Category: Journalism

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Capstone Design HCId Journalism Share

Capstone Project Plan: It happened in the news, so what?



The Indiana Daily Student newspaper printed a short piece previewing Ron Paul’s upcoming visit to Bloomington, Indiana. The great thing the editors coordinated was a little sidebox answering two questions “Who is Ron Paul?” and “Why should I care?”

This is what I want to do for my capstone, only better.

Background/Problem
I want to help people get a better understanding of why they should care. I want to give context to what is in the news. I want to answer the questions “so what?” I want to bridge the gap, the disconnect, between what is being reported and published to what is going on in our daily lives. We have more personal, intimate, publicly, legal, free data than ever before about about individuals. We now have social data. I want to use this informatin to bridge that gap.

Primary User Group
Moderate to heavy social media consumers and producers with a general interest in world events and news. These people likely don’t consume as much news as they would like to.

Client
New York Times Digital, LLC (and possibly Facebook Connect)

What is the anticipated final outcome
I will design an interface and experience that helps news and social media consumers answer the question “so what?” when consuming the news. My goal is to design something that fits into their daily lifestyle and does not require them to visit a new website or install a new program.

Readings

Exemplars
http://www.newser.com/
http://storyful.com/ (alpha)

http://vimeo.com/4553749 (NYT Custom Times)
http://www.everyblock.com/
http://digg.com/news
http://news.google.com/news?pz=1&cf=all&ned=us&ict=ln (news for you)

First Sketches & Concepts of Final Design
P1010294

P1010297

P1010293

Final Concept Design

How do we relate to news?

Our News Communities

Timeplan Subject to change
October
Interviews with social media users and news readers. After a good grounding I will begin to introduce professionals into my interview conversations to understand design decisions companies have made before me and how this space has been explored.

I will continue to read and keep up on research papers and blogs exploring products currently within development.

Preliminary sketching will include rapid wireframing of existing interaction design interfaces, visual discussions of ideas, concepts and explorations.

I am currently reading The Facebook Effect. My goal is to finish it by the end of the month along with other readings, Ted Talks, Papers and books.

November
Research, prototype sketching, presentation preparation

December
Research and Prototype development preparation, presentations

January
Research and prototyping

February
Research, prototyping, testing and evaluation

March
Prototype finalization and

April
Presentation preparation

May
Presentations and reflection

Categories
Capstone Design HCId Journalism Share

Clear Vision

Below are two quotes from The Facebook Effect (p 54). One thing that Mark Zuckerberg can attribute to much of Facebook’s success other than a well engineered product and a great idea is a clear vision. As I am learning from David Kirkpatrick’s book and my personal experience as an active Facebook user is the importance of a clear vision when beginning to develop a product.

When you understand your users (consumers, readers, viewers, etc) and know what exactly you are trying to do, everything must be so much easier. It must be so much easier to know when to stay no, when to drop features, when to change the course of action. For “Zuck”, Facebook always has and still is about connecting people, plain and simple.

As I begin two HCI projects, one related to sharing content and the other about social connectivity and news, defining, it’s nice to have a reminder to maintain a clear vision about what I want to do.

“A couple of Google executives came over to see if there might be a way to work with or even buy Thefacebook. Even at this early date, Google was well aware that something noteworthy was going on in Palo Alto. Zuckerberg and Parker were leery, though because of the risk of becoming subsumed by Silicon Valley’s Internet giant was real. If they wanted to do their own thing, they had to stay independent, they believed. Anyway, what they were trying to do was very different from what Google did. Their site was about people; Google was about data.

“Really great leadership, says Parker, “especially in a start-up, is about knowing when to say no–evoking a vision very clearly, getting everybody excited about it, but knowing where to draw the line, especially with products. You can’t do everything. And that’s a lesson Mark didn’t know yet. That’s a lesson Mark learned.”

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Capstone Design HCId Journalism Poynter

Is a journalism education still useful?

Yes. Very useful.

Carrie Hoover asked a group of grads “is a journalism-centric education is still useful in today’s job market?” for a piece she’s doing for the Society for News Design Denver Conference. Here’s what I wrote back, the bottom bit is the most interesting.

I am grateful for every second of my journalism experience and opportunity. I tell people that SND raised me as a professional. There is no professional community that cares for students like this one does.

Journalism school has been an essential part of my growth and career development. I studied at Indiana University, in Bloomington. I had an opportunity to learn about working on deadlines, in teams, dealing with plagiarism, accuracy, content, design and other critical thinking skills. Because I studied journalism, I had an opportunity to start a magazine that won many awards while a student. Many people don’t get to be entrepreneurs any time in their life!

My journalism experience took me to London for an internship and then onto a job at the Indianapolis Star. But, those things are all the traditional path. Now for the good stuff.

I’m studying Human-Computer Interaction design at IU. With this degree I blend the what I’ve learned about people, technology and design. This summer I worked at RockMelt, a startup in Silicon Valley which is backed by one of industry’s most recognized investors.

I have no doubt that my journalism experience helped me get this opportunity. J-school and Poynter taught me to talk to people, but more importantly how to listen. When I am doing usability studies or interviewing people in our demographic, I have a better sense of what kinds of questions to ask and simply, I now know, just to shut up and let people talk.

After I do an interview or a study I go over the session with my team and do a writeup. I need to tell a story and I need to do it quickly. Why? Because we are a small, committed team with a never ending list of things to do, just like in news. I can handle deadlines, pressure and have learned to balance many projects at once that require real deliverables.

When I’m designing product wireframes, building the behaviors and describing the experience, I cannot write a long winded essay for our developers. I need to write concise but descriptive lines of text that are clear and succinct. We take these skills we have for granted.

On a higher level, journalism school prepared me to be a critical thinker and a hard worker. There is a lot left to be desired in J-Schools when it comes to designing classes for the future. It’s essential to teach the foundations of journalism but students need to be taught about the future, not the past.

Newspapers, radio and cable television should be taught in media history classes. Students should be taught to produce for and think about Mobile apps, Google and Apple TV, Ubiquitous Computing, Virtual Environments, Chat clients, Facebook, Twitter, Bloggers, GPS devices, etc. The list goes on and on. If the medium is the message, it’s time to open our eyes to all the new mediums.

We should have invented Twitter*. We should have invented RSS feeds. We should have invented Craigslist and Groupon and Youtube and the iPad and Google Search and Yelp. It’s okay to hire developers. It’s okay to take a risk. If people inside the news industry don’t change the model, people outside will.

*I think I had lunch with someone, somewhere during the last month and they said journalists should have invented Twitter. I don’t remember who or where, but I really want to give you credit.
Categories
Capstone Design HCId Journalism Share

Why is this news story important to my life?

Reading the news can be a real drag.

It’s depressing, it’s dense and you wonder if your life or the world would be any different if you read yet another article about the BP oil spill. It’s tough to connect epic war sagas to my life of sitting in front of a computer and hanging out at the park.

Although, I actually love reading the news. It’s full of rich stories and usually great writing. I want use Facebook and The New York Times to connect what’s going on in the world to what’s going on in my life.

Example

Close Senate Races to Test Depth of Voter Discontent
GREENWOOD VILLAGE, Colo. – Two Senate primaries that were supposed to be tranquil affairs have turned into roaring Rocky Mountain shoot-outs that could provide the best test yet of how deeply anti-establishment, anti-Washington sentiment is running this year.

So tell me which of my friends are following this news story, who I know in Colorado, which policies are related to my interests and how these leaders are related to my Senators.

I got the idea when Aditya posted a status citing that his newsfeed content is more interesting than the New York Times. And, he’s not the only one who feels this way.

Categories
Design HCId Journalism Share

What makes content shareable?

Below is a graduate journalism school independent study proposal.

Summary
Social media may be in its infancy but its model changes as quickly as slowly as mature newsroom are evolving. In short, the divide between social and hard news media is growing further apart. Traditional or hard news values like timeliness, impact and accuracy are important tools that inform reporters and journalists. However, there is little conversation published about social news values. My research will include understanding and defining emergent themes such as social news, social journalists, shareability and social media.
What will I do?
I will wireframe existing social media tools to analyze their designs, interview social journalists (Facebook and Twitter users) to understand how they decide what to consume and share and I will study their news feeds. For wireframes, I will draw out the essential parts of sharing interfaces to better understand the user interactions. I will sketch out the the placement of text fields, buttons, hovers and behaviors. Throughout these tasks I will consume texts and videos related to shareable content.
Why understanding the shareability of content important?
It is important for multiple stakeholders to understand what drives the share-ability of content. I will focus on members of the news media and interaction designers. Understanding what makes content sharable is intended to inform future models and designs that serve publishers and consumers.

Who wants to know what makes content shareable?

News Media Members (Traditional) News media companies now compete for attention of consumers casually browsing who subconsciously debate between social news in their Twitter stream or hard news on the The New York Times online. However, increasing the shareability of New York Times content can benefit journalists, consumers, other content producers and communities.

Interaction Designers
 It is important for interaction designers creating social broadcasting tools to understand the values and motives of their users. In doing this, they can design empowering, usable products and services that deliver better experiences.

Objective
Develop a critical eye as an interaction designer and journalist to understand what makes content shareable thereby informing the design and models of future media content and tools. The goal will be to make and deliver insights to distribute to news producers news site designers and device designers. I will deliver insights  about what kind of content and design increases shareablity and will likely increase traffic and quality of news companies’ brands.

Deliverables
 Throughout the semester my work will be publicly shared through my media networks like Twitter, Facebook, Quora and on my personal blog. I will blog my insights and findings throughout the semester. My blog will include a rich analysis and conversation of my questions and findings. The blog will be text and hopefully comment heavy. All sources requiring citation, analysis and conversation will be referenced and discussed at http://nina.keystreams.com/share.

I will summarize and express my findings in a highly shareable medium. I will plan produce a video but will change the medium if my research something that has higher shareability. This will be based on the feedback and insights I gain from my networks.

I will also attend the social media theory group meetings coordinated by Mark Deuze to inform my project and discuss my findings.

Process (Subject to change based on research findings)

  1. Lit Review
    • Define social media, social journalists, sharability
    • Develop an understanding of social news values related to traditional news values (impact, timeliness, prominence, proximity, conflict, weight, etc)
  2. Framework
  3. Questions
    • Who do social journalists produce content for?
    • What do social journalists consume?
    • What motivates social journalists from sharing content?
    • What do social journalists get for sharing content?
    • Is the medium the message?
  4. Evidence (Data)
    • Potential Interviews
      • Aditya Agarwal, Facebook (Director of Engineering)
      • Arjun Banker, Facebook (Platform)
      • Matthew Beebe, RockMelt (Designer)
      • Andrew Devigal, New York Times (Multimedia Editor)
      • Tyson Evans, New York Times (Interface Engineer)
      • Jason Putorti, Bessemer Venture Partners (Designer in Residence)
      • Robin Sloan, Twitter (Online Strategist)
      • Xande Macedo, RockMelt (Designer)
      • Mark Slee, Facebook (Lead Project Manager)
      • Poynter
      • Digg
      • LinkedIn
    • Explore and wireframe features essential to social media like geo-location tags, Twitter @replies, @ facebook tagging, including a URL, inline photo and video scraping

Resources

Media
Below is a preliminary list of relevant video and texts I want to consume and analyze to motivate my research. As I research new books, videos, papers and blog posts will become relevant and some listed below will become less important. Citations of consumed and referred content will be included as a deliverable.(Social and News Media)

Design

Theories

Schedule of Work (subject to change)

30 August
Begin search for heavy facebook and twitter social journalists
Consume, share and analyze related media

05 September
Wireframe interaction design and analyze of Facebook and Twitter clients
Consume, share and analyze related media
12 September
Wireframe interaction design and analyze of Facebook and Twitter clients
Consume, share and analyze related media
19 September
Prepare questions for social journalists and social media designers, engineers, project managers
Consume, share and analyze related media
26 September
Prepare for and interview journalists at SND Boulder
03 October
Interviews with social journalists and analysis of their news feeds
Consume, share and analyze related media
10 October
Interviews with social journalists and analysis of their news feeds
Consume, share and analyze related media
17 October
Interviews with “techies” & Interview Analysis
Consume, share and analyze related media
24 October
Develop an analysis between traditional news values and social news values
Consume, share and analyze related media
31 October
Relate interview findings with social news values and social news features (geotagging, @ replies, etc)
Consume, share and analyze related media
01 November
Begin forming a synthesis of findings and an argument for what makes content shareable
Consume, share and analyze related media
08 November
Form synthesis of findings and an argument for what makes content shareable
Consume, share and analyze related media
15 November
Form synthesis of findings and an argument for what makes content shareable
Consume, share and analyze related media
22 November

Video Production (Storyboarding)

Thanksgiving

29 November
Video Production
06 December
Video Production
13 December
Video Finishing & Collection of deliverables

Details
 During the Fall 2010 semester at Indiana University in Bloomington at the School of Bloomington, I, Nina Mehta, propose the Independent Study above with Professor Hans Ibold for three J804 credits. I will not be sitting in on an undergraduate course. All deliverable will be submit to Professor Ibold by or on Friday, December 17th, 2010 at midnight.

Arjun Banker, Matthew Beebe, Adrienne Dye, John Wayne Hill, Apurva Pangam and Robin Sloan for being listening ears and critical friends.

Categories
Design HCId Journalism

Digital news devices disregard the digital divide

Many journalism blogs and conversations are suggesting that E-readers, tablets and new devices will be the future of journalism. These will save news. I disagree. Below is a repost of a comment I made on the Society for News Design blog post about these readers. Matt Mansfield post reports on Roger Fidler, program director for digital publishing at the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri, and his work and reviews of these tablets. Matt has been an important mentor for me in my journalism and design career. I’m not sure where he stands on this issue but I believe him to be someone who does value the user’s (reader’s) needs, society and quality content.

Much of the comments before my response celebrated these devices; though “LdF” eloquently reminds readers that content is king. My response reads

@LdF I agree, Content is king. I think everyone will agree with that.
@Adam Levy I’m struggling with the idea that E-readers are the only possible option. If we think from user’s perspective, how many people are running out to buy, yet another, device to carry around with them? And that’s not even considering the monetary cost of buying an e-reader device. Which brings me to my point about the digital divide.

Sure, there are the people who can afford to buy an e-reader, those people likely have smart phones. I’d be curious to know how many people who take a phone, charger, laptop, camera (maybe), wallet and their lunch to work also want to lug an e-reader around with them.

Then, what is the news solution for people who cannot afford an e-reader? Sure, news is online, it’s free. I think that’s excellent. It works for me. I think we, journalists, designers, need to have some conversation about readers without mobile devices, without internet connections at home (or at least fast ones). Yes, we are designing for the future, but people with low-incomes will exist in the future, too.

I am not arguing that we need to fire up more printing presses for those without internet connections. Because those people, likely, are not buying the newspaper too (because of cost, not interest). So, let’s remember to also design for the future of news on the other side of the digital divide. If we don’t, I predict we’ll see an educated Bourgeoisie and a proletariat without access to news.

Coming back to my point: I have a smart phone, it costs a lot of money, it let’s me read the news without having to buy anything more.

Just playing devil’s advocate…

I do plan to return to the media, journalism community during my career, sometime. I will practice my skills as an HCI professional in other fields, first. I just hope, by that time, news information is not a luxury item that is only available to those with access to high technology. Let us not create a society where only the elite have the opportunity to be educated about their economic, political, social, local and cultural news.

Categories
Design HCId Journalism

Let’s get connected and hired! Elect Nina Mehta for 2010-2011 GISA Research and Professional Chair

Nina Mehta

Classmates, Colleagues and future SoIC alumni,


Let us continue the great work that has been done by former Graduate Informatics Student Association officers and carry on the tradition of excellence.


I request of the School of Informatics and Computing bio, chem, human computer interaction design, music and security informatics graduate students to elect me to represent them as the GISA Research and Professional Development Chair. It is a natural fit for me.


According to the Cornell University Career Services, up to 80 percent of job openings are unadvertised. Professionals are hired through connections and this School has those connections. In collaboration with the Career Services Staff, Faculty, students, other university groups in Bloomington an of course alumni, I will work to further connect my colleagues.


I will work with the administration, faculty and Career Services staff to facilitate what needs to be done to get SoIC students jobs, internships, research, teaching and other positions to further their professional development.


I am an HCId Master’s student with an undergraduate degree from IU in Journalism and a second major in Political Science. I graduated in December of 2007. I worked full-time for a year at The Indianapolis Star and took a six-week professional leave to attend the Poynter Institute summer Fellowship program to intensively study digital storytelling and collaborative working on a full scholarship. I then worked at the IU School of Journalism Communications Department, The Kinsey Institute, Oliver Winery and now am a full-time Graduate Assistant in the Office for Women’s Affairs. I was hired for all of these jobs in 2009 alone, all through connections. I will do what I can to help SoIC students get connected within and outside of Bloomington. I am also currently working with the small team of students, Pete Bucklin and Erik Stolterman to influence the future HCId design space.


My goal is to learn more about the alumni network that Jeremy Podany has already cultivated so well. I will work to understand what can be done to strengthen that community for current students to join upon graduation. I have experience, connecting, preparing and hosting multiple alumni events from my experience working at the IU School of Journalism. I do not know someone who works at Intel, IDEO or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but I will work with the staff to find someone who does. This gets jobs.


I am a written, oral and visual communicator. I have professional experience with both graphic design and media writing. With these tools I can express the wants, needs and interests of SoIC students with a polished look and a garnish of fun.


I invite the School of Informatics and Computing graduate students to elect me, Nina Mehta, as the 2010-2011 Graduate Informatics Student Association Research & Professional Development Chair such that students who vote for me will formally express their research, professional wants, needs and interests.


You may review my portfolio, resume and this letter at
http://ninamehta.com/
http://ninamehta.com/NinaMehtaResume.pdf
http://ninamehta.com/loves/gisa.pdf


Thank you,
Nina Mehta


Read about the GISA Elections

Categories
Design HCId Journalism

Your designs are “crappy” but you have good taste

I revisit this video of Ira Glass, NPR Journalist, every couple of months. I think it’s completely natural to go through these cycles where you think I think I am just absolutely fantastic at what you do. Now, is not really one of those times. But, that’s exactly it. I (we) reach these thresholds and tipping points where all of a sudden we can see further along the horizon of how much more we have to learn and experience. Anyway, any time I am starting a new creative project or feel like my designs “suck” I call on Ira Glass (watch from 0-:00-2:41. Then skip to 4:45 if you want to skip the journalism part). I always feel better. He reminds us 1. We are young 2. We have great taste, that’s why we began doing this in the first place 3. We have the great taste to know our work is “crappy” 4. There is a solution: do a huge volume of work. Keep practicing and exercising.

I’ve been thinking about this video as I’ve been filling up my calendar with red, orange blue and purple events. Work,  HCI, events, social and so on. Then I start looking at my task lists. Again, work, HCI, Shopping, General life To-dos. But then I think about Ira. I think about how much work I am doing. These huge volumes of work and how much practice I’m getting. (Remind me to blog on Malcom Gladwell’s Outliers. This is all about practice).

That’s what I think we are learning here. Between all of these classes and the rest of our lives going on we are learning a lot in a short ammount of time. We are implementing Ira’s advice to do a huge volume of work. Failing often. No problem.

If this video doesn’t make you feel better… well, it will. It really will. I just love it.

“It’s going to take you a while… You will make things that aren’t as good as you know in your heart you want them to be. Just make one after another.” Please trade the word “TV” for whatever you want to be making.

Categories
Journalism London Travel

No Man is an Island

I’ll really have to start making an effort if I want to be Lonley.  This is the city to pass through.  Yesterday I met up with Chris Courtney and his wife Karen (Chicago RedEye design kinds).  We had a great dinner at The Troubadour restaurant.  I really enjoy taking people there because it’s a nice way to see my neighborhood, do something ‘novelty’ like, and break away from the tourism insanity that London sometimes brings. I hope they enjoy London, it was nice to meet up for what turned out to be a 4 hour dinner!
The reason the Troubador is a novelty, besides the delicious food and cool atmosphere is all the big names who have played on their stage. Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and Paul Simon to name a few.

This was the beginning of my constant flow of visitors.  I’m prepping for Peter this weekend, a fancy design-types dinner next Monday, and next weekend Annamarie and Alec (who’s been backpacking since Berlin).  Anyway today, Alec departed for Dublin, but neither of us knew he had a stop over in London.

Till this morning, when I receive a wall posting that says, “hey you, im in london” and simply just that. WHAT?
We got in communication eventually and he made it over to my office.  We shared a cute lunch at the new veggie cafe across the street inside the Church/Garden Museum.  Alec sported his new hot orange Birkenstocks and me in my 15 denier tights that keep ripping!

Anyway, the tales of familiar faces will only continue! It really brightened my day.

Still homeless for this summer, anyone know a vacant apartment in Indy? please.  Or a cheap way to get out of writing papers. I’ll take either.

Categories
Journalism London

Swanky

This week I’ve been working more with epolitix.com. They had a climate change symposium and invited me along to watch the debate and questioning. I left with one of the people in the office but got caught in massive traffic. Protesters were voicing themselves in Parliament square about the nuclear trident agreement. Greenpeace also hung a banner that read Tony <3 WMD. There were some protesters who were laying on the street with their arms cemented in barrels.

Anyway, this made us terribly late, but we arrived just in time for the discussion, but missed the amazing food. It was really interesting, and particularly good because it was in the genuine interest of people in the audience. I later learned it cost a hefty pound to attend this event.

When the symposium ended, my coworker and I found out that they saved all the lunch food warm for us. We feasted and she mentioned to me that we were inside The Commonwealth Club. Apparently it’s a member’s club that costs 2000 pounds a year to be a member. Wowzer. Anyaway, we split a cab back and I ended up getting out of work early. Sweet.