The News of Tomorrow.

When we talk about online journalism, or even blogs of the more serious kind, it is important to stress the fact that we are still dealing with journalism. The code of ethics that apply to journalists and a good sense of news judgment are key to keeping the standards up, also in online journalism. Since anyone can post something online and label it "online journalism" it becomes even more essential, to the individual blogger or journalist, to differentiate him or herself from the mob of less than good writers out there. You want your readers to take you seriously, and they will only do so if you follow the basic rules of journalism.

As far as language and grammar goes, you just cannot make mistakes, if you want to be taken seriously. No matter how well you research or how vividly your, by the way very interesting, story is told you need to write in a fluent and correct language. As a new blogger it is easy to fall into the pit of using IM language. After all, this is how you normally communicate online, with your friends and peers. For some blogs that type of language is accepted, or perhaps even expected some times. But journalistic blogs should not use the same language as blogs about celebrities, for instance. One good reason for this is that in any type of news writing you need to be precise and concise. There is simply no room for weak or ambiguous statements.

However, in many aspects news writing online does differ from that of the printed media. With new possibilities obviously come new standards of doing things and new responsibilities. One rule that is predominant in any way of conveying news is the paradigm of "content is king". That being said the issue of urgency and time, that dominates online journalism, is somewhat in contrast to using a lot of time to check your story with several sources before pressing the post button. Therefore a good rule is to post what you know to be the facts about a given story as soon as you can. You can always add to the story later, when you have confirmed other facts.

The internet allows anyone with a computer to read what you are writing about. This dramatically changes your potential audience. According to Suzanne Levinson, Director of Site Operations of The Miami Herald, their online audience largely consists of readers from outside Miami. All of 80% of the audience of The Miami Herald's online edition do not live in Miami. People from all over the world can follow local news anywhere they wish and according to Suzanne Levinson a large percentage of the readers from out of town and out of state go to their site to read about The Miami Dolphins. Google searches are a major factor in directing Dolphins fans from all over the world to The Miami Herald.

Although many aspects of journalism remain the same, online journalism is redefining standards as the frontier of the news of today and tomorrow.