What's going on
-- Spent yesterday morning editing video with Allison Perkins for a story she's doing. We didn't finish, but hope to on Monday.
-- Tonight I'm shooting more video for an upcoming story by Tina Firesheets. Here's hoping it's not as rainy as it was last week when I shot Allison's video.
-- Two more N&R blogs will be appearing within the next few days. Mike Fuchs, the newsroom's main Web guy on weekdays, will be writing the Bargain Blog, which he plans to make a coupon shopper's paradise. (UPDATE: Mike says his blog will make its debut Monday morning.) And reporter Justin Hayes in our High Point office will be starting a blog focusing on the Jamestown/North High Point area. Also, our existing SportsExtra blog will be gaining two new voices: Charlie Atkinson, who has been a sports writer and editor here for more than 20 years and currently works on the night sports desk, and Bill Hass, another long-time sportswriter who currently covers the Greensboro Grasshoppers.
-- An update on our new Web-publishing system. I'm told we've got all the organizational kinks worked out in getting story categories in that system to line up with story categories in the system we create and edit stories in for print, but that there are "a few kinks" left. We can't finish creating story templates, story-category templates, etc., in the new system until those kinks are worked out, but we hope to have that process finished within a week. (Extend that to two weeks if we have problems with the software that will enable commenting on individual stories, but that's a feature we think you'd be willing to wait another week to get.) Presumably we'd launch the new site a couple of weeks after that.
-- Key newsroom people will begin receiving training within the next week or so on how to post stories online with the new system. (Actually, they won't be doing it "with the new system," they'll be doing some things in the existing print system that will allow the new Web system to grab and publish those stories, but I'll spare you the gory technical details.)
-- I'll be appearing at 10 a.m. tomorrow on WNAA's Table Talk talk show with host (and friend and former co-worker) Joya Wesley to talk about grassroots journalism, including but not limited to what we're up to here, and its implications for community and democracy. WNAA is at 90.1 FM, with a live Webcast here. It's also a call-in show, and I believe the number to call if you want to comment or ask a question is 334-7952 (or send e-mail here).
