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Specialty: Writing, editing

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I am a Sydney, Australia-based journalist/editor with nearly a decade’s worth of writing experience on such topics as Australasian politics, the environment, science, health, human rights and general world news.

Specialising in news and news feature-style articles, I currently work as a contributing writer to the water sector news journal OOSKAnews, covering global water supply, sanitation, wastewater and desalination news and have recently taken up the position of Associate Editor for the Korean-based English language The Jeju Weekly.

EcoSeed, the global green news portal, also publish my extended commentaries on water, clean energy and other environment-related topics.

I recently founded my own independent Australasian/Pacific news site, theangle.org, realising a long-standing interest in developing the way news is written, presented, packaged and disseminated to readers.

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Specialty: Magazine Writing/News Writing/Technical Writing

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My name is Katie Schwener and I am a student at the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg. I will be graduating in December 2011 with a BA in English (Technical Writing concentration) and a minor in Mass Communications (Journalism and Media Studies concentration). As I have just begun my bachelor’s coursework, my current portfolio is limited. However, the few samples I do have, which include my resume and most recent college transcript, are accessible on the website listed above. I am looking for the opportunity to begin my freelancing career and add quality pieces to my portfolio by writing articles for your publication. Please feel free to contact me with test topics relevant to your publication so that I may submit my work for review in order to first determine my fit for you before submitting my first article. All contact information can be found on my website. Thank you for your consideration.

I’d like to share some thoughts on the immediacy issue today as it might apply to journalism and get some of your own feedback. The example I’m going to give stems from a recent conversation with friend and colleague Judy Gombita of PR Conversations, and specifically deals with the issue of people live-tweeting through events like conferences and whether or not that’s more valuable than a journalist doing a later story on the same event.

The Example

Here’s the backdrop as simply as I can put it. We have Person A who was speaking at a conference. We have Person B who was a conference attendee live-tweeting through it.

Person B isn’t simply live-tweeting a “play by play” to let non-attendees know what’s going on. Instead, they’re opting to tweet their opinion about various points of the presentation, and they later tout that as being somehow legitimate coverage – even perhaps moreso than more detailed after-the-fact coverage.

OK. Here’s my problem with that – if you’re busy tweeting your opinion on the last thing the speaker said, you’re not paying attention to what the speaker is saying now. First of all, I think there’s an obvious level of disrespect in that. Perhaps more importantly though, Person B is likely taking some things out of context by not listening to the full presentation, therefore spreading misinformation to his followers (which spreads like wildfire).

At the end of the presentation, Person A asked if anyone had questions or opinions to share. No shock here, but Person B didn’t bother opening their mouth to share their thoughts in front of the audience present. Why? Who knows? But I find it strange that they’d share so openly with “followers” rather than take up their issues with the speaker and attendees, where they’d more likely have to justify those thoughts.

Long after the event had passed, Person B was still talking about it – this time in relation to a blog post or article coming after the event. They were (in a general sense) touting the immediacy of Twitter as almost a sort of replacement for real journalism based on the fact that they could live-tweet, whereas the more thorough piece came long after, with editorial standards applied.

It’s led not only to a bit of debate in the PR community, but also even calls from some saying that presenters should actually be tailoring their presentations to those who would live-tweet.

Does Immediacy Lead to Reliable Reporting?

In cases such as this, where we’re talking about a conference, I would say no. If you aren’t paying attention to what the speaker has to say, you’re not in a position to be offering commentary to others about what that person is saying.

Judy generally agreed, adding “Self publishing versus vetted / edited material. Big difference. For the most part, I still prefer door number two.”

As do I. When I want “real news” I still prefer turning to journalists (whether that be in print, online, or broadcast), where I know facts had to be checked and material was likely scrutinized by an editor.

Now don’t get me wrong. I obviously have an interest in self publishing and the immediacy of things like blogging. Hell, I make a good part of my living doing just that. But it has its place, and conferences are one example where live-tweeting / live-blogging can do more harm than good.

Where might these things work? I could see a play by play of a sporting event being a better use. Or live-tweeting about local news (such as witnessing a simple car accident to posting about a natural disaster as it’s hitting). But when your attention is more tuned to amusing your followers with your anecdotes or sharing opinions with your own little echo-chamber over being able to defend them to the speaker and attendees of an event, it’s a different game entirely.

What do You Think?

What are some situations where live-tweeting or blogging are the most appropriate publishing mediums, and in what situations do you still prefer news to come from more traditional outlets, passing by the eyes of an editor? And as a writer do you think that immediacy could potentially hurt your own credibility if not handled responsibly? How?