03/28/07 11:01 - 39ºF - ID#38673

Iran: Britain must admit to tresspassing

Click -> Iran Foreign Minister: Britain must admit to tresspassing before soldiers are released

Iran has given the United Kingdom an ultimatum. Britain must admit to illegally entering Iranian waters before 15 sailors and marines detained on on March 23, 2007 are to be released.

Permalink: Iran_Britain_must_admit_to_tresspassing.html
Words: 43
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: news

03/22/07 11:25 - 43ºF - ID#38586

Wikinews.org proposes WNN TV

We are currently discussing ways in which Click -> Wikinews.org, the news site that I currently freelance write for, can become more than it already is.

Since I have began editing and writing news articles for that site, Many users have come forward with a great interest in creating the Wiki News Network. If this were to be established, we would eventually be broadcasting on TV, but of course, like most things, it has to be started slow, but include big ideas. You can also visit here: Click -> About WNN

Click -> Wiki News Network Discussion
Click -> Wikinews: Broadcast With information and pilot episode

Some of the ways that Wikinews.org could broadcast to the World, other than writing articles is something along the lines of a PodCast or YouTube. Remember start small, think big.

We are also discussing just hosting the days headlines or news broadcasts on the site itself.

But with all big ideas comes problems and we have several. Some are big issues, others ar not so bad. Here are the problems in why we can't, at this very moment, start WNN:

1) The money. We are a user based site and everything that goes on the site is in some way user contributed in one form or another and that stuff does NOT cost money. The site is free to write and free to browse and upload and edit. So Wikinews.org has no means of profit. With that said, Wikinews is operated under the authority of the Wikimedia Foundation. The foundation just had a fundraiser and raised nearly 2 million dollars to keep the Wiki sites up and running, not that the money is really needed though.
Resolution: Ask the foundation for a grant or a loan. A grant would be the more reasonable and logical way as since none of the "Wikinewsies" aka reporters do NOT get paid for any of the work we do, we would not really able to repay loans since there is no profit or money. So we can turn to private investors, or in other words: YOU! But how would you be able to do that? Well we are not sure yet either as any donations currently made to the Foundation goes to all Wikis, not just to Wikinews.

2) Equipment. We have no TV cameras or regular cameras or a studio or anything to that nature as a whole. We do have however, the individual resources from all users on Wikinews. They report the news and sometimes even in the field: See reports by a Wikinews Journalist who reported LIVE from Las Vegas, Nevada about the Wendy's chili finger case:
Click -> Wendy's Chili Finger Incident part 1
Click -> Wendy's Chili Finger Incident part 2

We even have a Click -> WNN Pilot Episode
You can also see a collection of Original Reporting, in the field journalism by ME about the hotel proposal here in Buffalo, New York:
Click -> Elmwood Village Hotel Proposal Articles
These are examples of what kind of equipment, resources and capabilities a single journalist has for this site, and I am not the only one. HAve equipment and an interest? Help us :)

Basically what I am trying to do is stir interest to anyone and everyone. If you can help, or have any ideas regarding this project, please visit the discussion on WNN and voice what you think or what you might be able to do to help. You do NOT have to be a member of Wikinews or a user or have to sign up to make comments, but it is helpful.

Click ->WNN Discussion

Have any ideas for me? Just comment here in my blog.

zobar writes at 09:37:55 03/23/07 - Comment #16751: There is no doubt that adding a/v content can bring an added dimension to text/image based reporting methods, but there are pitfalls to be aware of. [I have been around this block a couple times, and I want to be clear that I am not hating on this project.] The punchline is this: professional-quality video production is very time-consuming and requires expensive software, huge bandwidth, and lots of top-of-the-line hardware. Considering the up-front expense and continued overhead, it is important that you use your limited production resources effectively. My suggestions:

For starters, you should scrap the linear presentation of news items. For old media like television and radio, producers had to decide what consumers were most interested in. Thus, if you knew there was going to be a piece on the Middle East, you'd tolerate sitting through an excruciating five-minute expose on Britney's detox treatment. That doesn't fly on the Web in general or Wikis in particular, because consumers have been empowered and expect to be able to follow their own interests.

Once you've gotten rid of the linear progression of news items, you can also get rid of the anchors. The only real job of the anchor is to MC the broadcast, but since the consumer is deciding their own path, that job becomes unnecessary. This is a good thing, because when you're on a shoestring you don't have time or resources to dedicate to producing filler. This one-minute 'pilot,' for instance, is all filler and totally unnecessary if you instead make short video segments and place them on the appropriate Wikinews article pages.

Next, consider your a/v content carefully. There's no need to stand in front of a camera and read an article that is already available as text, simply for its own sake. It is faster for a consumer to read the article on his own [also it gets indexed by search engines, whereas videos do not]. The video should bring something to the issue that can't be more easily expressed as text. Excerpts from performances, music, and movies work well. Interviews also work well, especially if you provide an unedited or less-edited version of the interview that is included in the textual article. These Chili Finger pieces are better off as plain text - it's a guy reading an article, and the b-roll is static photos run through a Ken Burns filter. The time it took him to go on-location, set up a camera, read the article, edit it together, compress it, and upload it is as far as I'm concerned a waste - because he had to write the article anyway, and he could have had it up already before he even got in his car. Instead: provide a video of the press conference.

And finally, there are technical issues. You'll have to address the format wars, of course, but there's a more pressing issue: despite its name, MediaWiki's support for non-image media sucks. At the very least, users should be able to see a preview of the video inline, much like the way images are displayed. I think it's much less intrusive if it plays inline as well, but it would be acceptable to click to a detail page to watch it [sort of like clicking on high-res images]. Furthermore, you can't expect that producers are going to have the software or technical know-how to compress video to spec. The server will have to accept multimedia files coming in from a wide variety of sources in a wide variety of formats and recompress them, if necessary, to something more consistent. This is very processor-intensive.

- Z

Permalink: Wikinews_org_proposes_WNN_TV.html
Words: 623
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: space

03/22/07 04:41 - 54ºF - ID#38554

Impact crater found in California

Click->Article
Researchers in San Joaquin County, California have discovered what appears to be a massive impact crater made by an asteroid nearly 50 million years ago, while exploring the area for possible oil deposits. The period in which it struck the Earth, say researchers, is called the (WIKIPEDIA - Eocene) Epoch.

Images from a seismic survey has shown the crater is nearly 6 kilometers wide, buried under sediment at nearly 4,300 feet and may even still contain the asteroid which is said to inside the crater nearly 10 miles below the Earth's surface.

Copyright: www.wikinews.org using the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 license.

Permalink: Impact_crater_found_in_California.html
Words: 99
Location: Buffalo, NY

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