Aug 03

Find Out News Today

A hat tip to recent alum Emily Maher, @eamaher90, for her recent tweet of a resource that will help with story generation.  AP publishes a list of the 10 things to know each day in the news. And it’s available on its website, which means you can get it on your smartphone, when you’re not at the office to read the wires.

It appears in the mornings each day on the website, but if you’re checking later in the day, try this: Go to AP’s main site and look in the left column for the search bar. Type in it “10 Things to Know” and you will get a list of stories and should be able to find it there.

If you don’t see it in the list, use Control+F (on Windows), the find command, and search for “10 things”.

Check it out each morning to make sure you know what’s going on. And use it as a jumping off point for localizing an issue, following a trend or being ahead of the story.

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Jul 31

Minnesota Association publishes quick ways to find helpful crime and safety information

Sometimes I stumble on amazing websites. If you cover crime and safety or do investigative work, I just found a great directory of resources. Check out this long list of helpful websites, Investigator’s Links, from the Minnesota Coroners’ & Medical Examiners’ Association.

It includes links to:

  • law enforcement and crime-related associations,
  • clearninghouses related to crime and justice issues,
  • criminal justice resources,
  • intelligence and counter-intelligence entities,
  • investigative resources  for in-depth searching,
  • technology-related publications,
  • statistics,
  • consumer protection info, and
  • training related to law enforcement.

It’s a treasure trove that I hope will help you be a better, faster and smarter reporter.

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Jul 27

How to Track Product Recalls

The government has made it easy — bet you don’t see those words too often!  Easy to find out government recalls. One site,  Recalls.gov, encompasses six federal agencies listing recalls ranging from food to tires to cosmetics.

You can search by topic:

Beyond recalls,  you can learn safety tips to write into your story.  The site also allows you to search by agencyConsumers can report a dangerous product, too. 

And here’s a great help. You can sign up for an email list to get notices of recalls for certain types of products or by agency.  Nothing like having story ideas come right to you!  Or download the recall app.

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Jul 24

Find the Inside Scoop on a Business

Suppose a corporation announces it is locating in your area. Or a big company in your region is in the news.  You need some background on the business.

If it’s a publicly-traded company (stock is traded) then it has to file regular reports about its business operations with the Securities and Exchange Commission.  The website, Edgar, is your easy access to all those reports.

Reading and understanding the documents, however, is a bit harder. So here are some quick tips from many years ago from New York Times reporter Diana Henriques that are still valid:

  • 10- Q covers operations, property, finances, pending suits, and the  background of corporate officers,
  •  8-K shows significant changes in sales, new management, lawsuit,a court judgment or fine. Diana once told me, “if the PR person says something is the most significant thing the company has done in years, ask if it has filed an 8-K. Then you’ll know whether it is significant.”
  • Pre-14-A previews shareholder votes on upcoming issues, sometimes including  executive compensation.
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Jul 20

Search for Grants to Local Arts Groups

The symphony in the city where I live went bankrupt last year.  The tough economy has meant many arts groups are scrambling for money.  Ever wonder what types of government grants the arts groups in your area are getting?

Here’s one way to check for federal money.

The National Endowment for the Arts regularly gives out grants.  Here’s a quick tip for how to search certain key words, only on one website. It works with Google, Yahoo! and Bing.  Here’s the formula:

       keyword(s) site:web-address-minus-www

Here’s an example:

      Syracuse 2012 site:nea.gov/grants

How did I know what address to put in? I could have just put nea.gov but when I went there I found the grants section so I used that address instead. By putting in the “2012” I limited it to the current year.  Here is what came up:

When I clicked on the first link I found a grant to the local theater, which did not surprise me. But the second result told of a grant that I didn’t know about —  for a photography residency  to a small arts operation:

Might be a story there.  See what you find for your city or region.

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Jul 17

Use A Directory to Find Farmers’ Markets

Where I live the produce is just coming in to the farmers’ markets — the blueberries and peaches have appeared and we’re all looking forward to sweet corn with butter dripping down our chins.  Some of you in warmer areas have been feasting on fresh produce for several weeks, I suppose.

Here’s a link to find farmers’ markets in your area. It’s a list compiled by the US Department of Agriculture.  You can search by zip code and designate a 5, 20, even a 200 mile radius in which to search. Check it out.

And comment below on what websites you use regularly to aid in your reporting so I can pass them on to others to help them work quicker, better and smarter!

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Jul 12

Learn Google for Faster, Better Searches

I just did a session with graduate students on researching on the Net.  Every time I do one of these I ask people’s favorite search engine.  Usually about 85-90% say “Google.”  This time I got 100% for Google. That’s a first.

But when I ask “why” — they really don’t know that it is better.  “It’s convenient.” “I always used it, I guess.”  So since you probably use it as your default, why not learn a little more about it. Then you can be a more effective searcher.

Here is what I got when I searched for “Everson Museum”, which is the art museum in the city where I work. And of course I did it as a phrase search in quotes:

Notice that a map comes up at the right.

Did you know if you mouse over any entry in the list of results that an arrow appears. Click the arrow and  you’ll get a  screen shot of the website, like below. See the circled arrow in red?

That’s a quicker way to peruse the results quickly, especially when you are not sure which is the best of all the results.  And research shows most people only click on the first three!

Above that screen shot, you’ll see the words “cached” and “similar.” Clicking on “cached” gives you the last picture of the website captured by Google. This helps if a site is down or out of service. Or you want to see what used to be there (especially if something has changed or someone has pulled off copy!)  Click on “Similar” and you’ll find websites similar to that one, which can be helpful for further research.

Spend 15 minutes reading this Google Inside Search help guide which explains what you see on the screen of results. Or read the “Tricks and Tips” page.   I bet you’ll learn something that will make you a better searcher.

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Jul 09

Best Help for Media Law Questions

The next time you need a legal primer or have a question about your legal rights — access to private property, juvenile justice or taping phone calls –be sure to check out the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

This non-profit has been helping journalists for more than 40 years and runs a 24-hour hotline. It’s also the group that represents  journalists’ view on legislation before Congress and writes briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court on media law cases.

If you go there and skim the material, you’ll find it’s like going back to your college media law course!  To get you started, here are five sections of the site I recommend:

Feel free to leave a comment about other online resources that you couldn’t live without.

 

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Jul 05

Top Three Tips for Searching Online

A student asked me the other day, “how do you write searches because I don’t always get what I want.”   Here are my top three tips to speed your searching and give you more effective answers:

1. Put phrases in quotes.  The search engines all put an “and” in between words so if you type:

Syria massacre

the search engine will return every page with Syria and every page with massacre. But if you type:

Syria massacre

then you will only get pages that have those two exact words next to each other. Using phrase searching will return fewer and higher quality returns.

2. Use the minus sign to eliminate words you don’t want. If you do a search and get a lot of bogus hits, eliminate that word but putting a minus sign before it.  For example, if I want to read about the Mirror Awards this year, I would use this search:

“Mirror Awards” -2011 -2010 -2009

It will give me every page that has the two words together Mirror Awards but not any page that has 2011, 2010, 2009 on it, so likely only those that have 2012, or those with earlier dates, but they’ll be lower on the page, likely.

3. When you know you just want to search one site, use the formula for a keyword search at one domain.  The formula is:

keyword site:domain-name

For example, if I wanted to search for the Mirror Awards, given annually by the Newhouse School (my employer) for  the best media writing, then I would put:

  “Mirror Awards” site:newhouse.syr.edu

Note that you don’t put the www in your domain.

Try out these tips and comment on how they work, or leave another search tip.

 

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Jun 27

Find Public Records for Free

Before you pay for public records online, be sure to check out the option that some of what you want may be available for free. I  wish that all states put records on free in an easy-to-find way, but that’s not true yet.

Attorneys General and other state offices do have records online so check some of the state agencies. Licensing records are common.  In some counties you can get the court schedule electronically.  It really varies by state.

The best master list I’ve seen is developed by BRB Publications. It gives an alphabetical state list and when you click in on the state you can see what is available.

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