Events

Regional press associations plan annual meetings

Texas has five regional press associations and each one has its own convention filled with ideas and training opportunities for newspapers.

The 2008 dates and locations are:

• March 27-29 -- Panhandle Press Association (PDF) at Ambassador Hotel, Amarillo
• April 3-5 -- North & East Texas Press Association, Holiday Inn Select in Tyler
• April 17-19 -- South Texas Press Association, Omni Marina Hotel, Corpus Christi
• May 15-17 -- Texas Gulf Coast Press Association, Port Royale Resort, Port Aransas
• July 17-19 -- West Texas Press Association, Inn on Barron's Creek, Fredericksburg

For more information on the conventions contact the regional vice presidents listed on the TPA board of directors page.

Did you enter? Contest deadlines draw near

The deadline for TPA's 2008 Better Newspaper Contest is March 28. The contest is open to TPA members active in 2007. New this year is month requirements for advertising and newswriting.

March 28 also is the deadline for the Monson FOI Award, sponsored by FOIFT and TPA. The award honors First Amendment and open government reporting.

Newseum to open in April in nation's capital

Planning a trip to Washington, D.C. this summer? Now you can put The Newseum into your travel plans. The Newseum, an interactive museum chronicling the news industry, will open its new $450 million, seven-level museum in the nation's capital April 11.

In 250,000 square feet of exhibit space, the Newseum blends five centuries of news history with up-to-the-second technology and hands-on exhibits, including The Pulitzer Prize Photographs Gallery, encompassing photographs from every winning entry dating to 1942.

The largest gallery is the 8,000-square-foot News Corporation News History Gallery, which features more than 350 historic newspaper front pages, newsbooks and magazines that span nearly 500 years.

Training

Feature Writing March 24-April 22

Only a few slots remain for the online course "Feature Writing" (PDF) scheduled March 24-April 21.

The course is free to member newspapers selected to attend and is part of the TPA Online Academy through the University of Texas School of Journalism. The instructor is UT professor Nick Lasorsa. Students can log on anytime 24/7 to complete the course work.

Traveling Campus comes to Houston March 25-27

The Southern Newspaper Publishers Association Foundation is bringing the Traveling Campus to Houston March 25-27.

Topics include: Great Media Writing, Outbound Calling for the Newspaper Professional, Secrets of Successful Story-Telling, Creating ads that get results, Conflict Resolution, Photojournalism, Coaching and Mentoring, Home Delivery in the Circulation Operation, Design between the ears, & Single Copy in the Circulation Operation.

All courses will be held at the Houston Chronicle building in downtown Houston. Registration deadline is March 21.

Course descriptions (PDF)
Course speaker bios (PDF)
Course registration (PDF)

DVShow provides answers to online video questions

Adding videos to your newspaper Web site can be challenging and frustrating but TheDVShow Web site offers a variety of ways to get your technical and production questions answered by industry pros.

First try the frequently asked questions or the tips sections. Can't find the answer? Call or e-mail questions, and the experts will answer them on their weekly podcast. The DV Show experts also have monthly videocasts where they answer the most popular question with step-by-step advice.

Memberships also are available for increased access and immediate answers on the site.

NewsU compiles helpful list of copy editing resources

NewsU, an online journalism training clearinghouse by the Poynter Institute, has put together a list of links to training sites with resources for copy editors, blogs about editing, language and word usage, some reference sites for your bookmarking pleasure, and more.

One example is from the American Copy Editors Society, which features a discussion forum, quizzes, articles and resources, including math and science editing.

Need help moving content to Web?

If you find your newsroom duties are involving the Web more and more, and you're looking for a good source for best practices and tried-and-true techniques, check out A List Apart, a resource for building solid Web content.

A List Apart is a weekly Web site focused on the ins and outs of crafting content for the Web "for people who make Web sites."

Internet

Online newspaper viewership reaches record in 2007

Average monthly unique audience figures for newspaper Web sites grew by more than 3.6 million in 2007, a record year for the industry and an increase of more than 6 percent over 2006 numbers.

Monthly unique visitors to newspaper Web sites averaged 62.8 million in last year’s fourth quarter, according to the Newspaper Association of America. Unique visitors in the fourth quarter represented a 9 percent increase over the same period a year ago (57.6 million).

Newspaper Web sites experienced a record in October 2007 with more than 63.2 million people visiting, an 8 percent increase from the same period a year ago.

For the year’s fourth quarter, 39 percent of all active Web users visited newspaper Web sites, with visits averaging 44 minutes a month. Users generated more than 3 billion page impressions on average, a 7.3 percent increase over the same period a year ago, NAA reported.

Trends

NewspaperNext releases version 2

The American Press Institute released its report Newspaper Next 2.0: Making the Leap Beyond ‘Newspaper Companies’ detailing a new vision of what newspapers can and must become.

The report includes 24 case studies of new products developed using N2 principles and methods, and seven profiles of organizations that made significant structural changes in the process of developing these products.

“If newspaper companies stay on their present path, the future is clear – the core business model will keep shrinking, along with circulation, advertising and profit margins. It’s time to make the leap – a mental leap, a leap of vision and leadership – beyond newspaper companies, to a larger, more diverse kind of company,” N2 managing director Steve Gray said.

Study: Small-paper journalists burnout faster than peers

Burnout and cynicism is increasing among the nation's journalists and 74.5 percent of newspaper journalists under 35 are likely to quit the field altogether, according to a new survey.

The survey by Ball State University professor Scott Reinardy measured job relationships among 770 journalists nationwide.

Results showed that copy editors and page designers report higher rates of cynicism than executive managing editors, and journalists at small newspapers reported higher levels of exhaustion than those in the largest group. Read the full survey results here...

65 journalists killed in 2007

  Sixty-five journalists were killed in direct relation to their work in 2007, the highest death toll in more than a decade, the Committee to Protect Journalists said in a year-end report.

For the fifth straight year, Iraq was the world’s deadliest country for the press. Its 32 victims accounted for nearly half of the 2007 toll. Somalia was the second-deadliest country, with seven journalist deaths.

CPJ, founded in 1981, compiles and analyzes journalist deaths each year. The 2007 toll is second only to that of 1994, when 66 journalists were killed amid conflicts in Algeria, Bosnia, and Rwanda. CPJ is investigating another 23 journalist deaths in 2007 to determine whether they were work-related.

Consistent with previous years, about seven in 10 journalist deaths in 2007 were murders. Combat-related deaths and deaths in dangerous assignments accounted for the rest of the cases.   The committee also released its new edition of “Attacks on the Press in 2007" detailing some of the most serious situations journalists face around the world.

NIE

Affordable Newspaper In Education conference set April 3-4

The 2008 NIE/Literacy Conference, sponsored by the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association Foundation, will be held April 3-4 at Meredith College in Raleigh, N.C.

Registration fees are the lowest ever – $100 per person (until March 27).

Topics will include:
• The Future of Newspapers and How NIE Fits
• NIE: Meeting the Needs of Schools
• Best Practices
• e-Editions
• Sponsorships
• and more

SNPA asks participants to please register ASAP and to not make travel arrangements until SNPA receives a sufficient number of registrations and confirms that the meeting will take place. For additional information, contact Carole Kallansrude 404-256-0444.

Association News

TPA welcomed the following new members in January: active member Longview News Journal; associate member TreeBark Software

The following newspapers sold network ads in February:

TexSCAN: Sweetwater Reporter, Wilson County News, Knox County News, Suburbia News, Seagoville, The River Cities Daily Tribune, Marble Falls & Community Newspaper Holdings Inc.

Texas 2X2: CNHI, Knox County News & Lake Cities Sun, Lake Dallas

Network participation as of Feb. 1:

TexSCAN -- 303 newspapers; 1.01 million circulation

Texas 2x2: 248 newspapers; 747,881 circulation

For more info on making money selling network ads contact Shawn Jones.