, director of research services for Gannett Corp., who moderated all of the sessions, and Nadine Selden of The Seattle Times, who chairs The Opinion Pool research work group. They were supported by energetic contributors from The Seattle Times, Des Moines Register, Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers The Treasure Coast Newspapers serve residents in five counties located along the Treasure Coast and The Gold Coast of southeast Florida, one of the wealthiest markets in the country. They are owned by the E. W. Scripps Company and have a daily circulation of 120,000. in Florida, and Reynolds Journalism Institute at Missouri Journalism School A journalism school is a school or department, usually part of an established university, where journalists are trained. An increasingly used short form for a journalism department, school or college is 'j-school'. . Reg Murphy will be featured speaker at the plenary session on The Opinion Pool at NCEW's September convention in Little Rock. His talk will be followed by two more hour-long sessions on what are emerging as the most promising online strategies and programs for newspaper opinion pages. Try to make it. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Former San Francisco Chronicle The San Francisco Chronicle was founded in 1865 as The Daily Dramatic Chronicle by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young.[2] The paper grew along with San Francisco to become the largest circulation newspaper on the West Coast of the publisher John Oppedahl told us at our 2006 Pittsburgh convention that opinion pages have thirty-six months to figure out how to be effective in the new world of new media. He said we have "a great chance and it's right now." That was more than twenty months ago. I think what Oppedahl said is true, and remains so. The clock is ticking. But we are making progress--and still have a great chance. Eddie Roth is editorial writer at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch The St. Louis Post-Dispatch is the only major city-wide newspaper in St. Louis, Missouri. Although written to serve Greater St. Louis, the Post-Dispatch is one of the largest newspapers in the region, and is available and read as far west as Springfield, Missouri. and coordinator of NCEW's Opinion Pool project. Email: eddierothnow@gmail.com |
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