This document provides tips for journalists on effective blogging. It discusses focusing your blog on a specific topic or "patch" that interests you, engaging with your audience through comments, and using links to credit sources, show your knowledge, and foster conversation. Links are an important part of blogging and can help drive traffic. The document also addresses managing comments respectfully and involving the community through guest bloggers, photos, videos and shared content.

1. So you’ve been given a blog
blogging for journalists

2. weBlog

3. we Link

4. we Share

5. we Publish

6. News turns from a lecture to a conversation
Jay Rosen - 2004
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2004/12/29/tp04_lctr.html

7. Audience Lecture
Community Conversation

8. what is your patch?
what do you want to blog about?

9. who is on your patch?
who talks about your subject?
who blogs about your subject?

10. make yourself heard
You are allowed an opinion outside of the website
comment
Find the voices in your community
read
bookmark/RSS
communicate email meet-up

11. You are a Journalist
You know stuff
You know people
People listen to you

12. the rules of blogging
transparency Show your working
Show your sources
credit where credit is due
share social bookmarks
raw data
ideas

13. The Almighty
LINK

14. a blog without links
is not a blog

15. a link is currency
it has value attached to it
It shows your trust
It shows your knowledge
It shows you're listening
It grows if you spend it on others

16. Pingbacks Trackbacks
When you link, they know. The system checks
When you link, they know.
Both automatic
Internal VS. External links
related content on your site
masterblinking double-linking
http://scobleizer.com/2007/09/12/bloggers-double-linking/
http://www.surflizard.com/archives/sneaky-links/674

17. finding links without stats
link:
use in google
to find blogs that link to you
-site:
use in google
to remove internal links
e.g. Link:http://blogs.coventrytelegraph.net/thegeekfiles/ -Site:coventrytelegraph.net

18. link out = link in
the proof !
http://www.seoco.co.uk/blog/2008/07/16/how-good-is-the-mainstream-media-at-linking-out/

19. quot;The link is an editorial judgment...
quot;There's a very legitimate concern about linking
to unverified or unverifiable resources. It becomes a
journalistic issue of 'can you trust the things you're
linking to', because by linking to it,
you are validating it.quot;
Scott Karp
http://www.publish2.com/
http://www.journalism.co.uk/5/articles/532603.php

20. Authoritative voices
breadth and depth of the story
taste and decency
link to the debate rather than the cause
other media
community voices
different from comment
blogroll

21. linking questions
1. Does the URL to which I am referring the reader reward him or her
with additional content that a reader of this story likely did not know,
or know how to get easily?
2. Does the text I am selecting to link this text give the
reader an obvious clue as to what the hyperlinked page
will contain?
3. Am I using the shortest possible amount of text to
provide that clue?
4. Would the content of the linked text, or the context surrounding it,
reasonably mislead the reader into believing that the linked page
contains something other than what it does?
http://www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/080215niles/

22. managing comments
moderate openly
censor words not whole comments
make your moderation process clear
engage
be visible in your comments
emphasise
post about good comments
More at: http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/02/blog_comments_1.php

23. community content
find for content at the point of delivery
avoid pet picture syndrome
guest bloggers
Flickr
Youtube
share and share alike

24. http://onlinejournalismblog.com/2008/09/18/basic-principles-of-online-journalism-c-is-for-community-conversation-pt2-conversation/

25. We cannot live for ourselves alone. Our lives are
connected by a thousand invisible threads, and along
these sympathetic fibers, our actions run as causes
and return to us as results.
Herman Melville