Breaking into Journalism
Requested amount from Knight News Challenge:
$4,000,000Total cost of project including all sources of funding:
$6,000,000Expected amount of time to complete project:
1 yearThe purpose of our Breaking into Journalism website (http://www.breakingintojournalism.com) is to provide training for more than 1,600 high school, college and university students on how to start their own newspaper, magazine or business journal. All students begin working in our virtual newsroom and can then work their way into
becoming an Internet-based media publisher.
Most journalism programs already have a school newspaper or magazine that publishes news stories related to school functions and/or local news, but none of them focus on the new world of internet journalism. Unfortunately, a common problem that exists for most journalism programs is that none of them provide students with a good opportunity begin covering a relevant news beat or building a database of industry contacts that will appeal to large media publishers once they graduate.
Breaking into Journalism’s virtual newsroom provides the perfect tool and automated publishing system that allows teachers to assign students a real news beat, allow students to build important industry relationships and enable them to build a massive portfolio of articles with their name on the byline with a national (global) newspaper. Students can choose from more than 300 leading edge subject matters that represent the most searched on news categories on the internet today.
More importantly, students will learn how to use web analytic and statistical software programs that will allow them to build news portals that contain news that readers are actually searching for versus the old stagnant news categories that are the same for almost every single newspaper in America.
4 commentsHow will your project improve the way news and information are delivered to geographic communities?
Breaking into Journalism Improvements on Traditional News Outlets
Breaking into Journalism’s “Overnight Publishing System” is designed for education facilities such as high schools, community colleges, universities and remote third world community centers engaged in training local residents to become internet publishers.
Students will want to utilize the system because it will teach them how salaried journalists perform similar activities to retrieve news, edit the content, and then turn basic press releases into feature news articles. The biggest benefit for students is the ability to amass more than 480 articles per semester with their picture and byline on it. More importantly, the byproduct of writing hundreds of news stories is opportunity to learn the industry and build relationships with important PR contacts, industry analysts, subject matter experts and C-level executives within their chosen industry.
Deans and Journalism Professors will want to utilize the system because it gives them a free way to set up a virtual newsroom with little or no overhead expenditures, while at the same time giving their students and their school global exposure based on their real world reporting.
Unlike existing school newspapers and school media outlets that limit the focus to the local news or school news, our system allows students the opportunity to cover one or more of the 300 most searched on news categories in the world.
Publishers and Editors of leading publishing companies will want to hire students that graduate from our program because they will learn something that most journalism colleges fail to teach their students – how to build a publication that is engineered to fulfill readers’ interests versus publishing an editorial environment that is of little value to the average internet consumer.
Everyone involved in the Breaking into Journalism program will learn how to use analytic trend software to recognize and define the most popular up and coming daily news trends, and then adjust news retrieving and publishing systems on the fly to build news categories to meet the demands for these readership trends. Instead of publishing the same old stagnant news that has been driving an endless list of media outlets out of business, publishers will learn how to build editorial environments on the most searched on news categories.
Unlike the old school separation of church (editorial) and state (advertising), internet publishers understand that every single advertising dollar is directly related to their news coverage. Publishing news on stagnant business industry categories where there are no active buyers and sellers is a losing business proposition.
There is no advertising value in advertising next to a story about people who were robbed, beaten or harmed in some terrible way (except maybe security systems).
There is tremendous value in advertising next to positive stories about products and services that solve everyday problems; stories that readers are actively searching to read.
For example, recognizing new industry trends such as alternative energy, hybrid cars or biofuels, which has soared because of rising gas prices, is the most profitable way for newspapers and magazines to attract lucrative advertising deals from companies who are seeking to market leading new products and services to meet marketplace demand.
In addition to news, the Overnight Publishing System also can be used to create buyer’s guides, awards management, event calendars and directories of company, products and/or services and other editorial products.
The Overnight Publishing system is very easy to use, very cost effective and is the perfect application for groups of people in remote rural areas and third world countries desiring to build highly targeted media outlets, without the usual overhead of most publishing operations needed to publish specialized newspapers and vertical trade publications.
To sum things up, Breaking into Journalism’s fully automated Overnight Publishing System is designed to allow students, schools and publishers or any group of people to recognize the most searched on news categories on the internet and build an editorial environment that effectively reaches these readers and attracts lucrative advertising dollars.
0 commentsHow is your idea innovative? (New or different from what already exists.)
Breaking into Journalism: News that Generates Advertising Revenue
As a current editor, I hate to use these words, but the Breaking into Journalism program and Overnight Publishing System could completely revolutionize the way newspapers and trade publications gather and publish their news. It will certainly teach them how to identify the news they should be reporting on; news that will be very successful at selling products and services; as well as generating significant advertising revenue streams.
Our automated news retrieval, editing and publishing system is very sophisticated and, powerful, but at the same time is very easy to use. Yes. Eighth graders can use it.
The revolutionary part of this system is the training we offer to schools, institutions and even commercial publishing houses is the ability to work with numerous search engine analytical and conversion tools to perfect editorial/advertising ratio and track the advertising program conversion rates.
In other words, media outlets can determine what the most searched on categories of news are and adjust/tailor their editorial to meet readership demands. It is much better to carry news surrounding products and services that their readers are actively searching to buy.
Once advertisers see the positive ratio based on conversion rates from advertising programs running parallel to the right kind of editorial, conversion rates for context based advertising programs will sell themselves.
Advertising media representatives will be able to generate even more revenue creating custom tailored advertising programs.
Editors can purge news categories with low readership statistics and rapidly expand news sections generating heavy readership and attractive advertising revenue, thus allowing a publication to evolve and become more and more profitable as the publication matures.
Old school publishers will tell you that the advertising and editorial departments are divided and should be kept separate as in church and state.
Editors used to say what happens in the editorial department is completely independent of what advertising messages. That is why they are laying off people and going out of business. You cannot make money these days with that kind of mentality.
What many publishers do not understand is that context-based based advertising, search engine technology and the internet have totally changed the dynamics of how editorial and advertising synergies work together to generate revenue streams.
Publishers that generate editorial to tap new and growing advertising categories will succeed.
Publishers that continue to generate the same stagnant content that no one cares to read will continue to dwindle and over time will become extinct over time.
Our students will be the one putting them out of business because we will teach them how to publish news that makes money and attracts global readership.
0 commentsWhat experience do you or your organization have to successfully develop this project?
Breaking into Journalism Proven Track Record
The good news is that the program is already developed. We can show anyone how to research, retrieve, edit and publish news on any popular news topic using the same methodology that we have been utilizing successfully for the past eight years.
Once editorial is being published, we can then show publishers how to create context -based advertising programs that make money without hiring a single sales person.
If an organization is interested in profit, we can also show them how to set up advertising departments that will generated significant revenue streams.
We are the experts. We can train anyone with a little intelligence to do what we do successfully.
We currently use this system to publish 19 online magazines such as http://www.bbwexchange.com and http://www.dailylocalandworldnews.com
My professional resume is at:
http://www.bbwexchange.com/hoskinsresume2005.asp
