Jonathan Dube at Cyberjournalist.net has come up with his list of Top online media stories of 2005, based on the most popular reports at his must-read site.
Not surprisingly, four of the top 10 are related to online media’s role in covering the tsunami and Hurricane Katrina. Jonathan writes that what may be surprising is the number one story on the last: New sites tap into Google Maps to create new ways of conveying information. When you combine that with two others on the list — RSS goes mainstream and podcasting takes off — it becomes less surprising, I think.
All three of those stories, as well as some of the ways online media was used to cover the year’s major disasters, represent the rush to explore internet technologies to create new ways of doing journalism. We’ve passed the point of newspapers (well, most newspapers) are kicking the tires of the internet. Now, adventurous journalists, some with a finely-developed hacker mentality, others with finely-honed storytelling skills, are digging away around under the hood.
Stories that report on how those folks are tricking out online media are likely to continue to come often in 2006 and likely to be among Jonathan’s annual top 10 lists for the foreseeable future.
TAGS: JOURNALISM, ONLINE MEDIA, GOOGLE MAPS, STORYTELLING
