Thomas Dalton wrote: Thought: while it's topical. According to p. 43 of today's Independent, Jason Cowley who is the new editor of the New Statesman is giving the Staggers a facelift. This cluster of issues (free content activism, citizen journalism, who controls news media) ought to be of interest to them, but last time I bought it the magazine had a rather fogeyish and literary take on culture. Would someone like to contact the editor to see if he'd like an opinion piece on it all? As for press releases: they're usually in the form of a story that is half-written, to attract the attention of hacks who can assess how hard it would be to make a complete story out of the bits. Charles

On Mon, 2009-11-30 at 15:41 +0000, George D. Watson wrote: Anything that can encourage more contributors and readers is good. Really a need to move beyond "Wikinews: Popular in Cuba" (according to Alexa). There are Twitter, Facebook, Identi.ca, and RSS feeds of published content available. [1] [1] http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews:Social_networking -- Brian McNeil <brian.mcneil(a)wikinewsie.org> http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil Content of this message in no way represents the opinions or official position of the Wikimedia Foundation or any of its projects.

On Mon, 2009-11-30 at 16:31 +0000, Michael Peel wrote: [CC'd wikinews-l, people there please see WMUK mailing list for prior discussion - papers behind paywalls is the topic with Mr Murdoch one of those most desperate to do this.] Uhm.... Points I'd cover/emphasise. * Slight element of conflict Wikipedia/Wikinews where people seek to do extensive WP coverage of recent events (turning recently-deceased's BIO into hagiography). * [[WN:NPOV]] still applies. * Require credible sources, or well-documented Original Research. * WN a project in the shadow of WP for the time being. * Opportunity for aspiring journos to learn wiki tech. * Operates as a "wannabe" wire service and has unashamedly copied from BBC News website (eg {{haveyoursay}}). If a release does go out, I promise to take the "be nice" pills for a couple of extra weeks. ;-) -- Brian McNeil <brian.mcneil(a)wikinewsie.org> http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil Content of this message in no way represents the opinions or official position of the Wikimedia Foundation or any of its projects.

2009/11/30 Michael Peel <email(a)mikepeel.net>et>: Ok, here's a first draft: http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Press_releases/Free_online_news I've done it as a statement from you and have tried to keep it short and sweet. I think that is the best approach. I've put it on the wiki since it could really do with someone editing it to make it read better - I expect it could be made shorter still if it wasn't so clumsily worded!

I wrote: Sort of like this: 1 December 2009, UK -Michael Peel, Chairman of Wikimedia UK, today responded to recent discussions about free online news: "Wikimedia UK is very concerned about the recent announcements by online news suppliers that they intend to charge people to access their websites." "Companies need to make money, but making it more difficult for people to read news is not the way to do it. There is an alternative news website that will always be completely free for anyone to use for any purpose, Wikinews at http://www.wikinews.org." "Wikinews is a sister project to the Wikipedia encyclopedia site, where news articles are written collaboratively by anyone who wants to help out, or to initiate articles about any news story. Wikipedia has shown that volunteers can produce quality work, and Wikinews has the potential to fill the gap if commercial news sites disappear behind paywalls." Charles

On Mon, 2009-11-30 at 20:16 +0000, Thomas Dalton wrote: Because MSM don't read further than that? The rest is assumed to be "We are X", "We're promoting Y", "We have association Z with Y" stuff. -- Brian McNeil <brian.mcneil(a)wikinewsie.org> http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil Content of this message in no way represents the opinions or official position of the Wikimedia Foundation or any of its projects.

Thomas Dalton wrote: OK, my version is now on http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Press_releases/Free_online_news . Just wanted to illustrate what I meant about style. Charles

Thomas Dalton wrote: I've done press releases before, and got some coverage. I don't know of a rulebook: I picked up a few things from someone who had done them himself. I don't regard them as hard to do, if you do have a "story". There's a kind of template, and if you can fit your message into it, that's the easy part. Then you have to know where to send them (how is easier, now fax machines have gone out). Charles

David Gerard wrote: Remember that Gordon Brown taught Tony Blair how to do a press release. And how much thanks he got. In other words (and I believe this to be entirely true) if you want to "get the word out" through the media, you have to play the game their way. Writing a competent press release is just a way of showing you know what they want, and they certainly know what you want in terms of getting into the papers. (WP is immensely fortunate that it has grown by word-of-mouth, not hype.) But for this kind of thing you go along with the game: don't be lengthy, and don't be boring, and if they want corporate identity stuff you rely on them to ask. It's just about getting them to contact you. Charles

On 30 Nov 2009, at 18:17, Thomas Dalton wrote: Steve Virgin's just rewritten this - any comments on the latest version? The current plan is to send it out tomorrow morning. Thanks, Mike

2009/12/2 Michael Peel <email(a)mikepeel.net>et>: I like most of that rewrite - talking about how social media is already playing a big role in telling the news is a really good idea. I've made a few changes, though: I've changed it back to being a statement (rather than a kind of op-ed) since that how I've seen other organisations do these kind of press releases. I've been told that press releases should be ready to just be put straight into a newspaper (although that isn't likely to happen with this one - it will get incorporated into a larger story, but the style should be the same) and no-one would publish an article about what we think, they would publish one about us saying what we think. I've also rearranged the first paragraph so it isn't such a run-on sentence (I've been trying to cut back on my use of commas!). Steve, what do you think? I have essentially no experience of writing press releases, so I may have it all wrong!

Brian McNeil wrote: I have slain some verbiage and re-ordered. You can always revert me. Charles

The BBC is running an article about Google's latest move in this story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8389896.stm If we get this release sent out soon then we might be able to get that article updated to mention us.

2009/12/2 Charles Matthews <charles.r.matthews(a)ntlworld.com>om>: HTML emails are the spawn of Satan.

2009/12/2 Michael Peel <email(a)mikepeel.net>et>: Now would be better... The Google story is doing the rounds now, it might be finished by tomorrow.