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| Here's
two excellent tip sheets on using the Internet in daily
news coverage. The first one is by a television producer:
the second by a print reporter. Both have good ideas and
both use the web effectively to bolster their local
reporting.
Using
the Internet in Daily News
- Hamilton
Masters
- Senior
Producer & Webmaster, KHOU-TV
- 713)
284-8746
- hmasters@ns.khou.com
For
the Investigative Reporters & Editors National
Conference 1997
You
know the Internet is a great resource for big stories. It
can be invaluable when a plane goes down in your city. But
are you using it for daily stories? Information you find
online can enhance the small stories as well as the big
ones. You can add context and depth to your stories that
will distinguish you from the competition.
Use
the Net to Get Information
Here
are a few examples of stories we've done recently at KHOU-TV
that have been enhanced by using the net.
When
there was an outbreak of cyclospora infections in Houston,
we found background information on the last outbreak and
analysis on the Centers for Disease Control web site.
The
Heaven's Gate suicides in San Diego had a big Houston
connection. The Internet quickly became part of the story
and a major source of information for us. We looked at all
the web sites involved, searched the news groups for
postings that gave us more web addresses to check, and
found references to old articles that we could look up at
the library.
When
a hurricane hit islands in the Caribbean, most telephones
were knocked out. But a scientist with a laptop computer
was able to post messages in a news group about the storm
and we were able to contact him by e-mail, We were able to
arrange a phone call that gave us a presence on the scene
of the storm.
The
Kobe earthquake in Japan also was reported in the news
groups moments after it happened. We were able to contact
a Houstonian - there are expatriate Texans everywhere --
and add local flavor to our story. (There have been a few
times when this ability to communicate on the Internet has
generated a sidebar story, We were able to relay messages
from family members who did not have e-mail access. That
became a nice little story.)
We
use the NASA web sites for background information before
every shuttle launch. The agency posts biographies of each
astronaut plus descriptions of the payload and any
experiments to be conducted on the flight. This material
is used to put briefing notes together for producers and
reporters who may cover the flight but are not usually
assigned to do space stories.
During
shuttle flights NASA updates the television schedule and
posts the information, We check it several times a day to
make sure we don't miss a feed.
When
a volcano outside Mexico became active, we were able to
background the %t(ITY online. We were able to download
many documents on the mountain from Mexico City's
universities, some in English and some in Spanish. We were
able to look at logs of past eruptions and put the story
in perspective.
Don't
Forget E-mail
E-mail
can be used to get information for stories. A lot of
companies and organizations are already sending you e-mail
news releases that end up in the trash. Turn the tables on
them. Use e-mail to locate sources, confirm appointments,
even conduct interviews.
Use
the Net in New Ways
Be
open to using the net in new ways. When tornadoes hit
Texas in May, we had plenty of pictures of the Jarrell
storm because a television crew was there. We did not have
a crew in Polk County when a tornado hit, but we did have
a viewer with a digital camera. He took a picture of the
tornado touching down and sent it to us attached to an
e-mail message. We were able to use the picture on air and
on our web site.
We
have been able to send other images and documents through
e-mail. Distance is no consideration. We have conducted
much of the business involved in sending a crew to Hong
Kong for the changeover through the net. We've used e-mail
instead of faxes to send information back and forth and
then faxed completed documents.
Learn
to be a Net Filter
Like
any tool, there are hazards to using the Internet. Anybody
can put information on a computer. Sometimes it looks like
everybody has, and there's a gullible reporter ready to
put it on the air or in the paper. Follow a few simple
guidelines:
Know
your source. Is this site a government site or posted by a
fringe group? Is the source reliable?
Confirm
the information. How many stories to you run with just one
source for the information? Treat anything you find on
line with the same rare you would any other source.
Attribute
the information- Tell your viewer or reader where you got
it
Don't
Do a Salinger
There
are traps out there, waiting to ensnare a journalist using
the Internet. (You remember the stories blaming the TWA
crash on a Navy missile. They were born on the Internet
and live there still.)
You
should be familiar with the basic structure of the
internet. That can prevent you from making simple and
embarrassing errors. The viewer or reader will not trust
you on the big complicated issues if you can't get the
simple things right.
A
good looking web site is no guarantee of accuracy. The
source of the information is more important to you than
the presentation- With modern tools, it is easy to put
together a nice looking site.
Know
the urban legends of the net. Then you will not be tempted
to write stories about the department store's cookie
recipe, the human organ thieves frequenting Houston
hotels, or the Good Times virus.
Sometimes
You've Got to Cover the Net
The
net can also be used to find stories. Every major city has
usenet news groups that contain discussions of everything
from politics to where to get your car fixed.
Regular
reading of the groups can give you ideas for stories that
have, nothing to do with the Internet. News group
complaints about traffic tickets in a specific area can
tip you off to new enforcement efforts by police. Postings
about the Russian space program in a group devoted to
space can spark stories about the financial health of the
program.
There
can be Internet-related stories too. When topless club
owners got angry at a now city ordinance restricting their
operations, they complained in the Houston.general news
group. Because the new ordinance required entertainers to
post -- and wear -- licenses listing their real names and
addresses, the operators put together a web site featuring
the phone numbers and addresses of each member of the city
council, with maps. That became a story.
Don't
be afraid to use the net to improve your daily product- It
may be a new medium of expression, but it is also an
important tool for journalists. |
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RETRIEVING
INTERNET DATA
- ERNIE
SLOAN
- Using
the Internet in daily beat reporting
- Everyday
tools
Online
maps and door-to-door directions
There
are lots of mapping sites on the Net, but the Census
Bureau's mapper has the most options for tracking or
mapping info. It is located at http://www.census.gov/cgi-bin/gazetteer.
Phone
number on the Internet
Links
to a number of white pages listings, including Switchboard
and Yahoo phone, can be found at http://www.ameri.com/noton.htm.
Need
to look up someone abroad? Try http://www.infobel.be/infobelworld.html.
Excellent
link to white page, yellow page and fax phone directories
around the world.
I
once got a deadline interview with a critical source via
email - he was on a trip to Indonesia and happened to
check his AOL account. I found out his email address
through an online search. You can do the same by going to http://www.ameri.com/findon.htm.
Links to a wide range of email search engines.
Commercial
Search Services
When
the free Internet locators work, they are terrific. Quick,
easy access to a phone number. However, the percentage of
hits typically is low. Why? Consider that in Southern
California 60 percent of the residents have
unlisted/unpublished numbers, so the online services will
not list them. If you spend more than a day searching
through voter registrations, DMV, etc., with no
luck
you might want to consider using the alternative,
Commercial services. For $20 you can run a skip trace and
find people you won't locate any other way.
Some
selected services:
- INFORMATION
AMERICA
- http://www.infoam.com/zpsframe.htm
-
- CSRA
ONLINE
- http://kadima.com/
Includes
an Internet database of all active Military Personnel
stationed in the United States. All branches of service
are included except for the Coast Guard.
- CDBINFOTEK
- http://www.cdb.com
- Claims
to be largest online source of public records, with
1,600 data bases, and 3 billion records.
-
- DATAQUEST
- http://www.nmia.com/-search/dataques.html
Find
their neighbors
The
FOUR11 site (www.four11.com)is
well known for finding a person's emailaddress. What is
less obvious is that it is one of the few sites where you
can specify a street address in looking for phone numbers.
By using the simple trick of inserting a wildcard asterisk
for the last name, you can pull up everyone listed in the
white pages on a given street.
A
word of caution: FOUR11 sometimes abbreviates Court as Ct,
or even the city name, If you don't figure out that
abbreviation, such as Huntington Bch, you will get no
hits. Run a known address first if you are coming up empty
to check for abbreviations.
Reverse
phone directory
Occasionally
you have a phone number, but no name attached. Several
Internet services used to provide reverse lookups, but now
the only major service left is at Database America. Go to http://www.databaseamerica.com
and follow the directions.
Is
it real, or just a mail drop?
Before
you drive out to a location do yourself a favor and check-
to see if it really is just a Kinko's or Mailboxes R Us.
All mail drops have a distinctive ZIP+4 code. By plugging
in the addresses at the U.S. Postal Service Web site you
can save yourself a lot of wasted time. (This was a major
help when the Register was tracking members of the
Heaven's Gate cult, who commonly used drops for their
addresses.) The Web site is at http://www.usps.gov/ncsc/
Are
they alive?
Though
not as up to date as the commercial online services, the
Ancestry Web site does offer Social Security death
records. If you can't find a person, check here: http://ssdi2.ancestry.com/ssdi/main.htm.
Who's
behind that Web site?
Late
on a Thursday evening I had discovered the Heaven's Gate
Web site and wondered who was behind it, was it legitimate
or just a fabrication? You can use the Web interface to
Internic, which registers domains, to get some answers.
You can look up a site on the Web at http://rs.internic.net/cgi-bin/whois.
This
site is also very useful for finding clients of a
particular Internet provider. Let's say you want to find
someone who uses EARTHLINK.NET. (Maybe their email service
went down and you want customer reaction.) At the WHOIS
prompt type @EARTHLINK.NET and you will get a list of
registered users.
It
will abort the search after 256 hits, so no, you cannot
use this to get the entire list of all AOL or CompuServe
subscribers.
For
IP addresses in Asia or the Pacific go to APNIC, at http://whois.apnic.net.
Wbat's
the chatter online?
Want
to know who's talking about what in Usenet? One easy way
is to access thevarious groups and historical postings
through Deja News. Once you register, you can even join in
the Usenet postings.
The
"Power Search" feature is most useful. You can
access it at
http://www.dejanews.com/forms/dnq.html.
Track
a doctor's license and record
The
online DocFinder service now provides online access to
records of 300,000 of the nation's 750,000 medical
doctors. States now covered: Arizona, California, Iowa,
Massachusetts Physician Profiles, North Carolina and
Texas. Point your browser to http://www.docboard.org.
Quick
story ideas
Track
your area's air pollution
Each
year in December the EPA releases its annual survey of the
nation's air, listing the number of days a metro area
violated federal clean-air standards. The report offers a
good opportunity to localize the info for your area, going
back 10 years. You can access it at: http://www.epa.gov/oar/aqtrnd95.
It includes tables with extensive data, charting the level
of six major pollutants.
TIP:
By contacting the EPA tabs in the Research Triangle in
North Carolina you can get readings from each sensor in
your county. That will let you do an in-depth analysis of
the air your readers are breathing. The results will
surprise you - and them.
Mine
the Federal Register
Among
other nuggets, the names, schools, majors, etc., of
college students who failed to repay loans under the HEAL
program are run in the Register. You can get an electronic
copy of the Register - and such lists - at http://www.gpo.ucop.edu/search/fedfld.html.
Give
readers the big picture on taxes
In
April, the Register ran a two-day series explaining to
readers where their tax dollars go, how many dollars come
back into the area, and how stiffly the IRS prosecutes
those who fail to pay their fair share.
The
Consolidated Federal Funds reports, which detail federal
spending, arc available at: http://www.census.gov/govs/www/effr95.html
The amount
of taxes collected in your area are available from the Tax
Foundation in D.C. The foundation posts only general info,
by state, etc., at their Web site: http://www.taxfoundation.org.
Contact them to get detailed info for your county, city,
etc.
Each
year during tax season the TRAC folks at Syracuse
University release a detailed analysis of the national
system: what percentage of returns are audited in a given
federal district, what tax violations are prosecuted
where, etc. This data, and much more, is available at http://trac.syr.edu/.
Story
ideas via email
Call
the Census Bureau at 301-457-3030 or email them at pio@Census.gov
to get their weekly list of upcoming data releases. The
weekly email is a good source of story ideas, and gives
you time to localize the results of a major study.
Medical
and science writers can stay up on some of the latest
developments in these fast-moving fields by joining
SciWire. The twice-weekly email feed covers a wide range
of journals, universities and organizations.
You
may subscribe or unsubscribe to SciWire by sending a
message to rjohnson@access.digex.net. Mention SciWire in
your message. You can also scan the online site at http://www.ari.net/newswise/menu-sm.htm.
Want
to track D.C. doings on a subject, such as education or
tobacco, but don't want to get barraged with a ton of
press releases? Capitol Newswire, similar to PR Newswire
or Business Wire, focuses on the Washington, D.C.
governmental, political and economic scene.
Go
to http://www.global-village@com/capitolnewswire/
to customize the feeds you get on Washington news
releases. |
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