Journalism News Roundup

It's the end of the week, so I decided instead of focusing on one journalism topic, I'd do a roundup of interesting stories that have piled up in my Google Reader.

First up is this article in the Wall Street Journal on five magazines that are pushing the boundaries of print to engage and interact with their readers. I really liked the story of T-Post, a Swedish "magazine" that every six weeks gives subscribers a tshirt with stories on the inside and an interesting illustration for the story on the front.

The Chicago Tribune, which has been working hard to expand its social media footprint, has unveiled the Chicago Now web site. The site is a series of blogs on all things Chicago, including: sports, the police beat, the social scene, gardening and dating, among other things. The official launch is in July, but they're adding blogs every day. I'm not sure how it's making money, but it's nice to see a newspaper thinking outside the box. My friend and social media guru Leah Jones offers her thoughts on the venture here.

The May 26 post on Poynter Online discusses Scribd, a web site that allows journalists and other writers to publish their work -- and get paid for it. With Scribd, writers get to keep 80% of the revenue when their material is sold. Unless you spend 24 hours a day promoting your work, you probably won't make enough to pay your rent, but these days, every penny counts.

As publications continue to struggle on how to get readers to pay for online content, we're seeing a lot of experimentation out there. This post at PaidContent.org talks about a new joint venture between the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute (RJI) and a group of media entrepreneurs. Under the effort, the JV -- CircLabs -- will offer online news and social media packaged together and sold under a multi-tiered payment system, wrote PaidContent.

I'll end this with a post from PBS's Media Shift blog. Writer Mark Glasser posts about his struggle to adjust after cancelling his print subscription to the San Francisco Chronicle. He offers up the pros and cons of getting rid of his newspaper, and gives some food for thought.